Mrs. Smith attended a public meeting to listen to a small group of community service providers discuss the beginnings of a new project to work together. When it was her turn to speak to the group she shared her concern and her need with these words: "I have taken care of my daughter, who has mental retardation, without any help from any group or agency for the past fifty years, and I expect to continue to have to do so for the next fifty years". At the same meeting other elderly parents told of never being able to go on vacations or have weekend trips with just the two of them because of the needs of their son or daughter who has been dependent of their assistance since birth and are now in their forties and fifties. These aging family care givers have been responsible for family members with disabilities everyday of their lives from the day they were born.
Over the past twenty-five years, a segment of America's population has increased quietly and unobserved in small towns, on ranches and farms, and in urban and large communities. People who have lived for decades with cerebral palsy, mental retardation, austim, severe seizure disorders and severe learning disabilities with family members, on their own, or in supervised living arrangements. These major disabilities are labeled "developmental disabilities" and have a legal definition in the federal laws. The federal Administration on Developmental Disabilities shared a picture of people with developmental disabilities as facing enormous odds. "They lack the basics of American life, a good education, a job, or a real home of their own. Tagged with diagnostic labels, segregated, and discriminated against, many lack the information and assistance they need to make informed choices. Their abilities are not recognized and their differences set them apart."
Many older families never envisioned they would be caregivers for their children with developmental disabilities for their entire lives. Today, service agencies are discovering on a regular basis, aging parents and older family members who have been caring for a family member with developmental disabilities for four and five decades with little assistance of support services or community agencies. Or siblings try to cope with the responsibilities of their own families and children and have not had frequent contact with their sisters or brothers but need to be responsible for assisting at the death or disability of a parent for either a short term or the years ahead.
The Dallas County Area Agency on Aging, under the leadership of Mr. Norman Moorehead, has recognized the existence of this "invisible population of aging Texans with developmental disabilities and elderly family caregivers" and successfully competed to be one of the first seven funded projects in Texas to seek to assist. The Dallas Co. AAA is working to establish cooperative relationships between aging services and other community providers that assist individuals with developmental disabilities. The overall goal is to establish community supports to insure aging Texans and older family caregivers can readily access all appropriate aging and disability services in the local community.
The Project leaders have offered these insights into the first year efforts: "The community has already begun to reap benefits from the coordination that was developed and it is an ongoing process. We believe that the Dallas Plan can and will serve as a model for communities with similar resources."
For more information about the Dallas Aging/DD Project, contact the Dallas Co. Area Agency on Aging , 400 N. St. Paul Suite 200, Dallas TX 75201-6804 or call 214-871-5065. For additional information on the statewide Texas Project, call the Texas Department on Aging- 512-424-6878 or James Stone at 606-273-9656.
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