For this article, we talked to Thea Lewis, who is a Therapeutic Support Worker at MacIntyre’s children’s home in Leighton Buzzard.
What is a Therapeutic Support Worker
First of all, we asked Thea what a Therapeutic Support Worker does.
It’s a role she trained for over a six-month period and gives her the expertise to fine-tune therapy and communications plans with young people. Currently Thea's main focus is on communication, looking at ways to support each young person to communicate and express themselves. To do this, she works closely with MacIntyre’s Speech and Language Therapist, and wider therapy team. She also coaches and encourages other support workers and helps them understand each young person’s personalised approach and the reasons behind it.
Of course this is just part of the wider day-to-day job of a Support Worker, whether that’s making sure young people get off to school on time, cooking supper, or getting out and about at the weekend.
Thea's background
Thea’s been at MacIntyre for about 18 months. Before that she worked with elderly people for a couple of years following a complete career change from landscape gardening. Thea’s mum was a teacher and got her thinking about working with children. So when the advert for MacIntyre came up, it was the right time and Thea joined as a Support Worker.
Young people having a voice
We asked what she enjoys most about the job. She described how interesting and rewarding it is to help young people develop their communication allowing each young person to have a voice.
The four young people who live in Leighton Buzzard are all very different and have varying support and communication needs. Thea talked about Cyrus. He has cochlear implants and is non-verbal. When he joined MacIntyre he struggled to communicate with staff and would often choose not to use his communication book. Thea took the time to create numerous communication aids for him inclusive of an iPad with a communication program on it. When he discovered that he could press a button on the iPad and it would communicate his wishes to everyone very loudly he was delighted and just loves to have the volume turned right up.
Rhiannon is verbal but there was a time where her verbal skills were very limited and she would often resort to taking staff by the hand to where she wanted them to be or where she wanted staff to help. Thea made some communication flash cards to support her to use her words to tell staff what she needs. She enjoyed using these cards and they allowed her to explain what she needed. Since using the flashcards her verbal communication has vastly improved and now will verbally express her needs to staff which makes her happy.
This isn’t about forcing children into mainstream methods of communicating, but about building trust and preparing for adult life.
Thea says:
I just love my job, every day is so different. Last year we went with the four young people to a beach holiday. They were nervous and didn’t know what to expect, but they trusted us and we had a great time. The important thing about this holiday for me was that although we all went together, young people also made plain their individual needs and interests, so it was both a community and individual experience.
Outside of work
In her spare time, Thea splits her focus between her mum, for whom she is a carer, going shopping, watching films and looking after her three cats, dog and guinea pigs and teaching them how to do different tricks!
