In the past two months I've met with prostitutes, transgenders, people sleeping under the bridge, people eating out of garbage cans, people with no family, people with no friends, people with no hope, severely mentally ill people, severely medically ill people, alcoholics, crack addicts, heroine addicts, people with bad luck, people who are fleeing domestic violence, people who trek all the way to come see me just for a $1.25 bus pass, people who are not ready to give up, and people who know there's more to life than what they've been living.
I am a social worker. Every day I meet with people that others have given up on. I meet with people who have sometimes given up on themselves. My job is to restore hope. My job is to help motivate them and to point them in the right direction. My job is to listen to their story when no one else will. My job is to be there for them when all they need to do is cry. My job is to spend hours on the phone making sure they can get employment, medical attention, food and housing. My job is to make sure that my 20-year-old client with a 7-month-old baby doesn't sleep on the street one more night. My job is to make sure that my crack-addicted alcoholic client doesn't sleep with one more man for a place to sleep.
But these things aren't listed in my job description. My job description is simple: Refer clients in crises to places that can assist them. But what does that entail? It's impossible to turn a blind eye to clients who come in and tell you they're living under the bridge with a 7-month-year old baby.
In social work, job descriptions don't matter because there are no words that can adequately describe what you do. You need to be well-versed in all mental illnesses so that you know how to approach people when they come into your office. You need to be able to be objective yet empathetic when someone tells you that they have lung cancer, kidney disease, liver disease and heart disease and they think every day is their last, however they don't have a bed to lay down in. You need to know how to talk to people in a way that says "I can't solve all of your problems, but I damn sure am gonna try."
You need to know how to motivate people who keep getting turned down for job after job because they made the mistake of not going to college. You need to be able to enforce that it's never too late to start your life over or make your existing life a life that you look forward to living.
You need to be able to give up your lunch or your daytime snack to someone who has a rumbling stomach throughout your whole session. You need to be able to give up your last $10 in your purse to a street musician who makes a living off of playing guitar on Bourbon Street but doesn't have the $8 to fix his guitar strings. You need to be able to change one of the worst days of someone's life into one that isn't so bad.
I'm aware that I'm a social worker. But that's not all I am. In the past two months I've taken on the role of best friend, shoulder to cry on, family, guardian angel, and glimpse of hope. I've given people the will power to become self-sufficient, to believe in themselves, and to realize that no matter what happened in the past, the future is still unwritten. Sometimes all homeless people need is a little shove, and I would like to think I've done a whole lot of pushing.
Although aspects of this post are well written I think overall you need to rethink the tone. As someone who graduated with a Bachelors degree in Social Work and is currently working toward my Masters in Social Work I feel like overall this is a complete misrepresentation of our field. I am proud of the title I carry as a social worker and sometimes when people are drawn into the field without any formal education, social work values get lost in translation. Some of the ideas you talked about are simply perpetuating false stereotypes about homeless clients (this is a particularly sore spot for me). I appreciate the work you are doing and I am sure that you are helping your clients, but I believe in social work as a strengths based profession. Yes clients are struggling to survive with life threatening diseases and living under bridges, but this is not what defines them. My clients are dependent on drugs and alcohol but this is not them. My clients are defined by their resilience, their kindness, and their willingness to share their story with me. All in all, I am happy to read about social work expanding, but I would like to see you take more of a learning role in their lives, rather than the expert.
ReplyDeleteSincerely, a professional social worker
Best of luck in the future!
I in no way, shape or form think I took on the role of an "expert." What I was saying was that I'm NOT just a person in a cookie cutter career and that I take on many other roles, including best friend and family so that they are comfortable to talk to me (which is what you told me to convey, however I already conveyed that). I do not think I perpetuated false stereotypes because I listed all types of people: Yes I listed mentally ill and alcoholics, but I also listed people who have bad luck and are stuck in a bad situation. This includes all ends of the spectrum. I basically said what you're saying--that all they need is the motivation and that they have the capability to achieve a better life for themselves. So I'm not sure where you're saying I went wrong.
