Letter template for you to use - Family Member
To Whom it May Concern,
Re: The importance of a Disability Support Worker
We have always been a Nation that cares for one another, and more importantly, cares for the people in our communities who need it the most. Those people may include the sick, the elderly and in other cases, those who are born with or have disabilities imposed on them due to medical issues or perhaps those who have been in accidents that have left them dependent on the State for care.
In our community, we have a healthy representation of “kids” that are dependent on their families, or AISH to be able to fully participate in life. Within this structure, they often have the privilege of having the opportunity to participate in society with the help of Disability Support Workers. The role a Disability Support Worker provides goes beyond just the individual they support, and in fact is someone who becomes an extension of the family, allowing parents, siblings, and grandparents to have respite and support from what can be a hectic or overwhelming circumstance, depending on the disability their child, sibling or grandchild has. This is an essential service in keeping families and our communities healthy.
In the instances that I have been involved in, the Disability Support Worker becomes a trusted extension of the family, providing care, support and decision making to these individuals, giving them an unparallel quality of life that otherwise, they wouldn’t have the chance to experience. The opportunities that a Disability Support Worker can provide to an individual and their families is a beautiful thing; imagine your baby being born with a disability, unable to speak, or perhaps unable to walk. Consider your child growing up without a physical defect, but perhaps bearing the burden of a mental defect that prevents them from being able to see, articulate their needs. This would be a life altering experience for you as a parent, your entire life would need to change to accommodate your child. It must be a very overwhelming thing to experience. Would you love your child less? No, you likely wouldn’t, but you’d certainly recognize the limitations that this may put on your life – and not just for the short term – for the long term. This could mean you may not be able to travel, or perhaps you may have to quit your job to care for your child. There are so many things to take into consideration when you have someone with special needs in your care.
The role of the Disability Support Worker is to ease that burden on the family; to provide opportunities for families to flourish, reduce stress and enable disabled individuals to have dignity in their lives. Not only do they provide care and oversight, but in some cases, they provide lifelong support that helps disabled people in the community with better decision making, health and wellness support and in a lot of cases, general love and companionship. They do all of this on top of managing their own lives and raising their own families. What a beautiful career choice! To provide amazing, life-giving opportunities to people who otherwise simply wouldn’t “fit” into society!
My wife is a personal trainer, and within her clients, she’s lucky enough to train a Special Olympian. It wasn’t the athlete that reached out to my wife for health and wellness support, it was her Disability Support Worker who made the call to arrange the personal training services to help this young lady make better lifestyle decisions to enhance her presence in the pool as a swimmer. When they did the original intake process, it was her Disability Support Worker that brought the 18-year-old athlete to our home for the consultation and to negotiate price and availability.
My wife, being a generous and compassionate person, recognized that the athlete was on AISH and offered her a discounted rate for her hourly training, which was received with gratitude. Her Disability Support Worker attended the intake session with her and helped the athlete understand the forms to sign up for services and helped her highlight any specific limitations and concerns she may have had. The level of independence that was provided from the athlete’s parents to be able to make these decisions and do this “on her own”, was only made possible by the loving guidance of her Disability Support Worker.
When the athlete went home after the consult, the Disability Support Worker and the athlete explained the opportunity to the athlete’s family. The athlete’s mother pointed out that she was receiving benefits that would enable her to pay a more reasonable price and insisted that my wife charge as such. Additionally, her Disability Support Worker would also attend the sessions – she felt as though she was taking advantage of my wife and expressed her desire to pay my wife for her time. Recognizing the wage gap that the Disability Support Worker had, my wife made the decision to provide her with the discount instead (all while still giving the athlete a rate-break), because she felt it was important to the athlete’s success and the Disability Support Worker’s dignity in the situation to provide her with the option to pay without breaking the bank.
This is a beautiful example of the community coming together to care for our vulnerable population, and at the same time, is a sad example of why Disability Support Workers deserve to have a proper living wage. No one should be put into a position where they’re essentially parenting someone for 10-15 hours a day and not being rewarded with less than a living wage. There are so many Disability Support Workers who live and breathe for their clients, ensuring these individuals have a good quality of life, make good decisions, stay out of trouble, and therefore don’t need to lean into other services such as mental health, hospitals or in some cases, the judicial system. These people shouldn’t have to scrape by or work two jobs to be able to afford to live when they’re doing such wonderful work and such a duty to our society.
A society is only as strong as it’s weakest links – there’s no reason for some of the best people to feel like the weakest links when in fact, they’re the ones who are keeping our vulnerable population healthy and safe.
It’s with these sentiments that I look to our government to make better decisions in supporting quality public services; there is so much opportunity to close the wage gap and create better opportunities for Disability Support Workers to lean into society even deeper with recognition beyond the meager wages they currently own.
Yours truly,
Kait Dinunzio