Swinging back and forth

Well, things have taken quite a turn, haven’t they?

I don’t have any special answers, any more than anyone does. I’m doing what everyone is: trying to balance childcare and work and self-care and watching the news (though I do less of that because self-care). I’m providing supervision and some therapy virtually; I’m seeing hospice patients in their homes, wearing a mask and sitting several feet away. I’m trying to provide some structure for my little girls, who are really too young to have a grasp of what’s happening but who still need reassurance after their lives have been changed significantly. I am video chatting with friends and family and having the occasional crying jag. I’m doing what we’re all doing. And in the midst of it, I am grieving.

I’m sure you’ve seen a lot about grief in the past few weeks. It seems to be the best descriptor a lot of people have about how they’re feeling. In addition to the anxiety and stress and depression many of us are experiencing is a heavy helping of grief: for the normalcy we’ve lost, for the suffering of others, for the waves of deaths around the world. We are all experiencing loss.

I have a favorite theory of grief. (If you’re a social worker reading this, or a hospice worker, I know you just nodded your head in understanding. If you’re not, I’m sure this blog is already a weird read for you so you shouldn’t be too surprised). In the past few weeks, as we’re all trying to come to terms with what’s happening, I’ve found this favorite theory to be a great comfort. It’s called dual process theory and I hope you find it helpful, too.

Imagine a pendulum swinging between two orientations: loss and restoration. When the pendulum swings into loss-oriented thinking, that’s when we’re actively grieving: experiencing our pain, adjusting to the “new normal” (a phrase I have grown to truly despise), and accepting our losses. We can only live in that space for so long though; it’s sad there and our brains can only tolerate so much sadness. So imagine the pendulum swinging again, this time to the restoration orientation. This is a state where we’re becoming comfortable in our new roles, being distracted by other needs, and paying attention to the ways in which our lives have changed rather than just our losses.

It’s not a linear theory; that’s part of its appeal, if you ask me. Instead it imagines the pendulum swinging back and forth over time, as we experience both states of being. There’s no timeline for grief, you see. There’s no normal way to do it. We’re all just swinging back and forth between the mundane tasks of daily living and the profound grief we are experiencing as human beings in the midst of an unprecedented crisis.

I hope you’re caring for yourself, however that looks. I hope this theory or this blog is helpful to you, or to someone you love. I hope that you are able to see the light that shines in darkness and that you can forgive yourself when you’re not able to; it is, after all, an ongoing process. I hope you are safe. I hope this ends soon. I hope you I hope and hope and hope.

Be my witness

I’ve had a lot of trouble writing this post. Not because I don’t know what I want to say; the words have been pouring out for days. It’s more that I can’t seem to get them into a coherent order. I’ve been struggling with my work—not my job, but the actual work of being with grief and illness and death. I’ve been thinking for weeks about what it means to witness the suffering of others.

It’s a heavy topic, and I’ve come to imagine it as an actual weight. When I’m with my patients and their families, I take their weight for a little while, to give them a rest. Then I hand it back before I leave the house. I literally leave, which helps separate me from the grief I’ve witnessed. But lately the weight has seemed heavier, not as easy to release when the visit ends. And because this blog has become a key part of my self-care, I’ve got to write it out so I can move on.

The other day, I mentioned to my husband that I had met someone who had lived the life of Job. He had never heard that expression before, which makes me think it’s an old-fashioned one (I have an old soul, you guys) so I will elaborate. Skip this paragraph if you’re familiar with our friend Job of Old Testament fame. Job was some poor soul that God used to prove a point to Satan. (Old Testament God made some upsetting choices, honestly). God not only stripped Job of his earthly possessions and killed off all ten(!) of his children, He also gave the guy a horrid skin disease. This was all to prove to Satan that Job would continue to love God under any circumstances. There are more details, of course, but you get the gist: Job’s suffering was incredible.

I sometimes meet people who have suffered so much that a part of my brain thinks, this cannot possibly be true. Their losses have added up so significantly that it is almost unbelievable that one person could have bad luck like that. There are times that I am faced with such tragedy and pain that it nearly takes my breath away. In those moments, I wish I didn’t choose to be a witness to suffering.

