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Community Living Assistant

Supporting People with Challenging Behaviors and Using Behavior Support Plans

You may support someone with challenging behaviors. A person you support may become agitated with you or raise their voice to you. They could cross your personal boundaries by asking personal questions or asking you to do something that you are not comfortable with.

For many potential new Community Living Assistants, this sounds a little frightening. Yet, with training, new Community Living Assistants with no prior experience learn how to prevent people from displaying challenging behavior. They also learn to respond to people in ways that helps people become or stay calm.

You will not be asked to work with people who have challenging behaviors without training on how to prevent these behaviors and how to handle them when they occur. Over time you may decide that you really enjoy working with people with challenging behaviors because you will play an active role in teaching them better communication and living skills, which should cause their challenging behaviors to diminish.

Many people with disabilities who display challenging behaviors are able to change with support from a Community Living Assistant.

AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIORS...

Felicia is very sweet and Tina, her Community Living Assistant, enjoys her time supporting her. Tina knows that Felicia has some emotional problems that she is working on, in addition to medical problems that cause her pain.

Some days Felicia is not in a good mood, which can lead to her yelling and throwing objects. Tina decides to talk with Felicia’s other support staff about strategies and techniques to prevent her aggressive behaviors.

Tina learns that one of the coping skills that Felicia has is to squeeze a stress ball when she is feeling anxious or out of control.

The longer Tina works with Felicia the more she is able to identify the signs that she is not feeling well and encourages her to use her coping skills to prevent challenging behaviors.