Occupational therapy- I'm in shock

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I just went to my first ever OT session. I thought I kinda sorta knew what OT therapists did because one of my doctors told me that you need to teach Aspies things like facial expression recognition and what to say in specific situations. I wasn't sure what to expect though cuz I don't personally know any adults that have gone through OT. I did have a 6 hour (OMG) neuropsych evaluation to find all my problems. And I had a shitloada problems, excuse my French.

Well Voc Rehab is sending me to OT plus psych therapy. Anyways I'm in major shock here because the OT person is going to come to my home next week and clean the place, shred my junk mail and help me with other household stuff. I even get to make her a list. She said up front she is going to wash my dishes that are piled high in the sink. I'm going to have her clean and organize my freezer too. Anyway I'm shocked, but think its kinda funny too!

That's weird. I didn't know OT involved a cleaning service. Is it covered by insurance?? My insurance is expensive; I might use it to get my house cleaned if I could . . .

You beaut! Just like those simplify-your-life and get-rid-of-clutter gurus - except without the high price tag.

I think the aim here, though, is to make a professional appraisal of your living situation, eliminate hazards to safety and health, and establish a maintenance routine which you can easily follow.

And when your OT is finished at your place, please send her to me!

lol - if you were a teenage/twenty-something guy, that would be very NT type apartment/house

must have been assie view of language then

always figured OT meant put the patient to work

now what here would be AS and what NT?

hi, sleeps


btw: at 51, and more or less having to be taken by the hand
to register for what should have been rightfully mine years ago -
yeah, that makes me feel very amusingly silly as well

aren't we pathetic eh, ticker

hey Bazza! are you sure about that? i peek into my neighbor's apartments when they have their door wide open or the windowshades up as i walk through the parking lot and kinda compare my mess to theirs. and i am amazed how neat some of these young guy's apartments are. i feel bad about my messy place, kinda looks like Yoda's hut because i come from a neat freak mom who literally will walk behind you with a wet cloth wiping up your mess. i've never been that kinda ocd compulsive when it comes to cleanliness. my dad is incredibly organized despite he and mom both exhibiting signs of AS. they would both freak if they saw how i lived. actually my mom would have a conniption at all the stuff piled up on the floor. maybe that's why i live 2000 miles away!

OT is NOT through insurance. OT is being paid by the state through the Vocational Rehabilitation agency that is part of the Dept of Economics. I just was sent there for hearing aids cuz insurance doesn't cover HA's. I have been there 3 yrs prior for my old HA's so I was familiar with the woman. I just asked the woman if they did OT there cuz someone told me they did. I have no idea what possessed me but I started crying and I think I rocked and told her about my AS diagnosis, my head injuries, the lightning strike, the memory loss, the 16 diff medical conditions I have. She was like "why didn't you tell me 3 years ago!".

She left the room then brought in a woman who she said was over the brain injury program at Voc. I was sent for a neuropsych eval that lasted 6 hours because they wanted their expert to say for sure whether I had AS and brain injury. So I got my third AS diagnosis through that! They all talk to me and identify my problems and they just tell me where to go for an appointment. Its paid by the state and also they bought me new hearing aids and glasses. They said all I have to do is be honest, show up for my appointments and continue to work my job. I can do that.

Yeah I'm just amazed though someone with a medical degree who has traveled to Africa helping people would come into my domicile and do cleaning. The idea is to get me back to a normal household level then teach me to manage time so I will keep up with my dirty dishes before it becomes a problem again. She's got a heck of a job before her is all I gotta say.

And if she wants a challenge with another 51-year-old, she can come and see me after she's done with you! I am trying Flylady, but it ain't happening the way I'd like it to. So I am waiting till I move and then in a smaller place it'll theoretically be easier. Right? Right?

lol - maybe I am out of touch with these young Gen-X (or Y or whatever) sensitive new age guys.

I'm not sure I follow you about trying Flylady. Nor the smaller place. Do you mean smaller domocile? Or smaller town? Personally I think a small rural town would be harder to get help in even from Voc Rehab. I think because this is a college town the employees at Voc here are a little more open minded about various disabilities and are more into advocacy. I can fully see Voc in the town I grew up in just telling people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and quit whining. I mean when I was a kid I saw a school psychologist who told me God was going to send me to hell. Uh... but the psych I am seeing now in this new town through Voc is very kind and non-insulting. I also think that because this is a college town there are more young healthy people and there is less "competition" for the resources Voc provides. If it was like a town with a high military population or older population it would be forget getting any help because they would be inundated with military people coming home with PTSD needing help and disabled old people. Or at least this is my take on it though I may be entirely wrong. Whenever I go into the Voc office though every time except for one I was the only client in there. So they always seem happy to see me as if it gives them something to do. And I think the therapists they send me to like me because its money in their pocket contracting out with a govt agency like that. But I think the therapists also care about their clients. And also my counselor knows all these therapists so she knows who to chose to send me to that will be good for the problems I have.

