Opportunities for Peer Support

Hi everyone. Recently I was talking to my spouse about ways to enrich my life and my spouse mentioned trying to connect to more people through peer support. I have some negative experiences with peer support, for example being kicked out of the Dutch DID peer support group for allegedly being a faker. However, once I’ve found the right tribe, peer support could certainly enrich my life.

Last Tuesday, I attended an online meeting for my regional branch of CP Netherlands, the Dutch cerebral palsy alliance. Even though I’m not 100% sure I have CP, I was welcomed with open arms. Originally, the organizers were thinking we may need to end the meeting early, as there were only five of us in attendance including them. However, we ultimately chatted the entire 90 minutes of the meeting. I even showed the other participants the polymer clay dinosaur my spouse and I had created.

One of the other participants is also visually impaired in addition to having CP. He told me there’s a “young people’s” (ages 25-45) meeting of the Eye Association (for blind and visually impaired people) in Zwolle. Zwolle is about 50km from where I live, so not too far away but not quite in my local area. This means I can travel there at a heavily discounted price using my national ParaTransit taxi card.

I also found out, when looking at the Eye Association website, that there are general meetings in Apeldoorn, Deventer and Zutphen, the three cities nearest to where I live. These meetings, since not catering to “young people” specifically, will most likely be mostly attended by people over age 50, but I don’t mind. I don’t yet have a local ParaTransit taxi card though, so can’t go there yet. My male assigned staff is going to apply for one for me though.

On Saturday, I attended the annual nationwide conference of CP Netherlands. It was less informative than the last few times I attended, since I knew most things the workshop leaders talked about already. However, it was much better with respect to peer support, in that I got to meet several people I’d either spoken with at the online meeting the previous Tuesday or met at nationwide conferences before. I also felt validated once again. And, yet again, I came away with the idea to finally ask my GP for a referral for rehabilitation medicine. Given that most likely my childhood medical records are all gone somehow, I’m pessimistic about getting any answers as to whether I actually do have CP or not. I’m trying to reason that this might be beside the point, but honestly my gut instinct is that it’s not.

I’m linking up with #WWWhimsy again.