Author Archives: dak1gou1

Mixed Feelings and Parking Tickets

Posted on March 20, 2014 | 3 comments
Mixed feelings and parking tickets
 
This time visiting headway, I felt much more comfortable and less anxious for my visit. I knew what to expect out of my which proved to be very comforting. Upon entering, I was greeted by the coordinator and another volunteer who was “assigned” to a specific patient as a care provider. My stay started with a causal talk around the pool table, with a few members playing pool. By the end of the pool session, there were 5 volunteers, one coordinator and approximatly six or seven members. The coordinator pointed out the ratio of voulinteers to members seemed excessive but they exclaimed,
“oh well, it makes my job easier”.
Having the mindset of a job made “easier”, due to a decreased load of responsibilities in the realm of social work seem like a backwards way of thinking. I agree that there was an excessive amount of volunteers on this specific day, but the comment seemed to rub me the wrong way. Later during my stay, one of the members made a comment about not having any volunteers to take her to the gym on that specific day. This got me thinking, maybe there was a more productive way to make the best of our time as volunteers. Leaving that day, I came to the conclusion that our time at headway was valuable to us as well as the members, but  redirecting our volunteer energies to more focused settings task based settings may be more helpful in the future.
I had another strange interaction with the coordinator that day which involved him telling the members the rocks would be put into the “garden”. I am not actually sure if this garden exists, but as the coordinator and myself were washing the rocks prepping them for painting they made a comment stating that I was being too meticulous with my rock cleaning. They exclaimed “It doesn’t fucking matter, the rocks aren’t actually going into a garden”. This comment made me feel uncomfortable because I felt as if the coordinator was being a bit “two faced”. In the coordinators defense, they were great while actually interacting with the members. I left headway and returned to my car with a nice $30 parking ticket… Shit.

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Yoga Party

Posted on February 24, 2014 | 2 comments

I am going to start by saying that I had some pre-conceived ideas of how I thought someone with TBI would act, many of which did not prove to be true. This seminar put me in this state of mind where I pictured every individual with TBI in a non-communicative and vegetative state. Throught the class we talked about mild and moderate TBI, which I know are less severe, nonetheless I was stuck on this idea that it would be tough to interact and communicate with the members.

I was apprehensive about my visit, but this tension quickly melted after the members and volunteers warmly introduced me to their space. During the first 30 minutes of my stay, there was only one member at the center. This allowed me a unique opportunity to simply chat with the member in the kitchen while enjoying a cup of coffee. The member was extremely positive, and full of practical advice. I had some an idea in my head that I would be the leader, role model and helper, but this was far from the truth. Member X, ending up being the role model, giving me advice on topics ranging from traveling, to post-graduate choices. This woman let me into her life, showing me pictures of her Children and grandchildren just as any proud grandmother would.

I chose to participate in the Yoga class due to my interest in physiotherapy and exercise in general. It turns out yoga is not the “in” thin to do at headway. It ended up being just one member and myself being lead by an adaptive yoga teacher. The activity itself was very calming; all of the stretches were done in a chair, with a focus on ridding your body of stress while concentrating on deep breathing. During my research for my presentation it became evident that there is lack of exercise and activity opportunities for TBI survivors, so it was awesome to be able to experience and benefit from one of the existing programs. I would advise everybody against the yoga sessions for the simple fact that yoga is entirely about “yourself”, which gives you little opportunity to interact with the members. Nonetheless, Adaptive yoga was a fun and positive learning experience.

I had the opportunity to chat with other members following the yoga session, during this time it became evident that headway was truly a “hangout”. The differences in presentation of disability became evident to me during my remaining time, but regardless of differences in impairment, everybody was there for the Headway community. It was an awesome opportunity to be welcomed into such a unique space, and I cant wait to go back and “hangout”.

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