District of Munich – Award for Frauke Schwaiblmair – District of Munich

The pin looks like a flower. White-blue Bavarian diamonds in the middle, white petals around it, the whole rests – so it looks – on a laurel wreath. Frauke Schwaiblmair from Graefelfing can now put the flower on her lapel as a thank you, for more than 40 years of voluntary work in open work with the disabled she received the Prime Minister’s medal of honour. She’s happy about it: A “thank you culture” is important, she says, because that’s how the work behind it is perceived. The work behind it, for Frauke Schwaiblmair, means enabling people with disabilities to participate more in social life, integrating them and not excluding them. That’s why she burns.

Frauke Schwaiblmair’s mission is to stand up for others, to give a voice to those who are otherwise rarely heard. Looking back, she would have liked to have known earlier that such commitment is only really effective when you combine local politics and voluntary work. “It has power, you can shape it, that inspires me.” Schwaiblmair had been doing voluntary work for almost 30 years when she moved up to the Gräfelfingen municipal council in 2005 as a non-party for the Greens/Independent List. She was a councilor for 17 years until she left office this summer. In 2014 she was also elected to the district council and worked there until 2020. She has been a district councilor since 2018 and in this role also the inclusion officer for the district of Upper Bavaria. In the district of Munich, she has been active in the advisory board for people with disabilities since 2011, most recently as chairwoman, until she gave up this job in the summer – it was all just too much for her.

Whichever committee she sits on, she argues with perseverance for the interests of people with disabilities. She can ignite a fire, for example for barrier-free bus stops or the question of whether sidewalks are wide enough for walking frames. Some colleagues on the committee roll their eyes – “Frauke again” – but she doesn’t care. “We only advance issues if we keep reminding them,” she says. And as long as they are not implemented, she will speak up. It sees itself as a “mouthpiece for people who don’t have a lobby”. She just managed to get the participants in this year’s Special Olympics to be honored at the annual athletes’ awards ceremony held in the municipality of Gräfelfing in the fall. Actually, they would only be awarded retrospectively a year later, “but that’s too long for a person with intellectual disability,” says Schwaiblmair. They need the recognition immediately.

When she was 13, she took her older sister with her

Frauke Schwaiblmair – she will be 60 in January – is perhaps one of the few in the district who counts people with a mental handicap among her friends as a matter of course. She has been volunteering for them since she was 13 years old. At the time, the sister, who was eight years her senior, was active in the youth work of the evangelical church in the north of Munich. The local deacon founded the “Open Disabled Work – Evangelical in the Munich Region” (OBA). The sister became a youth leader and Frauke went with them. The OBA organized recreational events for people with disabilities, especially those with intellectual and multiple disabilities. The concept has always been to bring people with and without disabilities together, long before the word inclusion existed. Under the umbrella of the OBA, she founded the Wednesday club in 1979 at the age of just 16, where people sang, did handicrafts and bowled, and friendships developed. “Some have lasted for over 40 years,” they grew old together in the OBA. Voluntary work, private life and work have long since become inseparable. She met her husband at the OBA, where he also volunteered. Likewise, her career choice is probably inspired by volunteering, as she says herself. Frauke Schwaiblmair has a practice for music therapy and psychotherapy, specializing in people with intellectual disabilities.

According to Frauke Schwaiblmair, it is “a coincidence that I slipped into it and that I was allowed to learn”. She gives a lot, but above all she gets a lot in return, such as friendships with a lot of closeness and great emotions. People with an intellectual disability are simply “undisguised”. You have learned not to overestimate the intellect. Decisions are also made on other levels, based on a gut feeling, for example, “that also has its value”. She found out early on that it’s normal to be different. She also experienced “the other side,” she says. In 1992, their first child with Down syndrome was born and was just under a year old. The responsibility to continue to get involved still has an effect today. She gave birth to three more children, one son died of a serious illness at the age of 17.

“My youngest son didn’t know what it was like, a summer without an OBA”

Meeting people with disabilities has always been part of everyday life in the Schwaiblmair family. Every year, the children went on a two-week summer vacation with open work for the disabled: “My youngest son didn’t know what it was like, a summer without an OBA,” says Schwaiblmair. She still organizes an integrative games and sports group in Gräfelfing once a week and trains an inclusive badminton team one evening. Sometimes her husband comes with her, sometimes her son too. Until recently, both sports offerings belonged to the OBA umbrella, but TSV Gräfelfing has now integrated them into its offerings, a great success for Schwaiblmair. People with and without disabilities do sports in the same club, which is exactly how it should be, she thinks.

Frauke Schwaiblmair now wants to take things a little easier. She only wants to remain a district councilor and run again in 2023. She’s not done yet, she needs political office to advance her volunteer work. “We have to create more opportunities for encounters,” is their goal, namely to bring people with and without disabilities together. For the new year, she has made it her goal to integrate people with disabilities even more into the local clubs.

source site