And yet, I did. Or it chose me, whichever. The point is, I am honored that people trust me enough to tell me about their trauma. I feel that it is a gift that I can bear witness to someone else’s pain and briefly hold it for them so they can get a break. I don’t have to live with it, myself (I have my own tragedies to carry). Anything is bearable for a few minutes and I usually can let it go.

But, like I said, lately I’m having trouble releasing the weight. I imagine myself being pushed down, little by little, as I hear sadder and sadder stories. Picture me up to my knees in the ground, carrying something heavy on my shoulders. That’s what it feels like: I’m standing upright but I’m sinking.

It’s hard to admit that. I pride myself on having excellent boundaries and solid self-care. It’s difficult to tell you that my usual stuff is not totally working at the moment. But the best disinfectant is sunlight; it’s better to admit that I’m struggling. So what will I do? In these times, which come along with the territory of the work, I allow myself to feel overburdened. I let my heart feel heavy. I go to church. I look into the beautiful, healthy faces of my daughters and try to be present with them. I read celebrity gossip. I take deep breaths. And I wait, as patiently as I can, for the weight to lift.

There is great tragedy in the world but also great joy. Even Job received his rewards (questionable whether the pain was worth it, but again, Old Testament stories are wild). I can still see the good. It exists in the warmth of strangers, in music, in bright sunsets, in my children’s laughter. It exists in my work, which can be deeply, profoundly sad, but also wildly, touchingly beautiful. It is heavy but I have chosen to carry it. I am still grateful.

Speaking of which, thank you for being my witness today. I hope you find an easy road today. Be well.

Not a rupture, but a tear

Over the years, I have grown comfortable with what I can and cannot do for my patients. I think often of my early hospice career, when I once called my dad after leaving a visit, sobbing because my very young patient was going to die. (I’m sure I’ve written about this before but it has shaped my practice so much in the past six years, I feel compelled to mention it again). The short story is, I told my dad that I couldn’t do anything for her because I couldn’t stop her from dying. And my dad kindly reminded me that I could do something: I could be with her.

It’s a lesson I carry with me into the saddest cases as well as the most mundane days. It’s how I do my work without being drowned by the suffering of others. Also, it’s true! I can’t stop people from dying but I can bear witness and be still and that is mostly enough.

But then, there’s this patient.

I’ve been seeing this lady every two weeks since July. She and her family were told by the doctor, in July, that she had hours to days to live. Another wise thing my dad has told me my whole life is that doctors don’t know everything and they definitely cannot accurately predict when death will come. Here, case in point: she’s still alive in November. And she’s not exactly thrilled about it. I can’t blame her: she’s mostly confined to her bed, she barely eats, and she feels like a burden on her children. When I visit, we talk about those things, but also about her life and her accomplishments and her family. We have a good rapport and I think she enjoys my visits.

Last time I saw her, she was having a particularly bad day. I used all my active listening and therapeutic presence skills and I thought, when I left, that I had been at least a little helpful. When I called this week to schedule our normal visit, she declined. This happens, don’t get me wrong; sometimes people aren’t up for a visit, especially if it’s “just to talk.” But there’s a little nagging voice in my head that is telling me she said no because I can’t do anything for her.

This isn’t a therapeutic rupture exactly but it does feel like a little tear, or a crack maybe. And again, I may be projecting, but I heard in something in her voice when she said “not today.” I heard, “you can’t do anything for me, so why bother?” And that’s the part of the job that scratches away at my confidence and my resolve. I can’t change things for her. What I can offer, she doesn’t want right now.

It’s taking everything in me to type the following: THAT’S OKAY! It is okay that she declined one visit, one time. It’s okay that she’s depressed. It’s okay that I have no magic wand. (Maybe if I write these words enough, they’ll come true). It’s okay to not be all things to all people.

