Looking Beyond the Boundaries
Being a person on the Autism Spectrum in a fallen world is not easy. It is not easy for anyone. It is good to have the new NDIS (National Disability Insurance Scheme) underway and there has been a lot of work in implementing it. The challenging thing however is navigating all the boundaries. This in itself is not an easy process and at times has lead to a sense of personal hurt and frustration. What can you do when you want openness with boundaries and yet the boundaries hit you like water against a rock's surface?
Encountering many years of avoidance, rejection and misunderstanding from others has made it difficult to develop and sustain friendships over the years. Now I have support workers who are or I guess more so act as friends and the flood gates open with the only problem being that the raging waters hit against all the boundaries making communication rigid and not open. All I can do is try my best to navigate the world and understand it as best I can.
My faith is very important to me. I recently have become born again in my faith and seeing Jesus as the way is crucial as there are no boundaries with Him. As Jesus says in the Bible
John 14:6
I am the way the truth and the life and no one comes to the Father except through Me.
Navigating through the NDIS is not easy and trying to engage all of the supports into a cohesive plan again proves difficult with all of the boundaries in place. I just have to do the best I can. I now have 3 very good younger men helping me as support workers but what the NDIS doesn't understand and more so society, is that the support I want and require is in developing friendships and maintaining interaction with my support workers also as friends. Although there is a paid aspect to this, it allows me a period of time and consistency in developing friendships. I have a total of 8 support workers but I have 3 main support workers and a different connection with all of them. I try my best to also provide mutual care for my support workers as they do me and it feels good to at least have some form of human interaction!
To be honest with you I find it fruitful to bring on board quality people and to allow them a means of being able to support me as I do them also. I really admire the work that they do and one of my support workers has now started his own disability agency. I am so proud of him and his achievements and really want to see him succeed but again the boundaries make it difficult for me to fully appreciate his success. All of my core support workers are good young men with a great attitude to professionalism and care. In all we are working together to greatly improve the means of raising awareness of the Autism Spectrum. I know it is not about me nor do I want it to be. The Bible says in
Ephesians 2:8-9
For by grace you have been saved through faith and not of yourselves. it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.
Although boundaries may be hard and brutal it is always good to have a commitment to faith and allow Jesus to be the guiding light in the way forward. Coming to God is not a last minute aspiration but more so a means of salvation from a fallen world. In Jesus there is eternal life and we all need to remember the price that Jesus paid for all of us when He went to the cross.
1 John 4:9-10
God showed his love for us by sending His only Son into the world, so that we might have life through Him. This is what love is; it is not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the means by which our sins are forgiven.
As I continue to work within the framework of my NDIS plan, I am at least grateful to now have a great team including my support workers. Although the boundaries are hard to deal with, at least I have connections and people to be around. I really do hope that the work I am doing will great assist and help others?
May God bless you all and all the best.