Navigating life with disability can involve much more than managing the disability itself. There can be challenges relating to relationships, emotional wellbeing, independence, accessing services, communicating your needs, managing significant life changes and participating in your community.
For people with an NDIS plan that includes appropriate funding for social work or therapeutic supports, Michele from Compass Counselling can provide individualised social work support focused on helping you build capacity, increase independence and work towards the goals identified in your NDIS plan.
The NDIS recognises social work as one of the allied health professions that may provide funded therapy supports where the support meets NDIS funding criteria and relates to the participant’s disability, functional needs and goals.
At Compass Counselling, the focus is not simply on a diagnosis. Michele works from a person-centred, strengths-based and trauma-informed perspective, considering the whole person and the circumstances affecting their everyday life.
What Can an NDIS Social Worker Help With?
Social workers are trained to consider the interaction between a person and the world around them.
This can be particularly helpful for people living with disability because difficulties in one area of life can often affect many others.
Depending on your individual NDIS plan, disability-related needs and goals, Michele’s social work services may assist with areas such as:
- developing emotional regulation and coping strategies
- building confidence and self-advocacy skills
- developing healthy boundaries
- improving communication and interpersonal skills
- managing changes and transitions
- developing strategies for stress and overwhelm
- increasing independence
- developing routines and practical life skills
- strengthening social and community participation
- understanding patterns that may create barriers in everyday life
- building problem-solving and decision-making skills
- developing strategies to manage challenging relationships
- strengthening your ability to communicate your needs to others
- identifying appropriate community and mainstream supports
- working collaboratively with other professionals involved in your care.
The exact support provided will always depend upon your individual circumstances, your NDIS goals and what your plan is funded to support.
Building Your Capacity Rather Than Simply Doing Things for You
An important part of NDIS social work is capacity building.
Capacity building means supporting you to develop skills, strategies and confidence that can increase your ability to manage aspects of your life as independently as possible.
For example, if making telephone calls to services feels overwhelming, capacity building might involve developing a plan for the conversation, practising what you would like to say, identifying questions to ask and gradually building confidence in communicating with services yourself.
If establishing boundaries is difficult, sessions might focus on recognising your own needs, identifying what a healthy boundary could look like, practising assertive communication and developing strategies for responding when someone does not respect that boundary.
The goal is to work with you, rather than simply doing everything for you.
Emotional Regulation and Coping Skills
Living with disability can sometimes involve frustration, uncertainty, sensory or emotional overwhelm, social isolation and difficulty navigating environments that do not adequately accommodate individual needs.
Social work sessions can provide a supportive environment for developing practical strategies for managing these experiences.
Depending on your needs and NDIS goals, this might include learning about:
Emotional regulation – recognising emotions and developing strategies for responding to them.
Grounding techniques – helping you reconnect with the present moment when feeling overwhelmed.
Breathing and relaxation strategies – developing practical techniques that can be used during stressful situations.
Mindfulness – learning to notice thoughts, emotions and physical sensations without immediately reacting to them.
Self-compassion – developing a kinder and less critical relationship with yourself.
Recognising triggers – becoming more aware of situations that contribute to distress or overwhelm and developing strategies for managing them.
These areas connect with many of the topics we have previously explored in Compass Counselling blogs and free resources, including mindfulness, breathwork, grounding, self-compassion, boundaries, habits and calming the nervous system.
For NDIS-funded sessions, however, strategies are used within an appropriate social work framework and need to relate to the participant’s disability-related functional needs and NDIS goals.
Developing Self-Advocacy Skills
Sometimes people know what they need but find it difficult to explain it to other people. Self-advocacy involves learning how to understand and communicate your needs, preferences and choices. Michele can work with clients to develop skills such as preparing for meetings, identifying questions they would like answered, communicating concerns, understanding options, organising information and becoming more confident participating in decisions that affect their lives.
For some clients, the first step may simply be learning that it is okay to ask questions and say:
“I don’t understand. Can you explain that differently?”
Building these skills can make a significant difference when navigating disability services, healthcare, community organisations and everyday relationships.
Managing Life Changes and Transitions
Change can be difficult for anyone, but some people living with disability may experience additional challenges when routines, environments, relationships or supports change.
This might include:
- moving home
- changing support workers or services
- beginning or leaving education
- changes within the family
- relationship changes
- changes in independence
- developing new routines
- entering new social environments
- adjusting to changes in functional capacity.
