"Living Life To Its Fullest!"

The AOTA website has announced OT's 'new brand': Living Life To Its Fullest!

As I think about where I am professionally and what drew me into the OT profession, I am reminded that I am in a different setting than I had hoped to be. I work with geriatrics right now in a SNF where the average age is 85. One of the biggest challenges is that due to the increased average age of the patients, health and aging remains an obstacle as we work and treat the patients. Sometimes it seems unrealistic for the 97 year old widow to return home independently. I was drawn to OT as sort of an addendum to my undergraduate degree, Sport Management. I love activity and I fill most of my free time with all kinds of activities (working out at the gym, soccer, tennis, yoga, swimming, hiking, biking, running, etc.). I love the feeling of being active and working your body hard. My ideal job situation would be to work with adult (25-55 years old) individuals who have some injury/insult/disease etc. that has impaired their ability to be active. I would love to work with a cyclist, a snowboarder, a diver who perhaps has been injured and is now a quadriplegic and unable to do the activities that they loved. I would like to work with them in creating and re-establishing different ways to be active that might provide them with the same gratifying feelings. Although I am not able to find such an opportunity at this time and I may find working with geriatrics a struggle at times, I am often reminded of the role of an OT, which the new AOTA brand accurately alludes to: "Living Life To Its Fullest". I believe in this and my role as an OT. I am very passionate about it. Thus, no matter what setting I may be working in (schools, psychiatric, acute, home health, etc), I know that my role as an OT is to enable individuals to live their life to the fullest. It is all about them! Thus, I am able to find joy and satisfaction in my current job setting despite that it isn't the ideal one. I know that I can make a difference in my patient's lives by enabling them in all aspects of their lives.