Thirtieth Anniversary Issue on Progress and Priorities in Direct Support

What is a direct support professional?

At first, I used to be so confused, like, what do I do when people ask me that? But now I, I start with, I'm a direct support professional. That's how I start it with it. Like, what's that? I'm like, you know, I'm pretty much, and then I'll just try to break it down like in simpler terms. I am a doctor, I am a nurse, I am a therapist, I am a coach, I am a teacher, I am a leader. I'm all that wrapped into one as a DSP, direct support professional.

What is an important quality for a DSP?

I'm a naturally funny person. Like when I walk into work every morning, if, if everybody's down their mood is down, I'm just gonna come in and throw a joke. I'm gonna come in and just have everybody laughing. Like my one participant, he loves when I go like this, he'll ask me a question. And I'll shake my head, “yeah.” But I'll say “no.” Or I'll shake my head “no.” And I'll say, “yeah.” He just laughs so hard. And he, he just loves it. So I feel like my gift to this is like my comedic side. Like, I just have, I have everybody laughing. I know when it's time to get serious. Yeah. But for the most part, I'm never serious. Like, I just take everything for a grain of salt and just like to joke around and it has gotten me through.

Can you make ends meet as a DSP?

Not really, no, because it, it's hard. So I do have a side job. I have my own business. I actually, I make clothes and then I also just, just got my EPA [Environmental Protection Agency] license for HVAC [Heating, Ventilation, Air Conditioning]. So I'm doing all that on the side. My career is DSP, but my side jobs also help me out. Because, you know, clearly we don't do this for the money. So I have three kids, a wife, a car, so I need money. It's reality. But I'm never gonna leave this field to try to get more money. I'll just do other things to make more money. Along with being in this field. What we do is very instrumental in their everyday life. Just like a, just like a nurse and a doctor is very instrumental in everybody's life when you get sick. We were like kind of that frontline before they get to the hospital or the doctors, you know, before they go see a therapist. I'm not asking that we should be paid crazy like doctors and lawyers, but we should be paid a little bit better than what we do. I seen a lot of people that love this field, but they left because they couldn't afford to take care of their family for it. And it, and it's sad because it was a lot of good DSP staff that would really help. But I can't fault them for having to take care of their own family.