Social work support can help break a significant change into smaller, more manageable steps and develop strategies to support adjustment.
Increasing Social and Community Participation
Feeling connected to other people and to our community is an important part of wellbeing. However, disability-related barriers can sometimes make participation more difficult. Social work can help identify what those barriers are and develop strategies for addressing them.
For one person, the barrier might be anxiety about entering unfamiliar environments. For another, it might be difficulty communicating with new people. Someone else may need help identifying activities that are accessible and genuinely meaningful to them. Rather than assuming what community participation should look like, the starting point is:
What matters to you?
From there, we can explore practical steps towards greater participation, connection and independence where these relate to your NDIS goals.
A Trauma-Informed Approach
Michele brings extensive experience working with people who have experienced adversity, significant life changes and complex circumstances. A trauma-informed approach recognises the importance of emotional and physical safety, trust, choice, collaboration and empowerment. It also recognises that behaviour often makes more sense when we understand what a person has experienced and the environment in which that behaviour developed. The aim is not to ask:
“What’s wrong with you?”
but to understand:
“What has happened, what is happening now, what barriers are you experiencing, and what support will help you move towards the life you want?”
Working With Your Existing Support Team
With your consent, social work support can also involve collaboration with other people involved in supporting you.
Depending upon your circumstances and funded supports, this may include communication with your support coordinator, occupational therapist, psychologist, GP, other allied health professionals, support workers or relevant community services.
Collaborative practice can be particularly valuable when a person has several services involved and needs everyone to have a clearer understanding of their goals and support needs. Your privacy, choices and consent remain important throughout this process.
Online and Face-to-Face Social Work Support
Michele can provide social work sessions face-to-face in Canberra or online, depending upon your needs and circumstances. Online appointments may be particularly helpful for people who experience difficulties with travel, fatigue, mobility, leaving home or accessing suitable services locally.
For other clients, meeting face-to-face provides the environment in which they feel most comfortable. We can discuss which option is most appropriate for you.
What About Compass Counselling’s Holistic Services?
Compass Counselling offers a range of services outside of its NDIS social work services, and regular readers will know that our blogs explore holistic topics such as meditation, energy work, Emotion Code, Body Code and intuitive healing. It is important to distinguish these services from NDIS-funded social work.
The NDIS currently states that alternative and complementary therapies and energy and health practices are not funded as NDIS therapy supports. Therefore, services provided using a participant’s NDIS funding must be appropriate NDIS supports and relate to the participant’s funded social work or therapeutic needs and goals.
If you are interested in one of Michele’s other holistic services, you are welcome to discuss these separately with Compass Counselling, but they should not be assumed to be payable from your NDIS funding.
Do I Have Funding for Social Work?
Having an NDIS plan does not automatically mean that every service is covered. The NDIS states that therapy supports are stated supports, meaning funding is provided for a particular support or service and cannot simply be swapped for something else.
Before commencing NDIS-funded social work with Compass Counselling, we can discuss the type of funding you have available and whether the service you are seeking is consistent with your plan and NDIS requirements. If you are unsure, you may also wish to speak with your NDIS contact, plan manager or support coordinator.
How Can Compass Counselling Help?
At Compass Counselling, we understand that life can be hard. Disability can sometimes add additional layers of complexity to everyday life, relationships, independence and accessing the wider community. Michele’s approach combines her professional social work experience with empathy, compassion and a genuine respect for each client’s individual circumstances. NDIS social work is not about telling you how your life should look.
It is about identifying what matters to you, understanding the barriers getting in the way and working collaboratively to develop the skills, strategies and confidence that can help you move towards your goals.
Interested in NDIS Social Work Services?
If you have an NDIS plan with approved funding that can be used for social work services and would like to find out whether Michele’s services may be suitable for you, please contact Compass Counselling.
We can discuss your goals, the support you are looking for and whether the services Michele provides align with your available NDIS funding.
Your goals. Your choices. Your life.
References
National Disability Insurance Agency. (2026). NDIS pricing schedule. National Disability Insurance Scheme.
National Disability Insurance Agency. (2026). NDIS support catalogue 2026–27. National Disability Insurance Scheme.
National Disability Insurance Agency. (2026). What are NDIS pricing arrangements? National Disability Insurance Scheme.
National Disability Insurance Agency. (2026). What are therapy supports? National Disability Insurance Scheme.
