{"id":2031,"date":"2024-09-23T11:52:56","date_gmt":"2024-09-23T01:52:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/192.168.1.221:8741\/?p=2031"},"modified":"2024-11-07T13:52:11","modified_gmt":"2024-11-07T03:52:11","slug":"robert-beats-injuries-for-culinary-comeback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/news\/robert-beats-injuries-for-culinary-comeback\/","title":{"rendered":"Robert beats injuries for culinary comeback"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barriers<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Robert is from the Sunshine Coast and began his employment journey as a 16-year old in the hospitality industry.

Unfortunately, Robert had one huge hurdle to overcome along his way.

While working as a chef in Raratonga in the Cook Islands, Robert crashed his motorbike into a seawall. He was found and taken to hospital in a serious condition. He suffered a fractured skull and a frontal lobe haemorrhage. 48 hours later he was airlifted to Auckland, New Zealand.

At Auckland City Hospital it was also discovered through further x-rays and CT scans that he had a fractured C1 vertebrae as well as a fractured orbital socket. His family flew to New Zealand and set up a GoFundMe page to help get Robert back to Australia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once back in Australia Robert under-went months of rehabilitation and and was eventually released from hospital. He continued to have both neuropsychology support and physiotherapy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Approaching OCTEC<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Robert came to OCTEC DES Gympie back in 2019, seeing consultant Graeme. Up until 2022, Robert attempted employment as a chef with several hotels in the Gympie area. Unfortunately these positions were impacted by both continuing symptoms from the accident and COVID shutdowns.
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<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Getting back to his dream job<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But in December 2022, Robert was able to gain employment at Tides Waterfront Dining, Caloundra, one of the Sunshine Coast\u2019s premier restaurants with the support of OCTEC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the ongoing support from Graeme, and a coordinated approach with his employer at Tides, Robert has grown to now be a confident and respected member of the staff. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He is now 39, a qualified chef and the father of a 10-year-old daughter. Robert is planning to continue chasing his dream of becoming a head chef at a top class restaurant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In what has been a long journey, Robert has now found his ideal employment where he is respected and can use his skills in an industry he thought may have been lost to him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you live with a disability, illness, or injury and are looking for work, please feel free to reach out to your local employment specialists for assistance<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Robert recovered from serious injuries and long-term unemployment to pursue his dream in becoming a head chef.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":2033,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2031","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2031"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2447,"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2031\/revisions\/2447"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.octec.org.au\/tr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}