Most religious traditions struggle with welcoming the stranger among us. Often, a stranger who has a disability challenges one’s beliefs. Consequently, religious gathering places don’t engage the community as effectively as they could. When engagement is lacking, families feel disconnected and unsupported.
While no one is trying to deny support and connection to and for families, it’s quite common that religious leaders themselves feel under-equipped to serve a family who has a disabled loved one – especially when the disabled person is a child. We want to help!
By offering trainings and coaching for faith community leaders, we feel we can have a tremendous impact in one local community after another. We are not here to preach or proselytize but to serve and equip.
Beginning in 2024, we will be offering trainings for faith leaders in the Raleigh-Durham area and beyond. These trainings will be called “Thriving Together.” It’s a chance for the “rising tide to lift all ships in the harbor!”
Most of us have been to a hospital. Some of us have served in the military. In both of these settings, chaplains play a key role. A chaplain is able to enter into someone’s story at a moment of trauma, joy, or disillusionment and offer hope for a future.
Many of the families we know lack access to this type of service. We’d like to bring the service to them by offering in-home chaplaincy. We are working to launch our program in 2024 and make home visits to those who indicate they could use a visit from a trained professional. Again, as with our faith leader training, the intent is not to convert anyone but rather to serve.
Most caregivers and/or parents are constantly on the verge of burnout. The energy that it takes to raise a family, plus the added pressures of having a child with a disability, can leave a person feeling very frazzled. It can easily seem like one will never be able to catch up and regain relaxed breathing – let alone actually have the opportunity for some sustained downtime.
Prolonged stress of this kind wears a body down. Mental health and physical health often deteriorates – and relationships can be put to the test. Some parents are fortunate to have another family member or close friend who can provide a brief respite from the steady demands of the responsibility. Many are not. We want to help!
Historically, respite workers are drastically underpaid – partially because reimbursement sources for billed services are contracted at ridiculously low rates. We intend to establish a respite program where our workers are compensated fairly. Who wants to have their child receiving substandard care simply because the worker is dissatisfied with the job?
With licensure and risk management requirements to figure out, we are probably looking at 2025 before we can launch this program. It’s not that we don’t think it’s a priority – it’s that we want to get it right from the start!