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Day in and day out we, as occupational therapists, get up for the day and put our best efforts forward to impact our patients, our clients, and our students to the best of our ability. Speaking for the majority of occupational therapists that I know, we work hard, and more importantly, we love what we do. Our purpose is to contribute to meaningful change in the lives of those we work with. But there's something underlying that almost all OT's who I know identify in professional discussions with me that they purposely leave out of everyday conversations. I couldn't tell you how many times I have heard therapist's identify themselves as unsure in the service they provide when it comes to executive function intervention. I will be the first to admit that I have felt that way A LOT! Do you know how many times I have been asked "how is that OT's role? " or "why would OT focus on EF?"....Too many to count. During those moments when I was questioned, I constantly kept many intervention related thoughts and opinions to myself because as an occupational therapist I didn't feel I matched up to those asking the questions. Speech therapists, psychologists, counselors, they all seemed to have it covered and did not understand our role. So I would think to myself that maybe I was wrong. Maybe I was way off base. But time went on and my perspective changed. I remember I was reading one night, in an attempt to further my executive function competence, and came upon an interesting definition. The psychologist Russel Barkely stated in his book; Executive Functions: What They Are, How They Work, and Why They Evolved (2012), that executive functions "can be initially defined as those self-directed actions needed to choose goals and to create, enact, and sustain actions towards those goals". Upon reading this my first thoughts were, "hey that's a lot of what OT works on with clients....their ability to attain their own self identified goals". So I read on, and as I did, my confidence in knowing that our profession plays a role grew and grew. It was the first book that truly gave me the confidence to pursue my ongoing interest in executive function intervention and become the therapist I am today.
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