Participant Interview

Share a specific quote, comment or insight that you gained from your participant interview. Share your analysis of the information gained in the interview and explain how it lead to your choices in the service plan.

One thing I learned from my participant during our interview was how very much she wanted to keep as active as she could. I thought it was awesome how Cindy lived with so much pain in her life, yet did everything she could to stay involved in activities and with friends in her life. She considers herself a very social person and enjoys spending time with her close friends doing things like quilting or shopping or going to movies. One specific thing that I found interesting was when she told me that her pain seemed to decrease greatly when she was really wrapped up in an activity. She knew that keeping her mind occupied had a lot to do with that.

She is an expert quilter and has made some amazing ad beautiful quilts in her life, despite her near constant pain from an injury years ago. She knows that pushing through that and making herself stay involved with activities is very important.

One thing she mentioned to me though was how much she missed doing more active things that she used to love to do like bike riding or swimming or exercising at all. I felt that she was mostly just afraid to try these things because she knew how much pain just walking caused her so she has never attempted anything more than that. I decided to start her slowly by getting her involved in a water aerobics class. This is low-impact yet active, and it is something she already knows she loves to do. She was excited about the idea and part of her care plan was to research a class in her area and sign up for one!