Skip to main content

Blog Post Challenge #8


For class today, we were asked to listen to a podcast before class titled The First Cow. The speaker was Abeny Kucha, a woman from southeastern Africa who has an amazing story. Her village was destroyed by war and for years she bounced from refugee camp to refugee camp walking and traveling for over eight years. Luckily she and her family made it to America. Listening to her story really opened my eyes to just how lucky I am to have the life that I have. When they first arrived they were taken to this apartment and told it was their new home… she expressed that the word home meant more to her than most could understand. Her children had never had a home, they had never been able to sleep in peace without any worry. She spoke of how they had no idea what orange soda was or what a fire alarm was, things that you never even second guess or need to think about can be completely foreign to others. She also mentioned how they had two couches in the living room and how no one in her family had ever seen a couch… a couch! We as Americans could learn so much from people who live and grow up in areas such as the place Abeny is from. I feel that we would all appreciate life and everything we have so much more. One last thing I wanted to mention was towards the end of the podcast she mentioned how she was able to enroll her children into a school and when the first day came she walked them to the bus stop and watched as they loaded up and the bus drove off. She mentions how she just stood there for a while with tears pouring down her face and how she was terrified that they may never come back that she might never see them again. I would guess not a single one of us would ever have to experience those thoughts as we send our children off to school, not that we don’t worry about them, but we know that the bus is taking them to school and bringing them home afterwards. Abeny however did not know this the way we do, so put yourself in her shoes and imagine how it might feel. I am so glad I was able to listen to her story and emotionally it truly touched my heart and reminded me how blessed I am as well as reminded me to do better by others especially those who may look or seem different, you never know the pain behind someone’s eyes.

Comments

  1. Dr. LancasterMay 19, 2017 at 7:39 PM

    I love this post, Cameron - very insightful and full of OT-think!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Neuronote #2

On Wednesday we were given the opportunity to attend the Memphis Rolling Grizzlies practice. The Rolling Grizzlies are a group of guys that are athletic, entertaining, and very inspiring. The individuals who make up the team all have different backgrounds, lifestyles, and goals, however there are two things they all share; they love the game of basketball and they play in the National Wheelchair Basketball Association (NWBA). For those of you who think the words disabled or paralyzed entails that someone is unable to compete or perform in an athletic sense get in contact with me and I’ll take you to the next practice and be more than happy to show just how wrong you are. We watched them practice for two hours, and I honestly hadn’t realized that even 30 minuets had gone by because I was so engaged and amazed with what I saw. I don’t know about you, but I played baseball, basketball, and football my whole life growing up, practice after practice. With my memories and knowledge of baske...
Post a Comment
Read more

Blog Post Challenge #9

For this post I decided to discuss just what a therapeutic relationship is and what it entails. A therapeutic relationship is defined as the interaction between an occupational therapist practitioner and their client. Therapeutic relationships differ from everyday relationships, in that they are key in facilitating the healing and rehabilitation process. They also differ from the typical relationship in that it's not about both people but strictly about the client and meeting their needs. Developing and sustaining therapeutic relationships involves the ability to develop trust, demonstrate empathy, understand verbal and nonverbal communication, and the use of active listening. Trust is one of the most important aspects in any type of relationship to me. Once trust is obtained the client feels more comfortable with sharing personal information which in turn greatly benefits the intervention process. Developing empathy is another huge part of this process, the client must believe tha...
1 comment
Read more

Neuronote #5

For my last neuronote I decided to write about the book The Reason I Jump. I had to read this book for a SPED class in undergrad and decided to re-read portions that I had originally marked as reading it the first time. When I read this book it made me completely change my thought process about how those who have autism experience life. I never once stopped to think how they actually view life and everything around them. The book is an autobiography written by a 13-year-old boy from Japan about what it is like to live with autism. The way autistic people view the world is very different than the way we may perceive them to view the world. This disconnect between how we view and treat people with autism and how they actually view the world makes living with autism is even more difficult than it already is. The book really made me question who is actually different. I feel like his perspective on life is so much more pure than my own and so much more beautiful. My bigge...
Post a Comment
Read more