You might be surprised though Ticker. My husband is OCD and I find it easy to follow his patterns and routines but impossible to create my own. That overwhelms me in no time. The few times we've lived in different cities during transfers, I still live exactly like he's there and follow all of his rules. He loves it because I don't mess with his order and I love it because I don't have to make any decisions. I'm always amazed at NT people who meet someone and want to change things around. I always wonder where they got their ideas. I'd get stuck with, should I shred that junk mail because it has my name or is it only credit card numbers or is it also... And there I'd be spinning in the endless loop like a Cobol program until I abruptly terminated.

It's probably going to take awhile though. It took him a long time to teach me how to do things his way. It wasn't really interesting and he'd have to keep saying, "Baby! Pay attention!"

Now mind you, he never really domesticated me. Mainly I had to learn those things so I wouldn't mess up his obsessive cleanliness. This was more like, if you walk over the oriental rug and mess up the fringe, you have to stop and straighten it all back out until it lies perfectly. If you take out a towel and it moves the towels below it, you have to straighten them all back up so there is the perfect amount of space between stacks and they are squared. Etc. He has rules about everything. I don't know how he stores all of that in his brain or where he came up with this stuff. Oh well, he tolerates space puppy and I tolerate OCD.

I think it will work! Happy mundane tasking!

But do they do windows?

Some insurances pay for OT, or community re-entry after a tbi, including lightning strikes. Your voc rehab sounds like what they are doing what they are obligated by law to do (WIA - workforce investment act), but most don’t. They pull the boot strap comments, as you say.

All state have a Division of Developmental Disabilities, which pays for these sorts of things as well. As long as you became “disabled” (and I hate to call AS a disability, seeing all the wonderful things people with AS do, but, hey, it is in DSM) before you were 21 (aka born with it), you can get services even as an adult. They will definitely deny you the first round, but if you appeal, you win services. Bring an advocate (family, friend, someone to keep track of their bs and paperwork. Some states can appoint an advocates).

Also, since you are in Voc Rehab, you can go to any vocational technical school, community college or state college and have your tuition waived. Yuppers, free. Just don’t play games on the test they give you after you are accepted or you will be stuck taking a bunch of basic skill classes that waste your time and you don’t get credit toward your degree for). Make education a “to work” program, if you can. Even some trade schools if they are a state vendor.

If you are between 18 and 21, don’t let your high school graduate you and you can have them pay for these things as well.

OT is to teach you activities of daily living (ADLs) and once they catch you up, they will teach you to not fall behind (unless you have depressive episodes, forget it. You will fall behind so work with OT closely to learn how to catch up after one of these). OT will make you work the clean up to give you basic skills. They will make it fun. A good OT will learn your likes and interests and make a game of it. Imagine, enjoying cleaning, organizing and doing laundry and dishes!

Wait until they make you balance your checkbook and manage your money. No more impulse buying at the grocery store. “Follow the list”.

Keep us posted!! I am really interested in hearing how this goes. Services will go on for perhaps a year, longer if you go to school. You can also get a job coach or a school coach.

And no, they don’t do windows!!

Last edited by fivecents on 18 Jan 2008, 12:02 am, edited 1 time in total.

And, oh, all this info is not necessarily meant or directed toward ticker, it’s for anyone who may find it useful

You want to hear something really disturbing. Since she's coming over next Tues I felt somewhat obligated to clean up a few things ahead of time so I don't look like a total slob. But then I found myself debating should I leave the stain on the kitchen floor or not. I'm like should I wear myself out when she could mop for me. But she only has one hour appointments with me so it will take many hours to clean my hut.

The list she made me make as my homework assignment of things that need to get done include things only an Aspie could think of.... ie: fixing the drawstring on my hoodie, fixing the pump thingie on the shampoo bottle ...showing I have some weird sense of prioritizing. I'm sure this will get reported to my Voc counselor and made even the psychotherapist they have assigned me too. BTW- they say I have mild AS and I am getting this therapy mainly for the brain injury. (I think) Though they have talked about so many things I stay constantly confused. They said I have bad aphraxia and aphasia (sp?) but so far no therapy seems to be aimed at that. The OT did say she thought I would take a long time to treat (or was that train?). I made a very bad impression for my neuro eval and the first OT session because I got lost trying to find both places. Makes my BI look worse than it is. I just got bad directions; I'm really not that stupid.

I'll keep y'all informed on how this goes. I'm now excited about the next OT session...I hope she gets all my dishes cleaned. And excited about the psychotherapy scheduled for next week again because she was a nice lady that asked me funny questions. I like someone with a sense of humor. The one that did my eval though was like an old prune...actually I think she had a touch of AS ...and she didn't like me at all especially when I couldn't complete my puzzles correctly & I tried to joke about it.

I'm now paranoid what all the OT is writing about me. Especially since my first initial phone call with her (and immediate refusal to let her view me at work or home) initiated a call to my Voc counselor to apparently report me before my first appointment. Ok after my first appt is when she convinced me to let her in my home. (But I may lock her in the dungeon till she thoroughly cleans the places.)

hee hee I was calling to report the weirdness of my psychotherapist when the Voc lady told me that the OT had called to nark on me. Now I wonder what kind of report this is generating for the State. I wonder if they are making notes like hair looks wild (hey I use a lot of hairgel so its suppose to look like that), clean clothes, teeth appears to be brushed, etc. I wonder if they've done a sniff test secretly to see if I bath and change clothes? I now want to ask if I can read my file and see just how personal they are getting.