One of the more frightening aspects for me of having a child with significant disabilities has been the hiring of personal care aides. I’m so very grateful that Ashley has aides, but finding and retaining really good people is daunting, to say the least.
Personal care aides assist a person with a disability with many things, even very personal and intimate everyday tasks like bathing and toileting. I still am very uncomfortable with a new hire seeing my teenage daughter naked and helping her with those tasks.
Ashley and I have been very blessed to find Amy, the aide that has been with Ashley the longest, and who is more a part of our family than an aide. But there is still a need for backup support, and that’s where my discomfort surfaces. So I did some Google searches on finding, managing and retaining quality personal care aides, and I found a great resource document. It is a publication of the Research and Training Center on Independent Living, and it is titled, “A Step-by-Step Guide to Training and Managing Personal Assistants: Consumer Guide .”
There are chapters on hiring and conducting background checks, supervision and management, performance checks, record keeping and paying an assistant, and avoiding ripoff by assistants. There is even a chapter titled, “The Intimate Side of Life.”
It really is a great resource – very practical and easy to understand. I encourage anyone who, like me, is a little uncomfortable with the transition to personal care services to take a look at it.
Deborah can be found writing here at 5MFSN every Wednesday, and can also be found at Pipecleaner Dreams.
Oh I totally understand your concern. We just hired a new worker for Joe. However , luckily we knew her through other programs that Joey was in and even though she’s never worked one on one with him before…we felt quite comfortable. However regarding his toileting and bathing , I am still there helping until I feel 100 percent comfortable Not that she would hurt him…but it’s personally and he is also very challenging too.
I am so happy you left that link for the book, it’s something I definitely would need as he gets older. We do not have Personal support workers but one on one behavioural workers who also do self help skills. I am not sure how to get a PSW at this point in his life…maybe as he gets older.
I have tonne of questions ….but have been putting them off…you know avoidance. Anyhow ..thanks for this post.
BTW..Ashley is so pretty.
Oh getting a good assitant is hard. It is such a learning process for me. I did not set the best boundaries to start. And we hired quickly out of desparation and need.
It is so hard to have someone in your house all the time, taking care of your child, especially when you never imagined you would have to do that.
Although we are transitioning from an attendant to a nurse now. The nurse will be a much better help.
I am totally checking out that resource.
thank you so much for this. Excellent resource