This is mostly my stuff because I’ve been having a hard time getting people to agree to visits, especially new patients. That’s a thing that happens in this job; after six years, you would think I could sit comfortably with it. But at this moment, I’m struggling with it. And honestly, that’s okay too. It’s not a rupture in my work, just a stumble. Carry on, my grandfather used to say, and so: I will.

Photo by Namnso Ukpanah on Unsplash

Living in the village

The other day, I just about ran out of a joint visit. It was a tough one: the patient’s caregiver is struggling, to put it mildly. His anger is palpable. He is hyper-focused on a story he tells every time I see him, of how the hospital and the doctors wronged him and his partner, and how he will get revenge (his words). It is a difficult house to be in, so the nurse and I have made a couple of joint visits.

As a rule, I love joint visits. This work can be isolating and lonely and it’s helpful to have someone else with you sometimes, if only to cut your eyes at when the family leaves the room. I’ve been lucky over my career to work with a lot of wonderful nurses who relied on me for my expertise just as I relied on them for theirs. I think of hospice—of all interdisciplinary work, really—as a village. At its best, the team functions as a mini village where each person has their own role to fulfill: the nurse, medical care; the home health aide, physical care; the social worker, emotional care; the chaplain, spiritual care. Beautiful, right? Everyone has their own set of skills in the village, which complement each other and serve the patient.

There’s a balance to village life: just as I’m able to give to others, I have to do some taking, too. Obviously it’s not always an even split; that’s life. But with this co-worker of mine, the split is so off that something has to change. And I’m struggling with how to set a boundary without derailing a fairly new professional relationship. This visit may be the straw that is breaking my back.

I don’t want to go into too much detail, because the minutiae is not terribly important. The gist is, this co-worker attempted to do some psychosocial interventions in a clumsy, overbearing, awkward way, that only set the caregiver off (I told you he was angry, remember) and took the oxygen out of the room for a few minutes. It’s not her fault that she did the interventions poorly; she didn’t go to social work school. Just as I would never take someone’s blood pressure or tell them how much medication to take, another discipline can’t do social work.

Despite this very large misstep, she had a good rapport with the caregiver so the visit didn’t end in a yelling match. The visit was over shortly thereafter and even though I knew she wanted to debrief, I had to get out of there. I just about ran to my car, angry with her for disrespecting my skillset, frustrated with myself for not cutting the conversation off the moment it began, and overall feeling horrible, about that particular interaction and about how poorly I’d set boundaries with this co-worker.

Luckily, I have good supervision at this job so I called my supervisor for some validation and guidance. She gave me both and helped me find a way to set some solid limits. I want to be helpful; I want to be emotionally present for my colleagues. At the same time, I can’t be all things to all people. I love the village concept but as I said, there is a balance. I hope this co-worker and I have found the right balance so that we can move forward. This job is easier when you’ve got other people on your side.

A (small) ethical question

I’m in the midst of a lot of professional training, both for work and for my side hustle (“clinical supervision” doesn’t roll off the tongue as nicely “side hustle”). I love continuing education: I love being with other social workers; I love reading case studies; I love doing exercises about theoretical framework. (It turns out I kind of miss being in graduate school). Because clinical social workers are required to have ethics training every two years, a lot of my recent continuing ed programming has involved some ethics credits. We start, always, with the most egregious examples of social work ethical dilemmas: stealing from your workplace (BAD); falsifying documentation (PRETTY BAD); having sex with a client (SO VERY BAD). Those ethical questions have straightforward answers: don’t do that shit. It’s the grayer stuff that I like to turn over. And today I’d like to turn a personal one over with you.

Don’t freak out! I am not involved in any egregiously bad activities! It’s definitely one of the gray ones.

I have a patient I really like: she’s bright and funny and interesting. She has a fascinating career. I’m sure that if we met in a different setting, I would strive to be her friend. But we haven’t met in a different setting; I’m offering her counseling, not friendship. And sometimes I find myself forgetting that.

I write often about use of self and counter-transference but I don’t think I’ve yet touched on this: what happens when we really like our clients? Obviously we like most of them; social workers typically like people. I’m talking about the unique problem of liking a client personally, the way you would like a new friend for instance, and how to manage that.

