It's been one year since I have started my job at the Re-spite home. I got a raise; yeah, now I'm almost making as much as I did at the bank. Most of you probably don't know what my job is. Usually I say that I would with people with developmental disabilities with their daily activities... and I wipe a lot of butts. But since it is my one-year anniversary, I shall go further in depth in my job description so you can better understand why I love my job so much. I work at a home that has two ladies that live there, and then other clients that only stay for a short time, like a couple of hours or for the weekend when their care-takers or family need a break. Their disabilities could be minor like Down's syndrome and they can do most stuff on their own, or they can be severely handicapped and unable to communicate or walk. I'll use fancy titles to make my job sound important:
-Culinary artist: I prepare dinner for about 6-18 people, depending on how many clients we have. Many of the clients have special diets, or need their food cut a certain way, or have their liquids at a certain consistency, so it is my job to make sure that all of those are correct so that no one chokes and dies, or has an allergic reaction and dies. Also, I help feed some of the clients. Once I accidently made a client I was feeding laugh, and I ended up being covered from waist up in chocolate pudding. I learned my lesson to not crack jokes at dinner.
-Personal trainer: In the summer, I'll swing with the younger clients, and play baseball or football with the boys. One of the boys is 6 yrs. old and his chin comes to about my knees; he's so cute and tiny. We'll play football with his brothers for hours. I'll let him tackle me, and if he has the football, I'll pick him up and carry him across the field. I also help one of the severely disabled ladies with her arm exercises. I put those Hulk gloves on her hands and let her take "jabs" at me. She moves extremely slooooow, so it doesn't hurt, and she gets the biggest kick out of it.
-Housekeeper: I do a lot of cleaning. Pretty much everything gets bleached everyday. I do the dishes, clean the kitchen, do the laundry, clean the bathrooms, sweep, mop, freakin' everything.
-Stylist: when the ladies that live at the home go out for the evening, I do their hair and make-up. Also, I'm kinda in charge of taking the ladies shopping. The ladies at work tend to buy them old-lady clothes, like kitty-christmas sweatshirts. But I get them cute clothes that look less "disabled" and that will get them attention from the boys at the dances. They love it.
-Day spa specialist: This is the best I could come up with for the dirty stuff. I help with a lot of showers and I change lots of Depends. One of my friends and I always joke around about how I have seen more "man parts" than any virgin should. I also have a lot of stories that I could share in this messy area, but I'll resist.
-Best friend: This is my favorite part. I'll watch Wheel of Fortune with the clients, go the movies, go shopping, go out for dinner, play games, do stupid stuff to make them laugh, rub their backs when they can't sleep or don't feel well, snuggle on the couch, go to dances, read them books at bedtime, give them kisses, anything to make them smile.
I love this job. The people I work with are great, but if I go into that this blog would be freakin' huge. I laugh all the time at my job. I do great impressions of all the clients. Even when things go wrong or things are really "messy", I still can't help but smile. If you ever get the chance, I highly recommend working with people with disabilities. It will definitely change how you view life.


Man, looking over my job description, I sound like I'm in housewife-training... I'm just lacking the marital "benefits"...