Eps. 16 | ABLE to Thrive: Understanding Supports for Adults with Disabilities

Episode 16 of ABLE to Thrive features a conversation with Janelle Stoneking, CEO of ABLE Inc., as we explore supports available for adults with disabilities and what it truly takes to help people thrive beyond childhood services.

We discuss how adult disability supports work in practice, including access to services, care coordination, community resources, and the challenges people and families often face when navigating the system. Janelle shares insight into the mission of ABLE Inc. and the importance of building supports that are person centered, practical, and sustainable.

This episode was made possible by a grant from the State Council on Developmental Disabilities.

Whether you are a family member, provider, advocate, or simply looking to better understand adult disability services, this episode offers valuable perspective on how systems of support can empower independence and quality of life.

Subscribe for more conversations on disability services, advocacy, and community support systems.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to Empower Indie Podcast. This podcast creates a space for honest conversations about health, well-being, and community resources to help people in southwestern North Dakota live healthy, legal lives. The Empower Indie Podcast is produced by Women Empowering Women, a nonprofit organization dedicated to connecting, supporting, and educating women to help them become the best versions of themselves. To become a member or learn more, visit wewnetwork.org. Welcome back to the Empower Indie Podcast. Today we're diving into conversations that gets at the heart of independence, support, and what it looks like to build a life with the right tools and people in your corner. We're talking about services that support people with disabilities and how those services come together to create real opportunities for growth, choice, and independence. We are joined by Janelle Stone King from ABLE Incorporated. Let's get started. Okay, can you start by telling us a little about yourself and your role with ABLE? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

So I, you know, I have been at ABLE Incorporated for 28 years, and I currently am serving as the new CEO. It's a pretty exciting time. Yeah, it's wild. It's really wild. Um, and so I I've held a variety of roles through the organization over all these years. So for me, it's now it's just kind of a culmination of all that experience coming together.

SPEAKER_00 1:31

Awesome. So for someone who's never heard of ABLE before, how would you describe what the organization does?

SPEAKER_01 1:38

ABLE Incorporated is an organization that supports uh people with intellectual and developmental disabilities through the lifespan. I mean, we support uh people who are young, young adults, uh 18, 19 years old, and people who are in their last stages of life. So we we have different supports that support people either residentially or vocationally and finding work and doing things, being active in their communities. What services are part of residential support? So that that can look like a lot of different things. It just depends on the person and what their preferences and needs are. Um we we have four beautiful group homes here in Dickinson and one in Headinger. And in those homes, there are staff that are present with people 24 hours a day to provide help with whatever they need. Um, for folks who are a little bit more independent, we have um supports that we provide in in apartment settings. Some apartments that we own and others that other people just rent through public housing, and we have the supports come in and be there with them through it, might just be a couple hours a day or often throughout the whole day. So that can really vary.

SPEAKER_00 2:54

It's just a variety depending on what people's needs are. Okay, what are some misconceptions people might have about residential services?

SPEAKER_01 3:03

I think that people assume that ABLE controls a lot. We try not to. Um, even for folks that have their own homes or own apartments, we try to be as least intrusive as possible because it's hard to have somebody in your life all the time, especially if you need a significant amount of support throughout your day. Um, we want people to live their lives their way, the way they want to, and doing what they enjoy. And we're just there to kind of walk side by side with them as they as they need a little hand.

SPEAKER_00 3:37

Okay, so how does staff help uh someone build skills over time rather than just providing assistance?

SPEAKER_01 3:44

Well, I think it just depends on what what that person's preferences are. I mean, there's a lot of things that we learn naturally from each other, just like you and I do in our lives. You know, you just naturally learn from each other. There are ways that we have to be a little bit more formal around helping people build skills because of the paid services we provide. So we we have to have some um written goals and objectives and um ways that we do that. But typically we try to be as absolute natural as possible. And a person's goals can be anything from them wanting to learn how to cook better in their home or get dressed more independently without help, or it might be as simple as learning how to Snapchat if they know others are and they don't know how yet. So on then second level though, I mean, really, I've had people we support with disabilities who taught me how to Snapchat. So I guess it goes both ways. We all have things to learn from each other.

SPEAKER_00 4:48

So vocationally, um, how does ABLE support people vocationally?

SPEAKER_01 4:52

With people's work, I mean, we've just recognized people need to have meaningful work or volunteer opportunities in their lives in order to have that quality of life they want. Um, so finding what they love and finding a role in which they can do that is really important. Um even even though a lot of the people that we support that have a lot of significant health and medical needs, we love to see them as active in the community as possible. No one should just be sitting home because they can't work. Right. So finding ways for them to um gain interest and opportunities in what they love, whether they love animals, maybe they can volunteer at Woofda. Or if they um love books, maybe they just take books to the little book libraries all across town. Finding ways to be engaged in the community and just um doing what you love. That's what matters.

SPEAKER_00 5:48

Yeah, I think this area does a really good job about that, you know, having people help at the hospital with collecting shredding things, people help at, you know, at Able or at House of Mana or different thrift stores too, you know, being able to just involve them in all of the areas of the community. You end up seeing those people in a lot of different venues in this town. For us, it's just like any other community member.

SPEAKER_01 6:15

Um we all have to find the our places we belong and the things that we love. And um, it doesn't matter what race, what what gender, what um socioeconomic background we have, we all should be contributing to the community and not be seen any differently. And so it's just part of services we focus on, making sure people are involved.

SPEAKER_00 6:40

Yeah, I think you guys do a good job with that. Okay, so what kind of job supports or training might someone receive? Well, it depends what their interests are.