In my current job, I’ve met almost 300 different patients. Of those, there are maybe 3 that I’ve bent the rules for: seen them for a whole hour instead of the usual 30 minutes, provided a few more personal details than I normally do with my patients. See? Nothing egregious. But definitely gray.

I had a colleague once who told me, when I worked in hospice, that if you get attached to one out of every one hundred patients, you’re ok. Any more than that and you should take a good hard look at your practice. I’ve passed that advice along a dozen times, at least; it makes sense to me. I’m not causing any harm here, to my patients or to myself. I won’t overstep any boundaries: we won’t meet for coffee or see each other outside of this professional setting. But I do want to pause and consider what it means that these people get a little more from me than my other patients get. Being mindful of how much of ourselves we give is one of my favorite ethical questions. Do I give less to the patients that make my skin crawl? Do I give more to the ones that are pleasant and friendly? Do I give too much or too little based on my own feelings? And, ethically speaking, is it ok if there are (small) differences in the care I provide?

The cool and also deeply frustrating thing about ethics is that there are often no clear answers; there are multiple scenarios and variables to walk through. In this case, I lean towards the side of giving myself permission to be a human person who sometimes gives a little less or a little more, depending on the circumstance. Of course I’ll always examine my practice and look closely for signs of trouble. But I also want to allow myself that one in a hundred; it’s part of what makes the work worth doing.

Photo by Dil on Unsplash

The gift of the work

I started off my day already over it. Yesterday only one of my five scheduled patients bothered to show up. This day was starting with a patient I had seen a year ago who told me the exact same story she was telling the first time we met. This was followed by another no-show and yet another frequent flyer patient who never wants to do anything to change. Overall, I was ready to leave the building.

My last scheduled appointment was a lady who didn’t really want to see me. Her son had cajoled her into coming and she went along with it because she’s a mother and sometimes we do things we don’t want to do. Granted, this woman’s son is in his 60s but still: you never stop being a mom. And your kids never stop wanting you to be well.

Still. This lady wanted no part of it. And I really couldn’t blame her. She’s depressed because she’s basically just waiting to die. She’s had a lot of loss, more than her fair share, as she says. And for awhile we just sat there staring at each other because she didn’t know what I could do for her. “Nothing’s going to change,” she kept saying. “What’s the point of talking about it?”

I was mentally cursing her son for not hearing his mother clearly say she didn’t want to come when suddenly something did change: she started to talk. We talked about what it means to get older, how much loss there is and how lonely it is. She talked about how even in her depression, she’s content with her life. She talked about the child and husband she’s had to bury and how she’s kept those losses tucked away in a little box that she hides from the outside world because she doesn’t want to disturb them. Then she talked about climbing trees when she was a little girl. She smiled. I did too. She said she’d think about coming back.

The rest of the day shifted in my mind. It’s been a long week and I was feeling useless and out of my depth and frustrated. I could hear myself being impatient with my other patients, wanting to rush them out of the office because I didn’t know what they wanted from me. I know what burnout looks like and I could see myself gliding towards the flames. This lovely lady brought me back, just by opening up a little bit and allowing me to listen.

Now I’m not saying that we should rely on our patients to keep us engaged and upbeat about our work. But I also can’t deny that success with one patient at the right time can make a world of difference. It is, I think, what keeps us in the work: watching people be helped, even just for a moment, and knowing that we are the helpers.

I’m also not denying that I’m nearing a burnout point; it’s time for a vacation, clearly. But I am relieved to know that I haven’t completely checked out. This is another gift of this work: the reminders that come from the grace of others, in letting us bear witness to their pain, even though we don’t have any magic answers. How lucky for me that this lady came along today, to remind me.

Photo by Leone Venter on Unsplash

The wave of grief

My referrals seem to come in waves: one month it will be folks who need help managing their diabetes; the next will be a wave of young patients with anxiety. This is only anecdotal evidence of course, but it was like this in hospice too: you begin to notice some trends. This particular month, it’s grief.