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DeleteGrace&Love,
DeleteI think you miss the boat on what this blogpost actually is meant to be. Yes, the premise of this piece is based around Cat and her job as a social worker, but the point of this entry is simply to explain to people outside of the social work profession what it means for her to do social work. Cat writes this blog so that her readers can live the experience through her perspective. You arrogantly display your "professional" title and degree work as if a) they matter in terms of this post, and b) you somehow have cause to critique the perspective and experiences of Cat. Not only are you mistaken, but you have ironically further misrepresented social workers (more so than Cat ever could in this post) to be stuck-up and unable to connect with humanist writing. It is incredibly sad that a social worker like you could read a post like this and simply think, "Well, that's nice and all, but she didn't touch upon the buzzwords/values/technique that people in the social work field should constantly reference." Get over yourself. If that's how you feel, then this post simply isn't for you and you should move on quietly. This post was meant for readers like me to see social work through the eyes of Cat Elsby. And not only did she do a good job and give me a greater respect for the profession, but she also role modeled to me how kind, generous, and empathic social workers can/should be and what they sacrifice to make a difference. How dare you take the opportunity to slight that.
You could learn a thing or two from Cat, humility being one of them. You and your clients will benefit greatly from that.
Dear graceandlove;
ReplyDeleteAs someone who reads Cat's blog quite religiously, I could not let this post go un-defended.
The only thing your response proves, to any reader, is that despite your Bachelors and (hopefully!) Masters degree, you cannot handle that someone without such exact credentials can feel compelled to write so frankly about their social work experience. I feel as though Cat hits some of the points that those of us without, as you say, "formal education" lose in translation. I am, as I believe you’d call it, just a volunteer. I don't believe Cat ever articulated or gave the impression that these stereotypes define the people she works with. If anything, she offers that these stereotypes, perpetuated by the sad state of society these days, are what for her have been not only a challenge, but perhaps where she has grown and learned the most. Cat speaks to their resilience, but also to finding her own; which is not usually the side of social work one reads about. For ONE post she has made the focus her own reflection of what she has come away from this experience with, AND if you had read any of her previous posts, you'd understand that as well. Cat is not perpetuating stereotypes: she’s being honest about the kinds of people she works with and her real reaction to that- not what we'd hope she might say. It’s a relatable reaction, and as a volunteer it gives me hope. She isn’t a saint; she’s human, like the rest of us. But I’ll be the first person and certainly not the last to admit she’s doing a damn good job of it. Being able to give of one's self so selflessly is what I think perhaps what I admire so much of Cat and I think what you've missed here. So you've studied Social Work. Now you have the right to judge how someone else FEELS about his or her experience in the field? (That must be the part of social work I missed while I was too busy volunteering. My bad!) You mention that social work is a strengths based profession. Do we see that as an applied definition to just the people we’re helping or could that potentially be applied inward; a personal reflection? I completely agree with you, strengths are certainly an area to not only focus on but to nurture in order to create individual strengths and confidence. But since I have no experience in Social Work, formally, I’ll focus on Cat, and her strengths. I think anyone able to blog about this experience is a brave person. You’re immediately vulnerable. To go in to this profession of serving others, no matter what you have studied or consider your-self ‘expert’ in, takes a certain amount of grace, conviction, compassion and a willingness to share ones heart. I certainly couldn’t admit to possessing the balls to pack up shop and move far away and give up life as I know it to help those who have experiences I could never imagine living through. Hence, I am not the social worker.
Before you consider stereotyping the people who perhaps do not write the way you would prefer your profession to be represented, let’s be thankful that there are people out there like Cat, willing to pursue service as something they are passionate about, and not just the letters that will hopefully appear after their name.
- Grace. (Formally, an architect. Informally, a volunteer.)
Proud of you every day Cat.