Transferable Skills Help Renew Your Life
Remember before your stroke? Remember before your TBI? Remember before the amputation? Of course you do. You may even recall them as the “good ol’ days.”
In a way, they may have been the good old days. Then, you were accustomed to doing tasks, jobs, even the most basic activities of daily living (ADLs) in a certain way. You used innate or learned skills to accomplish them. But things are different now. Different, but not over. That is what is so important to understand.
There is a concept known as transferable skills. The term is often used in the context of job changes and refers to the notion that skills learned in one occupation can be transferred and used in another. For example, an individual may be a skilled auto mechanic. However, if the business for which he or she works closes, those skills may be able to be transferred for use at a marine facility to repair boat engines.
Or suppose that you had been a teacher, and later had some sort of traumatic brain injury that affected your ability to clearly speak. That does not mean that you can no longer be an important contributor in the field of education. The students need you and, in a very real sense you may need the students. They and their need for all you have to offer based upon your experience can be a vital part of your rehabilitation and ensure the best possible outcome for all.
For example, if you sustained a mild or traumatic brain injury that affected speech, speech therapy at NeuLife would be a key target of your individualized Client Goal Plan for post-acute rehabilitation. The overall goal may be to return to the classroom. But even if, once you reach the point of supported independent living or complete independence, you are unable to do so, you still have teaching skills that can be transferred to another venue. There are a host of opportunities to teach online or to become a curriculum developer for an online school. These opportunities do not require you to speak clearly. You know the subjects. You have the skills needed to teach and to prepare lesson plans. You merely need some vocational rehabilitation or technical help, such as in using a suite of software to enable you to flourish in this new aspect of a vocation that you have always loved.
The skills that you have, whether native or learned, are imbedded so strongly as to transcend nearly whatever catastrophic injury you may have sustained. They can rise to the surface in another form. The multidisciplinary staff at NeuLife: physicians, psychiatrists, therapists, RNs and others, through its specialized post-acute rehabilitation, is there to help you down the path toward independence to the fullest degree that your physical and psychological abilities allow.
Proper and timely post-acute rehabilitation that may determine the difference between disability and independence is what NeuLife refers to as the “platinum post-acute period” — the crucial window following acute care that is needed to nurture the whole person to health with specialized, clinically relevant services.
NeuLife’s philosophy is that healing, wellness and personal fulfillment are best achieved in a positive and uplifting therapeutic environment where caring staff encourages, assists and supports each client so he or she may achieve specific goals. NeuLife believes personal fulfillment is equally as important as goals to achieve function and independence.
NeuLife, in Mount Dora, Florida, is an accessible residential post-acute program providing specialized rehabilitation to individuals diagnosed with traumatic brain injury (TBI), spinal cord injury (SCI), traumatic amputations and other catastrophic injuries.
2725 Robie Avenue
Mount Dora, Florida 32757