I’m quick to say I lead a blessed life, but it has not been without great losses. My mom died three and a half years ago when I was pregnant with my older daughter. It was a terrible time, of course, but her death was not unexpected. In some ways it was a relief; she suffered for a long time. And since I was pregnant with a very wanted baby, there was a lot of joy intertwined with my devastating loss. When she first died, I still worked in hospice and I found that I was able to use my grief to help patients. Not every day of course, but sometimes the conversation opened the door to self-disclosure and it felt both clinically appropriate and personally beneficial.

More time has made it both easier and harder. Lately, the patients I’m seeing who are struggling with their grief are focused on how much time has passed. “It’s been two years,” one told me, “I should be better.” Should is a useless word, especially when it comes to how we feel. I describe grief to those patients as ocean waves: you can be standing at the shore for a long time and not notice them. Then suddenly one knocks you over without any warning. I know this as a clinician and I know it as a daughter without a mother, but still. Still. My own grief sometimes sits on my chest like a weight, making my breathing a little shallower. There is a pricking feeling behind my eyes that signals tears. In those moments, I am afraid that I won’t be able to hide it. I haven’t lost it yet but recently I have felt very close.

This is grief, I remind myself. This is a big ocean wave. This is because I had a baby recenty and my 3 year old only knows my mom through pictures and because the holidays just passed and because now that I’m a mother, I understand her so much better but I can’t tell her that and because… Because. This is grief.

The question now is, what will I do with it? I’ve been guarding it like a secret but I know that sunlight is the best disinfectant. So here I am, bringing it into the light: I’m having a hard time. Now I’m going to be mindful and intentional and not let myself be swallowed whole. Self-care is sometimes stepping back and being well. And the occasional afternoon hot chocolate. I learned that one from my mom.

The body knows

I had a tricky interaction with a patient a couple of weeks ago. A patient of mine (who has an extensive trauma history) made some comments about my children not being safe in daycare. She knows I have kids because she asked once and it’s such an innocuous question, I didn’t even think about answering it. In fact, I don’t generally have strong feelings around self-disclosure; sometimes I think it can be helpful to build rapport and trust so I don’t worry about answering mild questions from patients. This is all to say, I had no problem with this particular patient knowing a little personal information about me. That is, until she hit me with this nonsense about my kids being in danger because I’m not at home with them full-time. This is a touchy subject for me, because it’s a deeply personal choice that has several variables and the judgement around it feels absurdly sexist. When she said that I should be careful, that bad things could happen to them because they’re with strangers most of the day, I had to work very hard to be still and not let my face betray my internal, white-hot rage.

In the actual moment, it passed fairly quickly. I squashed it down and told myself that this woman thought she was being helpful; she wasn’t intentionally being cruel. (She even told me that she was being grandmotherly with her concern. Ok, lady). It was later, when I brought it up in supervision, that I realized just how very upset it made me. Telling my co-workers about the experience, my hands started to shake; I felt my breath quicken and my face get hot. And I realized, I was still really worked up about those few minutes!

It got me thinking about how we listen (or don’t) to our bodies when we’re working. I’ve written before about working with frustrating patients and suddenly becoming aware that my shoulders are up by my ears and my fists are clenched. How does it sneak up on me? Because I’m not really paying attention to my own body. There’s a lot we have to do when we’re with clients: listen actively, reflect back, read their body language, etc. But we also have to listen to what our bodies are telling us; often we react physically before we’re able to name what we’re feeling.

Personally, I especially struggle with being in touch with my physical self when I’m uncomfortable with the energy in the room. Give me someone on a crying jag any day; I can sit with that heaviness and have no problem being in my body: breathing deeply, being still, creating a space for vulnerability. But when a patient touches a nerve (usually unknowingly), my fear or discomfort or anger arrive first in my body, try though I may to ignore those feelings. In those moments, I’m trying so hard to reserve judgement and be still and present that I ignore the warning signals that I’m about to emotionally check out. When I feel my toes curl in my shoes and my hands grip the sides of my chair, it’s usually a sign that I’m not going to be at my best, clinically. In those moments, I have to recenter: I take deep breaths; I practice stillness. Then I take my ass to supervision, because clearly I have some things to work out!