SPEAKER_01 6:49

Maybe they're getting a job at a daycare. We just had somebody do that this last year. And so they they just need a little bit of extra help being reminded to stay on task, maybe job coach to be there. Um, and it maybe it's very, very minimal. Um, and even it could be faded in time. Or there's some people that have services through APL that need us to stay at work with them all the time, or work at jobs in which we provide all the support and the employment. So, like those that work at our thrift store, right? Um, many of them choose to work there because we can accommodate a lot of the needs they have, um, knowing that not every day might be a good day for work. Right. Um, if you have mental health or behavioral health needs, um, we can do a lot more accommodation than many other employers can. Right. And so we would rather see people outworking jobs in other settings. Um, while we love our thrift store, it's a fabulous place and a great place to work and to and to shop. Um, I would love to see people work in all different businesses around the community. So we try to really encourage that to whatever skill or interest people have.

SPEAKER_00 8:04

So, can you share some examples of kind of those goals vocationally that of what it would look like for a person?

SPEAKER_01 8:15

Well, I I think just depending on the person's um disability level and what the reason why they have us there providing supports. Um, some of the goals might just be looking at what the quality of their work is. Maybe they they enjoy doing, even if it's janitorial work, um, cleaning at at the T-Rex mall or at a local business. There's a lot of that they can independently do well, but aren't very good at checking the quality of their work and might need some help to see, oh, maybe we should just check this spot again and grab the mop if there's things that we missed. It just depends on what what that skill level is. It's like all of us, though, honestly, in our work. Um, we have strengths in certain areas and other areas where we might need a coworker to lend a hand and offer to build on it too.

SPEAKER_00 9:07

So, where would a case manager fit into this?

SPEAKER_01 9:12

Yeah, we have support coordinators that do a kind of a case management role. Um, it's a really fabulous job. It's it was one of my favorite uh positions at ABLE, actually. I love it because you're kind of in this like hub of a wheel with the person that you're supporting in services and you're helping them stay connected to everybody else that's encircling them, like their family, their job, their friends, um, their residential services, even their medical team, their providers, their doctors, and making sure everybody's communicating well and um is really there supporting that person with the type of services that they need. So it's a really neat spot to do that kind of case management because you're just kind of like that connector to everything and making sure the person with a disability is having the quality of life they want. And kind of putting it all together. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:08

It's fun, it really is fun. So, how is the plan individualized for each person rather than a one-size-fits-all approach? You kind of covered that a little bit already.

SPEAKER_01 10:18

Yeah, I did. You know, and it can be as simple as somebody we support who's very independent is working at a fast food restaurant in town, drives themselves to work, and just needs someone to stop by their apartment a couple of times a day to check in on some things with their medication or to see if they need anything or had any hiccups during the day. Um, literally, like where the day does not go well. Not worried about any hiccups diagnosis. But um, when we look at that, it there's other other people we support who um really have a much different look through their day and what services look like where we're there all the time. So it really our supports vary so much from one end of the scale to the next.

SPEAKER_00 11:06

How do you, when you have these goals you know written down for them that you you do have to have some measurement of it? Um, how do you define what success would look like for each person?

SPEAKER_01 11:18

Are they happy? I think it's like the same question for all of us. How do you define success in your life? And you know, that looks a little bit different for everybody, uh, depending on what your own personal goals are. But that general level of happiness and satisfaction with their life, that's how we know that they're getting what they need.

unknown 11:41

Right.

SPEAKER_00 11:42

And we didn't really cover this, but are they included in that goal setting and those goals and they're the ones that are helping decide, like because they're telling us what their goals are.

SPEAKER_01 11:52

Right. Um, and for people that can't communicate with words, um, oftentimes they tell us that in so many different ways. You know, you really just look at a person's mannerisms and what excites them through the day, and just because they may not be able to speak does not mean that they don't tell us what they want. And um, I think it's there's still so much judgment around many people with disabilities in our community. And those are some of the barriers we're trying to break as we look at how the team at Able impacts the community. Like we don't even like to think about things from that perspective, and we don't even like to reference ourselves as being staff or people like who are employed to help them. It's just weird. We, you know, in in a perfect world, we'd all have natural supports in our lives just to be there for each other. Um, that's just not where we're at yet in today's society. So there has to be paid services. It just looks a little too formal sometimes for what our liking is at ABLE.

unknown 12:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:56

So, what is one thing you hope listeners take away from this conversation?

SPEAKER_01 13:02

One thing I hope everybody could take away is really when you look at a lot of the responses to the questions, that response is no different than many of the rest of our own life responses. You know, so we have some help at work and some support in doing a great job at our employee at our employment. Same thing for people with disabilities. Just like in our homes, we we have a lot of support in our homes. I'm not there right now feeding my kids because I'm here with you. But it's a blessing. I have someone there to do that with them, and my husband's there to give them dinner and offer that support because I'm not there and I can't. Um, we all have support and things in our lives, and really it goes down to that satisfaction. Like, are you happy? Do you have the quality of life that you want? And and so if we could all just judge each other less and look out for each other more and understand each other better, I think the world would be a different place.

SPEAKER_00 14:02

So if someone's curious about services or things they might need support, where should they start?

SPEAKER_01 14:09

Well, typically they start right with um Badlands Human Services with our health and human services. Really, we take all referrals through through them. Um the developmental disability program managers are the ones who have to recognize whether or not that person um has services and support them first and then um help them find us. Um but if you a person wants just more information about ABLE and what kind of services we offer, they can always call our main office here in Dickinson or look us up online at um ableinc.net.

SPEAKER_00 14:43

Okay, awesome. Thank you, Janelle, for helping us better understand how these services work. They can seem complex at first, but conversations like this help make them feel a little less intimidating. This episode was made possible through a grant from the North Dakota State Council on Developmental Disabilities. Until next time, stay informed, stay empowered, and we'll see you on the next Empower Indeed podcast.