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The Lived Experience of Interdependence: Support Worker Relationships and Implications for Wider Rehabilitation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 November 2021

John A. Bourke Open the ORCID record for John A. Bourke [Opens in a new window]
John A. Bourke*
Affiliation:
Burwood Academy Trust, Christchurch, New Zealand Menzies Health Institute, Griffith University, Southport, Queensland, Australia Preventive and Social Medicine, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand
*
Email: johnny.bourke@burwood.org.nz
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Abstract

Engaging in a meaningful life where one can exercise autonomy has been proposed as a key aim of rehabilitation. Influenced by a neoliberal worldview, this has traditionally been characterised by a pursuit towards individual functional independence in which one completes tasks and activities unassisted. However for many persons, individual functional independence may not be a realistic, prioritised or beneficial goal. Many individuals must learn to work with support workers to exercise choice and control. Such relationships extend beyond a transactional nature and involve many subtle characteristics. In this article, I draw on my lived experience of partnering with support workers to illustrate the complexity of such relationships and how they can enable interdependence to serve as a vehicle to self-determination. I finish with some ideas about what rehabilitation can do to recognise the important role human connections play in facilitating interdependence. Understanding the nature of these relationships is necessary to provide services which value interdependence, supporting people to pursue a meaningful life following impairment.

Keywords

Interdependencelived experiencesupport worker relationshipsautonomyrehabilitation
Type
Clinical Practice: Current Opinion
Information
Brain Impairment , Volume 23 , Special Issue 1: Humanising Connections: Bringing people together in rehabilitation , March 2022 , pp. 118 - 124
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Australasian Society for the Study of Brain Impairment

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