The body knows; we do better when we remember that and listen to what we’re being told: to slow down, to reflect, to breathe. And to utilize supervision!

Expanding with creativity

Photo by Lucas Sankey on Unsplash

I’ve struggled to find my voice as a therapist. I’ve tried on some different hats: motivational interviewing, CBT, narrative therapy. Part of the challenge is that my role in this job has been nebulous to say the least: there’s no standardized practice yet so I’m just kind of… on my own. I also see such a variety of patients, I find myself constantly looking things up and reviewing interventions. It’s interesting in that way, but it also adds to the challenge of figuring out which intervention feels right, both for me as a clinician and for my patients. In order to provide the best care, clinicians need to be comfortable with the model we’re using. For a long time, I’ve shied away from being creative in my work because I felt uncomfortable. But the more I grow into this role, the more I see the benefit of some more creative thinking.

Social work lends itself to invention and innovation. There are all kinds of ways to get people to open up to you and for some patients, the outside-the-box stuff works best. I must admit, I’ve been resistant to using creativity in my practice for years. Colleagues of mine in hospice talked about using empty chairs to signify the presence of a departed loved one, or using art or music to help clients express their feelings. The thought of doing those things made me feel deeply awkward. I felt similarly as a grad student whenever we had to role play to practice our clinical skills; it felt silly and inauthentic. That feeling carried over into my work: it would be too uncomfortable for me to ask someone to talk to a chair and pretend their deceased loved one is in it; it would be too awkward for me to explore a piece of music with someone in therapy and ask what kind of emotions it brought up for them. Actually even writing that sentence feels awkward. But why is that? Why should my fear of feeling silly block out a large chunk of practice?

It’s not an overnight change. Little pieces have been creeping in over the past year as I try to figure out how to work with patients who really want solutions. I’m somewhat limited because my role is short-term but there are options. For instance, I sometimes encourage my patients to create a Tree of Life (a narrative therapy tool) so they have a visual expression of their values and goals. It’s an exercise I’ve done myself and I think that’s key: we have to be comfortable with what we’re asking others to do. Most recently I attended a training about psychodrama and sociometry and used one of the exercises (a locogram/floor check) in my supervision group. We all got a chance to move around a little and talk about what skills we have, which we want to develop, and why we’re drawn to/avoid some populations.

I’m excited to stretch in this way. I’ve written in the past about how frustrated I’ve been in transitioning to this job and this is a great way to get unstuck from that. Using my brain in a different way helps me reorient to what I love about this work: every day is a new and different challenge.

Boundaries

I think (and write) a lot about boundary setting in my work. It was a thornier issue for me when I worked in hospice; being in people’s homes makes the lines all the more blurry and the boundaries rather flexible, in my experience. Now that I’m in a doctor’s office, it’s easier to draw some firmer lines. No one is offering me food, for instance. I’m not sitting on the edge of someone’s bed. I visit with patients in empty exam rooms; there aren’t any pictures of my family or any personal artifacts. Still, the balance of building rapport while keeping firm boundaries remains.

Take, for instance, a regular patient of mine. We’ve seen each other off and on since I started this job a year ago. We’re actually nearing the termination process now, much to his chagrin. He’s a nice guy; I like him a lot. But lately he’s been a little more familiar with me and I’m struggling with whether or not to push back.

Familiar feels like an odd word to use here but it’s sort of the only way to describe it. He’s not outwardly inappropriate; there’s nothing he’s said or done that I could point to and tell him to knock it off. It’s been an insidious little bit of boundary pushing. It started with an increase in cursing during our sessions. (Which honestly, if you’ve spoken to me for more than five minutes, you know that I have a foul mouth. I come by it honestly: my mother swore like a sailor). The words don’t bother me per se; it’s more that he used to watch what he said. My patients often apologize for swearing during a session, to which I answer that I’ve heard all the words before. I even allow myself the occasional “this is shitty” or something to that effect, if the relationship is there. But this patient’s frequent use of heavy curse words feels more boundary pushing than before.

