Where’s the “personal” in Personal Support Worker Service Providers?  We have been requiring the assistance of personal support workers for 4 ½ years.  My husband received a catastrophic brain injury from a motor vehicle accident that left him with left-sided paralysis.  My strong, athletic husband was no longer able to get out of bed on his own and required the help of PSW’s for almost all of his activities of daily living. 

How do I as a wife and mother remain strong and hold my family together after such a tragedy?  I’ll tell you what you, you look to others for their help both mentally and physically.  You look to those that are in the business to help families, like ours, to make it work and keep our family together.  Aren’t these people supposed to provide the help that is so desperately needed?   You want to be the wife and “protect” the marriage and not inter with how you feel about your partner intimately.  That is why you give up most of your privacy and invite these support workers into your home.  

Every morning and evening they come and they go but at least you know that they are their to help to make things easier for you.  How is it that companies that are suppose to be the business to help, turn “personal” into “impersonal”?  They don’t see your husband or your family as real people with feeling, emotions and needs but as just as a dollar figure to make their bottom line.  When your husband begs for consistency and instead of offering it and providing those that are familiar, you deliberate withdraw the familiar and send employees unfamiliar and unqualified.  How can you ask a person to have strangers on a regular basis be part of the most private part of your day and be amongst your children and in your home?  These strangers wouldn’t be strangers, if your unprofessional attitude and lack of concern for a person didn’t cause you to withdraw that worker or you just can’t retain them long enough in your organization.   Don’t you think hardship has already hit our family without throwing up roadblocks!!  God forbid such tragedy ever befalls a weaker family because luckily for my family I am a strong, hard as nails advocate for my husband and family.   I won’t back down to your condescending bully tactics or continual need to unstaff us, just to show us who is boss.  How does the song go “ I get knocked down but I get up again”?  So unfortunately your pathetic company will probably continue to overcharge and unstaff the disabled and seniors in the community but hopefully more families come forward and speak up!