Transcript: Disability champion - Jo
[Voiceover]
Jo has suffered from health problems all her life, but ten years ago, they nearly got the better of her.
[Jo]
Just in the last decade, I found that I could never get well again.You know,I’d have, the sick periods would last longer and the ‘well’ periods are getting shorter, and I got really suicidal. You know, I just thought life's not worth living any more, if this is going to be my life.
[Voiceover]
Then she started on the Disability Support Pension.
[Jo]
And I went to the psychiatrist at the Redfern Community Health Centre, and eventually she talked me into going to Centrelink. I was given this fantastic woman Erica, who is just brilliant and works at Centrelink, and who's my disability support officer. She was absolutely great.She was the first one who made me see the light at the end of the tunnel. She was the one who referred me to Ostara where I met Barbara, and then Barbara then referred me around to Uplift, the psychological place. From then on, things have been going up, and up, and up.
[Voiceover]
Ostara is a Disability Employment Service where consultant Barbara has seen a big transformation in her client.
[Barbara, Ostara Disability Employment Service]
Well, I’ve been seeing Jo about a year I would say, and now she is very confident lady,I have say, yeah. The first day she came, she was in tears. Really in tears, and sort of not happy person in herself and lost, I would say.
[Voiceover]
An established painter, Jo began to meet other artists in her area, holding group exhibitions, and teaching.
[Jo]
It's actually become really inspiring, and it spurs me on and gives me energy to do more of my own work. I just love also being able to see the looks on people's faces when they realise that they are creative and they produce things.Especially the people who say, I can't draw, I’venever be able to draw, and I'm not creative. I don't have a creative bone in my body,and everyone does in my opinion.Everyone is born creative, and it just gets drilled out of you, as you get older.
[Voiceover]
Painting itself is also very therapeutic.
[Jo]
You stop worrying.So it's actually really physically healthy because it lowers my blood pressure.It gets me relaxed and it takes me into a zone, and when I am in that zone I feel like I’ve had 8 hours sleep, you know, it's fantastic. It's very refreshing. It also has that effect when you get feedback on your work from other people that love it and fall in love with it. It just does something.It moves them to sometimes an incredible degree.That's quite shocking in a way.How much they can fall in love your work sometimes and that makes you feel part of society as well, and it makes you feel belonging.
[Voiceover]
Jo's health problems stem from a hereditary condition that led to mental health issues.
[Jo]
Because I have such weird conditions, and I can look perfectly fine sometimes and still feel like hell. But it causes a lot of pain and I’ve had a lot of surgeries, and I have had to go into surgery about ten times, for different surgeries, and then that takes a long time to recover.
[Voiceover]
Stress and anxiety exacerbate Jo's condition. But Barbara helped her find discounted membership at the local gym.
[Jo]
So I also had a bit of anxiety about going to gyms, and other things as well, but this place is really welcoming and relaxed.It gives me so much energy even if I go down there half dead. If I do a bit of exercise, it actually,something changes. I get a lot more energy, and come back and I feel better and even if I can't do too much, I just feel better in the head. I don't feel so ‘urg’.
[Jo presenting an artist’s work to the art class]
…because of the way he does the composition, the tone….
[Voiceover]
Now Jo's looking forward to a different future to the one she used to imagine.
[Jo]
Just knowing that I’ve got access to things that make it feel better, and that if I do the homework from the meditation and the yoga and stuff,that my health will probably get even better and better.So that's made a huge difference,just having a bit of hope. I think it's gone instead of despair; it’s gone from despair to hope [laughs].
[Text on screen]
Support. Connect. Achieve
For more information visit humanservices.gov.au/dsp