Maybe I wouldn’t even have noticed except that the swearing comes along with a little more… flirting, for lack of a better word. Again, nothing so outrageous that I could give a firm, “not appropriate, knock it off.” More a subtle change in his tone of voice, a casual remark here or there. I have a feeling my female friends know exactly what I’m describing. If I mentioned it to him, he’d surely say he didn’t know what I was talking about. It’s subtle and honestly, I’m not totally sure he realizes he’s doing it. Which is partly why I’m struggling with what to do about it.

I should state here that I don’t feel unsafe; that’s a different topic for a different day. My discomfort is more about how I’m reacting to his boundary pushing. I’ve found myself coming back with a little attitude. For instance, he asked why I won’t be at work on a particular day (we were scheduling an appointment) and I jokingly replied, “None of your business.” We have a good rapport, so he laughed and said he was only kidding. It was a deeply awkward moment though. It’s the kind of response I’d give to a guy in a bar, not to a patient. But because I kind of let the boundaries blur, I let things get away from me.

That being said, this is not unsalvageable. And it’s possible that some of the over familiarity on his part is because we’re terminating our relationship soon and he has some feelings about that. Whether we’re going to address them the next time we meet really depends on how the session goes. I can consider different reactions to different things but I cannot predict the future (sadly) so I’ll just have to wait and see how it all shakes out.

In the meantime, I’m considering how I relate to my patients and if I need to take a more clinical approach. I don’t think there are any hard and fast rules here; it’s a case by case approach. I think what’s really needed is a little more self reflection and maybe a little pulling back. I guess we’ll see how hard he pushes and therefore, how hard I’ll have to pull.

Ah, clinical social work: where every interaction is deeply weighted! I guess it’s part of the charm of the work. Right??

On returning to work

I went back to work on Wednesday this week. I haven’t been completely without work during my maternity leave; I’ve been doing some supervision for the past few weeks but an hour here and there having a conversation about someone else’s job hardly feels like work. It’s deeply enjoyable, in fact, and I get to do it on my own couch. Going back to my full-time gig is a different challenge. My maternity leave was a lovely interlude wherein I got to watch every episode of West Wing and clean my house.

I’m not a terribly organized person so this was a good chance to go through some junk and de-clutter. (Anyone who has ever lived with me or seen the inside of my house is laughing right now, I know it. But I made some good progress!) In the process of straightening up, I stumbled across a professional portfolio I made a few years ago during my hospice tenure. There was a case study about one of my most important cases (a young hospice patient, of course). Reading it brought me to tears. I cried for the patient I lost, and for her family, who had suffered so much. And I cried, selfishly, because I really miss that work. As sad as it sometimes was, as awful as it could be to witness tragedy so often, it felt meaningful and important in a way my current work sort of… doesn’t.

Part of what I’m working out here is a feeling of being stuck (a theme in my clinical work, as you may have noticed). I’m stuck in my current job. I have two little kids and my current schedule works for our family. I can’t do the nights and weekends that hospice requires; it doesn’t make sense logistically. So what do I tell my patients and my supervisees when the feeling (or reality) of being stuck starts to interfere? Make it better where you can. For me, that means I have to find some meaning instead of comparing what I do now to what I did before.

And of course, I can find meaning in helping people manage their anxiety or quit smoking. More than that, I’m finding meaning in raising my daughters and enjoying this very short season of my life. Still. These past few weeks, as I look at my old papers and remember the joys of my old work, I find myself longing to focus on my career in a different way. I chose to have children and I’m thrilled that I did; they are the great joy of my life. But it has slowed me down a little, professionally. That’s hard to wrap my mind around. It’s going to take some time to adjust to the idea that I have to pause a little and make the best of what I have: a flexible 9 to 5 and a young family that needs more of my attention than my career does right this minute.

Next time you hear from me, I hope it’ll be about a complex case or an interesting supervision question. Until then, keep me in your thoughts as I adjust to going back to work, having two kiddos in daycare, and try to live my normal life.