What Does It Really Take to Work With Severely Mentally Ill People?
Today I am going to speak to something that is close to my heart and soul especially when it comes to putting oneself self out there as a person who is capable of helping others. There may be some who are upset by this post, and that is quite fine as it still needs to be written so far as I am concerned. I am writing on behalf of the clients.
One of the reasons that I left the world of conventional mental health was that there were way too many people running programs with Masters Degrees in Mental Health - specific degrees did not matter - who never belonged in those positions for many reasons. In some of the cases, my bosses were just plain ignorant about the capacity of the client involved in a certain situation, and in other situations, the bosses were just really nasty people who had a lot of bravado that they carried into the programs that they worked at because of their own lack of sense of self - otherwise, why would one have to throw one's weight around with people who rely on you to take care of their basic needs? People who are secure in who they never need to act out in that fashion.
On the other end of the spectrum are those folks who work in these programs who have not gotten their own lives together so that every little statement made will become a 'trigger' to their past abuse history.
Let me tell you what it is really like working in a place with about 200 mentally ill adults coming in during the course of the day for the 4 programs that were run there. It isn't for those who haven't gotten their own lives together!
I had one client, a 24-year-old woman who had borderline personality disorder on top of a cocaine addiction that started when she was 7-years-old thanks to her mother giving it to her. She was turning 'tricks' in order to get the money for her drugs when she was taken off the streets and put into the program. There were many times when I would take her out to medical appointments or her weekly NA meeting when she would argue with me when I would suggest that she thank someone for something kind they did, or apologize for her behavior. Sometimes she would get very angry - and yet, it was my job to teach her how to better socialize out in the world so I had to never take any of this behavior as personal because it wasn't - it was all part of her illnesses. Interestingly enough, in this case, she asked for me to be her one-to-one counselor wanting someone older than the person who was originally assigned to her who was much closer to her age. I was 34 -years -old at the time and the other counselor had just graduated from undergrad.
I had another client - a paranoid, schizo-affective who I loved working with because he was a very kind person. However, he hated taking his medication except for the Trazadone which was for sleep. It was understandable as his Prolixin for the psychotic features was causing great problems with oxygenation proven with the blue lips and blue nails. I went over my boss's head and had him moved into a much more structured program with a psychiatrist who got him off the Prolixin and onto another medication that worked better for him without the damaging side-effect. During the time he was transitioning to his new program he had to do some overnights to get used to the program. I would drive him up the hill to the program and on one occasion he jumped out of my truck for some reason of which I can't recall all these years later. I got him back in the truck and he went to the program and ended up moving there. Seventeen years after working with him I ran into one of his roommates from the program I worked at who told me he was living in his own apartment with a roommate and doing quite well. That was a fantastic day for me for sure for all I went through to help this client receive the structure and much better medication for him because my boss could not understand the need for the change, sadly. I promised his parents I would get him out of the program and I did because it was something that they could not do on their own the way the system is set up.
I had another male client in his late 20s who would sometimes get really mad, for no reason that I could ascertain. It did upset me, but my mentor boss told me that my job was to realize that these folks had serious issues and that very rarely were these outbreaks due to anything we did. My job was to let him calm down and then move forward. Well, that was the day I realized that I needn't take any of these behaviors personally. So, happened that on my last day working in that program (I was only allowed to work there for a year) that same client gave me a thank you letter for the great work that I did for him and the others. Who knew?
My point is that we as the providers of healthcare be it in the conventional world of healthcare or some complimentary form including health coaching need to understand that those behaviors that our clients bring in with them are the behaviors that we are employed to help them deal with (or in my current case as a hypnotist, clear to the best of my ability).
Because, if we take what our clients say in a personal manner at all, then we are no longer giving them a safe place to learn what they need to learn. It isn't that one puts up with bad behavior, not at all. However, there is a difference between being assertive in the way that one responds to the behavior and being 'hurt' by the behavior. There would be no way in hell that I would be able to do the work that I do if my clients' behavior triggered me in any way. Nor, should I be doing the work if my clients trigger me in any way. My job is to have all my own issues resolved and the wisdom gained from the resolutions into the work that I do with my clients because anything less than that leaves my client in a very precarious position. It is not their job to 'not trigger me.' It is my job to never be triggered by them and instead take the appropriate action to help them to learn and grow.
These days I work with people who have deep traumas to clear, however, most of them do not bring in the complex mental health issues of the clients that I worked with in my positions in conventional mental health. However, there are times when my clients are indeed triggered and my only response to them is to help them understand what triggered them and to clear that issue right then with them - that is it.
If you are a person who is 'sick of being sick' or 'sick of being stuck' DM me and we will set up a free 45-minute Chaos to Clarity phone call to see what we can do to help you out. If you are an appropriate fit, you will end up with the quickest clearing ever!