Article "Quality Control and Brain Damage", Quality Progress, March 2007
- Thread starter GStough
- Start date
W
winchm
Way to go Howard - I posted the QP article on Welcome Newcomers thread in reply to Wes Bucey - you are a courageous human being. 
M
mooser
Howard,
Thanks for your story. It is really encouraging for all of us. You truly have experienced one of life's great secrets - Believe, feel and visualize your future.
mooser
Thanks for your story. It is really encouraging for all of us. You truly have experienced one of life's great secrets - Believe, feel and visualize your future.
mooser
H
Howard Lee
Remember me? I think it was ten years ago that I left industry and quality to take care of my wife who had multiple sclerosis that had advanced to the point that she required full time care. Last October she began having trouble swallowing and by Thanksgiving she had lost the ability to swallow. She had done an advanced directive back in 2010 that stated she would not accept tube feeding. She reiterated that refusal last year and died on the Thursday before Easter this year. I woke up on Good Friday alone and feeling that my life had lost all point.
In August I began looking for a job again and was in and out of several minor positions. Two weeks ago I decided to expand my search to include the past ten years as a care giver but I lacked official credentials (not a CNA). Someone said that they might consider me for a position at the Veterans Victory Home, a nursing home associated with the VA in Walterboro (they do training). The local newspaper said that they were looking for a maintenance associate and since I can fix air conditioners and know a little plumbing and electrical and can clean floors, I went to their website to apply.
Their website didn't list a job in maintenance but there was a position available for an activities assistant so I applied for that. I was called for an interview the next day since I had ten years of experience working with someone who was profoundly disabled. When I went to the interview I took a copy of "Quality Control and Brain Damage". I told the interviewer that not only did I have experience working with the profoundly disabled but I had been profoundly disabled myself, being a survivor of traumatic brain injury. I told her that I knew what it was like to sit around wondering what I was going to do....to have little hope. She read my story and said, "We've got to have you!"
I'll start there on a probationary, "as needed" basis right after Thanksgiving. It's a start, I got my foot in the door and it should be enough to pay the bills.
In August I began looking for a job again and was in and out of several minor positions. Two weeks ago I decided to expand my search to include the past ten years as a care giver but I lacked official credentials (not a CNA). Someone said that they might consider me for a position at the Veterans Victory Home, a nursing home associated with the VA in Walterboro (they do training). The local newspaper said that they were looking for a maintenance associate and since I can fix air conditioners and know a little plumbing and electrical and can clean floors, I went to their website to apply.
Their website didn't list a job in maintenance but there was a position available for an activities assistant so I applied for that. I was called for an interview the next day since I had ten years of experience working with someone who was profoundly disabled. When I went to the interview I took a copy of "Quality Control and Brain Damage". I told the interviewer that not only did I have experience working with the profoundly disabled but I had been profoundly disabled myself, being a survivor of traumatic brain injury. I told her that I knew what it was like to sit around wondering what I was going to do....to have little hope. She read my story and said, "We've got to have you!"
I'll start there on a probationary, "as needed" basis right after Thanksgiving. It's a start, I got my foot in the door and it should be enough to pay the bills.
