A new beginning......

Today at Craig’s Table three new participants arrived, there was all the challenges of finding out who everyone is, where to park cars, who has milk and sugar in their tea or coffee, and issues of what time training starts next week. It is just exciting to watch it all unfold for each of them. Clearly on show was a mixture of nerves, self-preservation and excitement for all that the coming weeks will hold for them.

Two very important conversations were had today. One I was a part of, one I eavesdropped on.

I spent about 15 minutes talking with the very first person to sign up for Craig’s Table about how she was feeling, how she was growing in herself and what it felt like for her to see the newbies coming in. I asked her if she remembered what it was like for her, coming into a place that she had never heard of and knowing what she knows now and how she thinks the new participants will go.

It was a very honest conversation of how she relied on so many external things before coming to Craig’s Table, things that masked her fears and her concerns for the future. She also mentioned how within weeks of coming to Craig’s Table she dropped many of her anti-depressants and how her sleep pattern had improved, and how she was actually enjoying the knowledge that she has a future and that what ever it brings she has the ability to tackle all of it. 

She also told me that many of her family had also remarked on the changes in her and how a skin condition had cleared up. 

The best part is that she laughs so much now instead of not having a reason to laugh or even the want to laugh.

The other conversation I eavesdropped on.

Is was about how positive everything at Craig’s Table is, how everyone is welcomed in, how the place just feels happy.

Again the first participant was speaking to one of the newbies about how without really noticing she had dropped a very large amount of medication. She put it down to being wanted and being needed and having real things to do that help her understand what she is capable of doing and helping her community at the same time.

There were a lot of questions and a lot of discussion about what Craig’s Table holds for everyone and how all of it about getting and giving support.

I am wise enough to know that when I wrote Craig’s Table, it was all about what I could see was missing and all about combining concepts into a way that on the surface look and feel very easy.

I have had conversations over the years with injured workers who have benefited from all that I have done.

But its not until you get to hear others speak from their heart without them knowing that I am listening that I realise just how fragile a hold some of the participants had on their own lives and well-being; and how just being at Craig’s Table has altered so much in each of their lives.

Each of them learns right from the very start that they have respect and trust from Craig’s Table, for some of them as odd as it may sound, just knowing that they are trusted and believed and that no one is going to question them or require to know details of their injuries is actually hard to cope with. 

For many of them they are so used to having to remember and repeat every fine minute detail so it is a shock that all that is asked of them is their current medical certificate and that is only so we know what the restrictions are to ensure that they follow their doctors’ directions. 

Over the years I have watched many injured workers reduce and remove opiate-based medication and replace it with a better frame of mind, a knowing that regardless of the injury, they are still a valuable person (as I remind them, I am an injured worker, but I am not my injury) they also learn that when they are engaged in meaningful work they feel better in themselves. 

One person I have worked with went from wearing high dosage opiate-based pain patches and smoking up to 50 cigarettes a day to no pain medication what so ever and ceased smoking as well.

None of it was easy, there were set backs including having this particular person call me to say that she hated me beyond words and a few other choice words.

A few days later she called back to say that she had been cigarette free for a week and that the reason for the rage was that she felt she was about to fail. 

I reassured her that I knew all of that, and that her angst had been expected.

I am often asked will what happens at Craig’s Table work for every injured worker?

My answer is yes, I have in the 20 plus years that I have been working within the injured worker community met only a small handful of injured workers who do not want to engage within the process of return to self, return to community return to work/study. Those who don’t want to, it is normally because they have been so broken by the system that they fear to trust that everything can change and they can gain control again. 

The newbies today will follow the now well-trodden path of “can’t” to can within a very short space in time.

They will get excited by small achievements, they will be eager to have new conversations with their families and friends. They will arrive early and they will stay late. They will laugh and they will cry and they will push pull drag if need be and they will support each other through learning and growing together.

And I will sit with them, I will learn who each of them is, I will hear their deepest fears and their wildest hopes and dreams as they grow within Craig’s Table and Craig’s Table grows around each of them. 

Hang on, its going to be a wild ride of pure fun.  

Yours in service
Rosemary

www.craigstable.net.au
rosemary@craigstable.net.au
SKYPE Rosemary2412
24th^th April 2018