Knowing Your Limits

In the helping profession, it can be easy to become burnt out if you are not careful. My field placement can be intense and chaotic, and if you do not know your limits, you may find yourself not being so empathic as you would like. One lesson I have learned over the past month is that there will be different outside stressors impacting your days at work and at home throughout your life. Understanding what you need to keep moving forward is vital.
For myself, I need friends around me for psychological, interpersonal encouragement. I do not do well when I go home and am isolated from others. I also need to be physically active and relaxed. When I sit around, I feel lazy and unproductive. Exercise also boosts endorphins! These are great to have when you work with people and their problems all day.
Because my field work can be so intense, I have seen how much I can handle each day. I subconsciously serve my friends in a social worker sense when I go home at night, and this can be a strain after working doing the same with strangers all day. Some may choose to work in less intense environments; some may decide to do that "helping" job part time. What are your limits?

My Race?

This post can take two different directions. One, what race you would describe yourself to be ethnically; and two, what race you are running in life.

How would you describe your race? This is a question we ask every consumer while we complete our intake form. Today a woman responded to me by saying "human". So true, yet so politically incorrect. Sometimes it frustrates me that I have to ask everyone this question, when we serve each of them with the same empathy and funding regulations. Why does it really matter? Why do we need to know their race? Do we really need to track what ethnicities are coming in? Yes, it is interesting to watch the demographics, but is it really necessary?

Now in terms of running that race in life.... What is my passion? What do I want to do? Who do I want to serve? Am I being true to myself in my daily activities? Balance in responsibilities and relaxation is important, and it is easy to become overloaded as a social worker trying to help everyone with whom they are working. Where am I looking for my race training? Who is/are my cheerleaders? How can I cheer others on in their life races?

Children

This week I have encountered a couple situations where I was talking to a (single) mom over the phone and I could hear multiple children in the background screaming and claiming for the mom's attention. Even as I was the person on the other side of the phone, I could feel the stress and pressure these women must have been feeling. It is so hard to hear and concentrate on the thing you're trying to work on when you have others fighting for your attention and direction.

One of the services that often becomes necessary for consumers at my field placement is childcare. Another issue that arises with that need is finances. The people we work with are low or no income, and have difficulty accesssing services to help them pursue work, affordable housing, etc. Too often we overlook the many challenges they face in their daily life and we should encourage them in the efforts we see them making while coming to us for assistance.

Social Justice

What is social justice? In one of my graduate classes, we have been discussing how we define social justice and what issues we are specifically motivated to work on. If we were to describe social justice in one word it could be:

• humane


• respect


• equity


• equality


• redistribution


• transformative


• access


• etc.

At my field placement the other day, a few of us talked about how "extreme" we might go to be equally accessible to all people. One issue that we focused on was if a person was unable to read. Would we put up a red sign to say we were closed and a green one to say we were open? Are we right to assume that everyone can read numbers (times of service)?

I think that in all of this it is important for us to look at who our target group is and make changes based on those demographics as well as what suggestions those people may have. As social workers, we want to help people, but we also need to be reminded that community-based ideas may work better in the long run than pushing our personal agendas.

Blueprint to End Homelessness...?

So, my field placement is a part of a community where we have a "blueprint to end homelessness". You have no idea how difficult it is to actually implement. People become homeless everyday. As we talk about eliminating the word "shelter" from our vocabulary, I wonder what individuals and families are going to do when they need a place to stay and we have shelter for them. Yes, we want to help people establish more sustainable living situations, but it is not an easy fix. What can be done to empower people and decrease homelessness without taking away the services? I believe that part of this coalition to end homelessness is the desire to stop the cycle of poverty that we see in our communities. We want to truly help, not rescue people in their crises. "Rescuing" helps short-term, but does not take into consideration what other factors are ultimately impacting the situation. Long-term sustainability is key. While offering a financial amount to prevent eviction is needed, it may not always keep the consumer from falling back into that same dilemma again.

Where is the Love?

As social workers we talk a great deal about helping people. However, we all can also say that each of us has encountered at least one angry consumer when we told them we could not help them with their specific need. While it is important to abide by your agency's stipulations, I believe it can be easy to push people away when their situation does not match up properly with what you offer. Where is the love in that? Sometimes we feel burnt out with all of the people with crises flying at us. Deep down we want to help, but taking that extra step to advocate for a need that we don't advertize can be challenging. I ask myself at times like these if I am looking at that person as another intake form or a real, struggling individual. Is my empathy forced or transparent? Looking at social services in general, are we truly putting ourselves out there to serve people? Or are pushing our own agenda? Is it structured to be accessible to those in need? Where is the love?

Chronic Homelessness

This week I met with a consumer who has been homeless for many years. He comes to our agency continually seeking assistance for moving in to a home, bus tokens, etc. It was difficult for me working with this man as I wasn't sure if he was telling me the truth about his situation, or even if he was completely "with it" cognitively. He talked about how his money and ID kept getting stolen, and he could not provide any sort of documentation about income even though he talked about it. He gets angry very quickly, even if you are simply reflecting feelings with him and trying to summarize what he is asking. I learned very rapidly that I needed to directly address what he was asking for and not focus so much on empathizing like we typically do.

Once I closed the counseling session with this individual, I took a step back and realized that I had never really believed that anyone could be chronically homeless. It's not a pretty idea! I would rather prefer to think that the services in place help to eliminate that kind of lifestyle. Unfortunately, it is a painful reality. Many people are unable to secure a sustainable living environment due to mental, physical, or financial reasons. What can be done to help these people?