support w**kers

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urrrgghhh sorry for this confused ramble, but that's the state of my brain right now

my old support worker is ill and will be off work for a while so i have to have a new support worker. i wasn't too unhappy about that as she was a bit unreliable. but support changes are always stressful to deal with, and because it was due to illness it's all been rushed and unplanned. last week i met with the person in charge of support and she said she'd found someone new to work with me, so in order to try and keep the stress of the change manageable i asked to see the new support worker together with the person in charge, just for a kind-of 'get to know you' session before the support started proper, basically so i wasn't on my own for the first time we would have met.

the only time they could meet me was this morning... and i am never good in the mornings bad start. i did want to write a big long moan about how badly it went, but to tell the truth i dissociated so much that i can't even remember what happened! that's how stressful it was. what i wanted was to find out about the new person, what she was like and all that... all they did was stare at me, double eye-contact... i ended up hiding behind my hands most of the time... they only wanted to talk about me, me, me... i don't feel comfortable talking about myself to a complete stranger, i felt extremely uncomfortable (and it must have been obvious) when i asked her to talk about herself, all i got was 'what do you want to know'... it was put straight back onto me... then they stared and stared again, i just can't communicate at all if people are going to stare at me in such an intimidating way, i went mute... waiting and waiting for them to break the silence but they never did!! !! !! they just sat there saying absolutely nothing, staring at me!! !! i just felt so awkward it was terrifying, and humiliating.

i don't understand why support people just don't seem to get the simplest thing. especially when they are supposed to be SUPPORT workers!! ! the whole point of meeting was to make the first meeting non-stressful. so why did they make it so awkward? they just haven't got a clue. i don't understand why they choose to make things worse!! !! why are they such idiots? i eventually managed to say to the person in charge that i needed the new person to talk to me rather than just say nothing and stare, and she said "but we didn't want to interrupt you in case you were trying to say something"... WTF????

apparently she'd taken my request of wanting to 'see' the new person literally - she thought i literally wanted to look at the new person. only i can't f*****g look at someone if i've got two people staring at me constantly and not talking!! ! what i actaully needed was to hear her - this is a prosopagnosia thing - the way people look changes, but people always sound the same. but when i told them that what did i get? SILENCE!! !! ! and more staring well that's as much as i can remember, whatever happened this morning is all a big black hole, i'm slowly reintegrating the memories as they come back (as ptsd flashbacks!! !! it was that bad)... god why can't support workers just be supportive? is it too much to ask? they're supposed to be helping for f***s sake, not causing even more stress!

does anyone else here have support workers? i mean i know lots of people complain that there are no services, i just want you to know that it's not all magically wonderful for those of us who do manage to get services, in many ways the services are an extra problem on top of the autism so who else has support, and what do they do and is it any good?

Diva... the mods can't know what you consider an attack until you tell us. I did notice Jman's post earlier but held off on responding because I wasn't sure how you'd react to it.

On the rest of the site, something like this probably wouldn't be considered an attack, but the rules are different in the Haven. Jman, would you mind editing or clarifying what you meant?

Oh and DivaD, if you ever need to see a list of all the mods, click on the Global Moderators link by any forum title: http://www.wrongplanet.net/asperger.htm ... roupcp&g=3 . It's best to PM a couple of them since not all of them make it onto the site every day.

Ok what I was trying to say I was, since your support worker seems to be unreliable maybe try doing things for yourself for once. Create goals for yourself, challenge yourself so you won't to depend on these people.

I've found out the hard way that you can't really depend on goverment agencies for anything, so it's best to see if you can do stuff for yourself, however if you are still having difficulty, just remember the old say "the squeaky wheel gets the grease" Keep complaining til you get what you want, need, and deserve.


Sorry if my post came off as an attack. Didn;'t mean it to be that way.

DivaD,I'd say you're one of the lucky ones to have even that unreliable level of support,from a UK view [which country do you live in?] it's practically impossible to get a social worker where I live.
They seem to think just because people are on the higher functioning end of the spectrum,they cannot have severe difficulties,and comorbid conditions/learning disabilities.


Don't be surprised at how unreliable they are,if living in the UK,they are supposed to be understaffed and overworked [my sister has to work with them on behalf of her clients and has told me this],plus they are clueless about the Autism Spectrum.

It is possible to get a support worker not from the social services,but I forget who it has to go through,basic wages for the support worker would be £7 per hour [again,my sister told me this-not from personal experience].
This way would be more reliable I think,but it can work out expensive.

There is nothing wrong with making use of the available support if needed,every person whether NT or Autistic will need help in their lives,some just more than others.
If it helps a person to live more independantly [ie,not with their family] without struggling then it is something that should be supported.

I have a lot of hate for the social services....they are the most incompetent people I have ever had to see,I have been waiting for over a year for one,at the first assessment,as soon as they heard the AS diagnosis [those around me think is the wrong Aut. category] and the way I spoke they said I was too intelligent for support [without listening to any of my actual difficulties] they had my case down as moderate-severe [referring to situation at home-living with a violent alcoholic] yet they never contacted me for over a year,my family,tutor,doctor and lastly,a housing lady had to harass them over that year to give me their final useless answer.
So have had to reaply for another assessment,and apparently it's going to be done by the same people-the people who dismissed me as being 'too intelligent for support'.

sorry if my posts come off as tactless but I am just trying to understand why you need such strong supports

have you looked into "direct payments"? you hire someone to work for you by interviewing people. choosing someone might help you separate the care assistant wheat from the care assistant chaff. the government pays most the cost towards employing the person, if not all, depending on your financial situation.