ambitions

I know I don't really need to decide now (or ever, I can bounce around) but I think a lot about job stuff after college and what kind of things I want to do.

I think something I've been realizing is that I may not be equipped to be support staff for adults who have ID/ASD. This occurred to me during the third session of camp when my brain stopped dead after micromanaging three people's showers in a row. I am a person who is mentally able to shower, but it's only been in the past few years that I've been able to do it well, without becoming spaced or having to use timers and write directions on myself. Even though I can do it now, I guess the foundations are still shaky enough that I have a limit, and don't have enough of that type of function to spare on other people who have similar problems. I'm just not able to do that kind of job long-term, and that makes me angry and sad.

An obvious idea would be to work in a school because there would be a fixed schedule and I could help people in academic areas where I'm not impaired. But I guess what bothers me about that is I feel like so many (non-disabled) people get excited about "special needs" kids because they think they can just waltz in and make the kids not be disabled anymore, especially in the case of autism. Or because they think that kids with disabilities are really cute and interesting--while being creeped out by disability in adults. These kinds of attitudes have always made me want to work with adults and not kids or teenagers because I feel like adults with developmental disabilities are just erased and devalued and the people they end up having as staff are not serious about what they do.

At the same time, the fact that most people who work in special ed are all Nondisabled Person's Burden about it isn't really a good reason not to work in special ed. And my decision to work with adults or kids doesn't affect the stigma against adults so "I have to work with adults" is kind of a dumb principle to have.

I'd really like to end up working with people who have "multiple disabilities," which I think is a really weird term. Last spring I got to spend some time in a class of preteens and teenagers some of whom had that label, and I felt like there wasn't enough of an organized attempt to engage them and develop communication. I mean, I'm not denying that a lot of people with the label probably really do have mind disabilities as well as physical ones, but I just think it's ridiculous to act like you can assess someone's intelligence who doesn't have a communication system. If I had the choice I would really want to do nothing but work on AAC with people all day, because it's so important and I think I'd be good at it, but I think that's sort of a big deal job that you have to go to grad school for and make your own schedule which doesn't seem workable for me.

Obviously I write a lot about being a Disabled Staff Person but it's usually more about identity and about having movement and communication things in common with clients/students that the other staff don't have, and how that is a weird experience. But the other part is that sometimes I wonder if I just am too disabled to be much good to other disabled people. When the person I'm supposed to be supporting doesn't need much more help than I need, or needs kinds of help I wish I could get, it ends up being sort of disorienting and occasionally making me jealous since I'm "high-functioning" enough to be expected to direct myself in daily living when I sometimes barely can.

In Can the World Afford Autistic Spectrum Disorder?, Digby Tantum tries to say that people with ASD are more wise, or creative, or something, because we figure out pretty early on that there are some things we want that we will never be able to have. And sometimes I do manage to convince myself that it's some kind of spiritual gift, but, well, usually not.