Ability Beyond Disability:  Our service agency, aka ABD and formerly known as Datahr Rehabilitation Institute, headquartered in Bethel, Connecticut, held something along the lines of a warm and welcoming cabinet meeting. The heads of the various units met, not in the oval office, but a conference room with a great big table.  I sat at one end of the table so I could see everyone.

Nine of Us (nope not that nine): All together there were nine of us: The Mom; The Behaviorist who analyzes the client need and trains staff to meet them; The Services Director who is high level administrator and the angel who has pulled all these pieces together; The Services Manager, whose job is to assign staff and coordinate services and resources; The Services Manager for the Individual Day planning (this refers to day programming on an individual basis); The Primary Care Nurse Manager who collects all the medical data and coordinates with staff; The Coordinator for Programing (group programming); Our Blessed Case Manager; The Information and Referral Coordinator aka the saint who will coordinate the funding and bureaucratic paperwork and criteria if  we want her to: Duh, Yes!

The Test: Hopefully there isn’t a quiz with this meeting. I supplied my materials and they each explained their component of the total team that will plan and produce residential, vocational, and social programming for our daughter. A profile of our daughter’s strengths and weaknesses was lightly reviewed but the reams of material and their meeting with her upon her return from school in June, will fill in the gaps.

Focus: What clearly is underscored is her intelligence, quick wittedness; her social strengths and safety issues. Big Time!

The Other Mother: As I was packing up, the other mother came in to present her daughter to the same team of professionals. We signaled each other warmly, tossed out a few updates on the apartment hunt, and I moved on.

Moving On: I left exhausted. But you know what? I am an old hand at this stuff. And so is the other mother. Moving on, and happy to do so.

Thanks ABD for a great start.

©Jill Edelman, M.S.W, L.C.S.W. 2011