We All Need Therapy

Eat Here

I'm generally a content person. I try to find joy in what I DO have instead of whining about the things I don't. As a thearapist, there are things that I learn are good for families and kids. I try to do as many of them as possible, but there is one that seems doomed to wait for a larger space. It drives me a little nuts. Maybe it's the ettiquette shoved down my throat as a child/teen/young adult, but it's much appreciated and (personally) a good tradition. This is the art of family meals. I love, love, love that there are ads these days encouraging family meals. Even websites such as The Power of Family Meals  and Meals Matter are encouraging family meals.

I enjoy family meals. Well, I enjoy all meals, but still. There is just something great about getting together and having a common purpose (even if it is just to see who gets the last scoop of whatever is on the table). People eat competitively and are still sitting at a table sharing the experience. Currently, my apartment does not allow for a dining table. We have no two chairs that match. There is no space.

I know what a great thing it means to have family meals. Research will tell you that it will: discourage smoking, drug use and teen pregnancy; position your kids to do better in school, pass on their ethnic, familial, and religious heritage; help prevent eating disorders and obesity; build your kids' literacy, vocabulary, and conversational skills; teach your kids manners; promote a sense of resilience; and enjoy each other more as a family. I'm pretty sure my mom didn't know ALL of these things when she forced us to sit up straight, put one hand in our lap, take our elbows off the table, don't reach over people, etc. would help us in our social interactions, but I'm sure with eight kids there had to be some semblance of structure for her to maintain her own sanity. :)

I miss sitting at a table and eating. I'll have to start saving my money for a table, a few chairs and some kind of organization for my kitchen so we can fit all that in there.

Mean Girls 1692 Style

I saw Mean Girls. It seemed really unrealistic to me. Yes, I did go to public school, but I really had no part in any of the drama. I'm sure it was happening, but I was so clueless and naive that I didn't see it happening. Also, it's possible that the fact that I was not a contender kept me out of the drama of our circles. Right now, at work, I'm a third party participant. I have clients who have beefs with each other and they don't know that I know almost all the members of the drama. It's pretty messy and quite silly. Girls and the rumors they start. Seriously. The most interesting thing is that most of the girls "hate" the other girls just because the boy they like happens to like the other girl. It's rather ridiculous, in my opinion.

These fights have been on my mind for a while. Through a series of events I was reminded of the Salem Witch Trials. I think this is the old school version of mean girls. If you didn't like a girl. If you thought she was going to steal the blacksmith's son from you, accuse her of being a witch and then they'd kill her. Isn't that how Mean Girls works? It's pretty bad. Of course, the girls learn it from their mothers. It's a difficult pattern to break. I wonder, were the Salem Witch accusers all just making stuff up like most girls (and their mothers) do now? At least now, the consequences aren't so...permanent.

Of course, I say this knowing absolutely no history of the Salem Witch Trials. I know they happened, or at least the history books tell us that. Wikipedia will tell us that women who were not subservient to men were often accused and thought to have the devil in them. I suppose many women would be dead today if they kept up that craziness. In either case, I wonder, truly wonder, how many girls in 7-12th grades would accuse a girl if they knew the end consequence would be death. Sadly, I think there would be at least a few that would hesitate and this is a sad thing indeed.

Drawing A Line

I've tried to write this two or three times. The short of it is, I'm a pretty poor decision maker. Not that I make bad decisions, but that it takes me a long time to come to a decision about certain things. I will wax and wane about something and then wax again. It used to save me a lot of money because I'd say yes, then no, then yes, then no and end up running out of so much time that I didn't buy the thing.

Because of my intensive process, I tend to like to limit my decisions to one at a time. When I have multiple decisions to make at one time the emotions of one thing overflows into the other decision and I cannot tell which one is okay, which is not, and which is pushing me to the point of tears.

This being said, sometimes help is not help. I have very generous relatives. So generous that our previous count of a laptop and a desktop will double by the end of the week. I don't know about the rest of you, but two people and four computers, just doesn't make sense. But their generosity doesn't stop there. So, that adds to decisions. Which ends up adding to stress.

While there is stress in this decision making process, there is also work stress. I'm pretty sure most people have felt, at some point in their lives, work stress. If you haven't, please tell me what you do for a living and I will promptly change occupations.

There is a decision to be made in regard to a client. An agency we work with feels that my client would be better served by a "more experienced" therapist. I'll confess, I'm slightly offended. I'm even a little more offended because this is becoming a pattern. The decision is placed before me to resist and demand that I continue to attempt to treat an avoidant, manipulative family or I turn the reigns over to a fellow therapist. Does my pride interfere with this decision? Yes. Do I feel the other therapist is equally qualified? Yes. Is it therapeutic for them to switch therapists? I don't think so. Will the family lie to the other therapist in the way they lie to me and everyone else? Most likely. If the family lies to everyone, how would it be more therapeutic for the family to lie to someone else?

Maybe I just trust too much. But then how do you know what to trust and what not to trust? Shouldn't I at least get a chance to help the family with the newly exposed information?

At least I have a great supervisor who will go with me to the meeting and help me not get emotional and/or defensive. One plus for the boss.

Does my emotionality about the situation at work affect my decision making at home? Certainly. Still trying to draw that line a little stronger.

"You'll Never Take Me Alive!!"

Fridays are my busy days. For whatever reason, I usually have every hour set for an appointment. Today was not much different. I had a doctor's appointment at 8:15 and the rest of the day at every hour was set. The morning went rather easily and at lunch I jinxed myself by telling my husband that the afternoon would be pretty laid-back. 1:00 was a family that I'm doing co therapy with, so no pressure there. 2:00 was a kid that is pretty laid back, love those teens. 3:00 was a treatment plan review which is pretty routine and my 4:00 was another teen which is pretty new, but I like her.

