Do you love to play and laugh and be silly? Do you have lots of energy and enthusiasm and creativity? Are you also sensitive to and passionate about helping children with special needs and play differences? If you consider yourself a highly charismatic person who enjoys inventing games and other novel play activities, all while brightening the life of a very special guy, then this opportunity may be a great fit for you.
Our son is a joyful and charming 15-year-old young man with severe autism and seizure disorder. His play interests and daily living skills are aligned with a 3-5-year-old child. He loves to be read storybooks (with voice acting) and helped in his own reading attempts, have pictures drawn from the ideas in his mind as well as do his own amazing abstract art, listen to music while dancing and drumming, and tell stories about his most beloved characters (or "friends," as he refers to them) with favorites including Winnie the Pooh, Dr Seuss, Curious George, Little Bear, Wiggles, Sesame Street, and Mr Rogers.
This job would take place at our home in the Southern Highlands neighborhood. The candidate would need to have very reliable transportation to this location and ideally have a commute of less than 30 minutes so we are easily able to adjust shift start times as needed depending how our son is feeling (because of his seizures).
Duties of this position are split between the roles of Nanny and Therapist. The nannying aspect involves general safety supervision and assistance with our son's activities of daily living such as dressing, toileting, bathing, meals, tidying up and managing the overall schedule. The therapy aspect involves the administration of a specialized autism 'play' therapy program for 2-3 hours each day for which intensive training is provided to all new hires during their first three months.
We currently have need for both daytime and overnight shifts. This ad is for the daytime position which would amount to 22-28 hrs/week. If you require more hours, please see our other ad for Overnight Caregiver which you could add for a full-time engagement.
Daytime shifts are typically 4-6 hours, could occur at any time of the day between 7am and 9pm depending on parents' schedule of activities that week, and would take place on five days of the week, with one of these a Saturday or Sunday. Having an open schedule and the ability to come at a variety of shift times including mornings, afternoons, and evenings on any day is highly appealing. The people who are most successful with this schedule typically have any other jobs/schooling that is online or otherwise very flexible and able to set their own hours to work around the needs of our household.
Example weekly schedules:
Mon 7-1, Tues off, Wed 9-2:30, Thurs 4-9, Fri 12-5, Sat off, Sun 7-1
Mon 11-5, Tues 7-12, Wed 11:30-5, Thurs off, Fri 9-2, Sat 3-9, Sun off
Mon 10-1, Tues 4-9, Wed 11:30-2:30, Thurs 7-12, Fri off, Sat 9-3, Sun off
We are seeking a LONG TERM employee for a MINIMUM OF 2 YEARS. Please carefully consider your commitment to this position with the scheduling requirements and number of hours available before applying.
Training on everything for this position would be provided, so no specific experience working with people with autism or seizures is necessary.
The perfect candidate for the job would have the following qualities:
Live nearby.
Have a very flexible schedule.
Be highly responsible and reliable: never late, rare absence, exceptional follow-through.
Enjoy physical activity and can confidently run after and maintain the safety of a fast and strong 15-year-old young man, including joining him on playground climbing equipment, trampolines, swimming pools, etc.
Be outgoing and unabashed when it comes to playing, able to go fully into all manner of silliness; highly energetic and entertaining. But, can also turn this off almost completely and contain your energy from the space to be really low key when needed for regulation.
Are creative and enjoy imagination play and coming up with new activity ideas. Highly sought-after skills are drawing, crafting, story telling, music making, and play acting (character voices, dress up, scripts, etc.).
Can derive satisfaction and fulfillment from the full range of duties described in this position from energetic playtime to assisting with dressing and toileting to seizure response and safety management.
Highly motivated to engage in study of specialized therapy techniques including attending online courses and reading books (all courses and materials provided by parents; all offsite training time would be paid).
Have a big heart, patience, empathy, and love to be of service.
Please note, due to seizure triggers, no personal devices with wi-fi capability are allowed in the same room as our son. Cell phones can be brought into the house but they must be kept in another room and put on airplane mode whenever they are not actively being used (and they would only be used to contact us if we are out). The same goes for Fitbits, Oura rings, smart watches and the like needing to be kept out of the space. You would need to be COMPLETELY comfortable with not having your phone on your person (or any of these other types of devices) in order to be considered for this job.
Funding for this position is provided by a disability program. Employment paperwork needs to be completed and background check approved prior to starting work. Paychecks are direct-deposited twice monthly (15th and last day of each month).