1:00 ended up showing up at 1:40 and expecting my co-therapist and I to do family therapy in 20 minutes. Not thrilled. My 2:00 was pretty routine. 3:00 turned crazy before my 2:00 was even over.

I printed out my 2:00's grades and attendance because he had to turn them in to court every Friday. As I walk out of my office to get them off of the printer, the grandmother of my 3:00 is at the top of the stairs asking if I've seen 3. No, I haven't seen him, but then I hear and see shoes peeking out from under a couple chairs by the window. Yes, he's right there.

Usually when clients come in they have to fill out a questionnaire. Since grandma has bad knees, she asked if she could stay upstairs and forgo the questionnaire. Sure, she can do it after on her way out.

We get started. What is 3's primary goal? 3 is playing in his typical manner, which isn't always quiet. He had already dumped over a large plastic container of building blocks. He then goes and spins in circles hitting the corner with a rubber chicken. Grandmother threatens counting (doesn't everyone know by now that counting does not work!?) and he gets a glimmer in his eye that says that he knows he's going to get away with this. We get about 20 minutes into the treatment plan and 3 decides he's going to tie the slinky around his ankles. Bad idea. Next, he chooses to open the office door and hop around the upstairs. Since grandma has mobility problems, I offer to pursue him. Besides, I get the impression that he doesn't listen to her anyway.

By the time I get out of my office he has made it to the sliding glass door. I grab him and hold him to get the slinky untangled from his ankles. He runs.

I go back into my office, unwilling to pursue a seven-year-old around the building. Chase is not a game I play. I come back out to see him hanging over the balcony on the verge of falling over the edge. I decide I can't just let him crack his head open and I pick him up and bring him inside. He resists and begins saying "You'll never take me alive" repeatedly. I carry him by his armpits as he kicks and continues to report that I will not be taking him alive. Just watch me.

Grandmother decides she needs to "talk" to him so I leave to lock the sliding door. He runs out again, down the stairs, around the building, repeatedly. He comes back up the stairs and cannot get in the door because I locked it. He wants in. I open the door and give 3 the option to come in or not. He chooses to run. I tell him I'm not playing this game and lock the door again.

Grandma wants him to clean up the blocks. Knowing the kid as I do, I know this is not a realistic expectation, but I persist in trying to help her get him to comply. Multiple efforts to get him back in my office, upstairs, follow directions, etc. were unsuccessful. I told grandma I would clean up the blocks. She headed out the front door, I headed out the back and we met him and he quickly went into the car.

The last thing I hear is that he is going to have to deal with his mother when she gets home from work. I do not envy that kid. We did finish the treatment plan and we did not get the questionnaire on the way out.

The front desk then asks me what is going on with him as though they are completely unaware that this is a mental/behavioral health facility and every person that comes through the door has problems.

Next Friday, I'll just keep my mouth shut.

Dual Relationships

Recently I took the Ethics test for my licensure. It is one of three tests that I have to take before I am officially a Licensed Professional Counselor. I have a two-inch binder full of laws, codes and rules to which I must adhere and follow. I am generally a rule-bound person. I excel in situations with well-defined expectations and rules. I usually meet or exceed expectations in this area. My family will laugh at me sometimes in regard to my rigid following of board game rules. (I feel I am getting a little more flexible about some rules.) I feel like I excel because I know what is expected and it creates a predictable and measurable standard for all involved.

When I am the only one taking the rules seriously...that's another story. I learned, through my studies of these rules, that I am required to report any activity affecting a school. This includes, but is not limited to reports of clients of inappropriate behavior, threats, substance abuse, etc. while on school grounds or participating in a school activity. Recently, I had a client come into my office and report to me that she had smoked pot during school. She came upon some peers, partook and had a severe medical reaction to it. I know the names of the kids involved.

I meet with the local Juvenile Court weekly in regard to drug abuse situations with children and adolescents. The court has not heard about some of the participants involved. I know about them, but for whatever reason, only some of the kids that were caught became involved with probation and court. I feel that I am ethically bound to report these other kids to law enforcement.

A few months ago I had a few kids referred to me by the school because they were caught on campus using peyote. Myself, not knowing the rule about the school, thought the school had followed appropriate channels for reporting. I am learning that I was likely wrong in that assumption. (That's what we get for assuming, right?)

I have heard about a local "therapist" who is commissioned by the school to handle the substance abuse assessments of athletes and other kids that they don't want to get caught up in the court system. All kinds of hush-hush behavior. I have never met this therapist. I just know that there are stories of Sunday evening "assessments" at his house. I know he got his training from a rather popular online university. Not that there is anything wrong with online education, but counseling is not something you learn from doing work on a computer, sorry.

In any case, this "therapist" also works for the school as a coach. So, a coach/therapist is the one who determines whether or not other athletes are eligible or ineligible to play. Seems like a dual relationship to me. Learning this, I'm pretty upset. A person that is behaving as a professional, but being very unprofessional, letting kids get away with destructive behavior and basically giving the message that football scores are more important than the laws.

Now I am left to determine if it is my place to report this perceived unethical behavior. I have, again, never met this person. I hear stories. I know the name. I can look them up on the online licensure database. I looked at the rules in my binder and counted at least five ways this person is breaking the law. BUT I have to be interviewed and questioned if I file a complaint.

It really bothers me that there are corrupt people in my town. I want to do something, but don't know that I have a place for it. Stress.