Do you have a work voice?

Do you have a work voice? Or jargon/ vocab that is associated with your work? I had this conversation with a friend who also works in mental health and I caught him using some vocab that came from his work in normal conversation.

I wrote some time ago about the word ‘insight’. That’s just one of many words we commonly use in mental health which might be part of a person’s normal vocab. Some others include… mood, risk, safety, soothing, de-escalation, prompting, intrusive, isolative, compliant… They reflect what is considered important in our culture to one’s mental health.

There has been lots written about social construction and language, which I won’t go into. But it makes me wonder what sort of language was used in years past when it came to mental health? I know that we have moved from using the term ‘Psychiatric Unit’ to ‘Mental Health Unit’. What else? Does anyone know? What about what words are we moving towards using?

happiness…?

What does happiness look like?

I struggled a little to talk with a client this week about happiness and joy without referring to spirituality and a fulfillment that is soul and spirit deep. She had lost everything – material and non-material – her children, her friends, her job, her house, she was in debt… How could I convince her that she should hold onto hope? Why is life worth living?

Without God, life doesn’t make much sense to me. Not to say that I need to convince every one of my clients who is thinking about suicide or has depression of this. But all I could seem to say was life was worth living; life was precious; she had things to live for …I asked what she wanted for her future but she just gave me the same response she’d given me for the last 5 questions, “I don’t know”.

What else could I have said? What does happiness look like for you?

Schizoaffective disorder, a donkey and horse

I found this amusing slightly strange snippet from a really old presentation on mental illnesses but can’t find a reference for it:

If schizophrenia is a horse and mood disorder is a donkey, is schizoaffective disorder …
- A horse that looks like a donkey?
- A donkey that looks like a horse?
- A donkey and a horse harnessed together?
- A mule?
- A zebra?

Call + Response

“Never forget justice is what love looks like in public.” Dr Cornel West (scholar/philosopher)

I am really excited about this film “Call + Response” which I am watching on 28 September. I don’t know lots about it except that it is about human slavery. It is described as “the first rockumentary to expose the world’s 27 million  most terrifying secrets”. I am expecting it to be confronting, challenging and hopefully inspiring me to action. You can find out more at the Call + Response. website.

secrets in the hallway

If you listen carefully in a hospital, you can hear the truth. Nurses whisper to one another over your still body when you are pretending to sleep; policemen trade secrets in the hallway; doctors enter your room with another patient’s condition on their lips.

(from Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Piccoult)

Joke for the day

Q. What’s the difference between the psychiatrists and the patients at the mental hospital?

A. The patients are the ones that eventually get better and go home!

Becoming jaded and uninterrupted cycles

How quickly does a Social Worker become jaded? Is it preventable?

I was on the phone with a Social Worker from a mental health unit in a different area recently discussing a client who had a 15 year history of going through a vicious cycle of a dysfunctional relationship with his father, and his partner, roaming the streets, putting his Department of Housing tenancy at risk because of his alcohol abuse, ending up in hospital…

“Vicious cycles can be interrupted and virtuous cycles can be established.”

It was not more than a month ago that he had been admitted into the unit, so it was disappointing to see him back. I asked the Social Worker I had on the phone for his opinion on what went wrong this time. We talked about the vicious cycle and I asked, “What do you think might break the cycle?” He said, “I don’t think it’s possible… oh gosh, how jaded do I sound!”

We had a laugh about it, but it struck me later on that – yes, even in the short time I’ve been a Social Worker, I have found my deep pool of hope has become a little less deep and a little more shallow. I have discovered breaking the vicious cycles are not as easy as I’d wished. I seem to face more dead ends on the unending road of optimism.

How do you keep yourself from becoming jaded or cynical?

The Secret Place

“When you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut the door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.” Matthew 6.6

Oswald Chambers says of this passage:

God is in secret, and He sees us from “the secret place” – He does not see us as other people do, or as we see ourselves. When we truly live in “the secret place,” it becomes impossible for us to doubt God. We become more sure of Him than of anyone or anything else. Enter into “the secret place,” and you will find that God was right in the middle of your everyday circumstances all the time. … if you will swing the door of your life fully open and “pray to your Father who is in the secret place,” every public thing in your life will be marked with the lasting imprint of the presence of God.

A good word, now to conquer the distracting and wandering thoughts. gotta shut that door!

Stigma and neglect of those with mental illness

“The shameful history of benign and sometimes malignant neglect of persons with mental disabilities is well understood: the deep stigma and unredressed discrimination, the deplorable living conditions, and the physical and social barriers preventing their integration and full participation in society. Countless promises have been made to right the wrongs, but new forms of neglect have always emerged. The mentally disabled have ended up in prison, in equally deplorable adult homes, or on the streets, homeless and desitute, while the wider society has averted its eyes.” (Gostin, 2004: 11)

What I find upsetting is not just that society has averted their eyes, but even at times the very organisations that aim to serve these people. And not only the organisational cultures – but the everyday you and me’s. At times, I am overwhelmed and disheartened by the lack of resources – affordable housing, support services, … I am also guilty at times of losing hope; of failing to uphold their dignity and enable their full participation into society. God help me not to lose hope for their sake!

Domestic violence makes me sick

Another brief post.

Just a few thoughts after some really excellent domestic violence training I received this week at work. Some basic concepts and some new ones:

• Domestic violence is primarily about gaining control and power over the other person in the relationship. There is an attitude or belief of entitlement or ownership over the other – “my rights” and “your duties”
• Violence doesn’t have to be occurring constantly, but the control is constant.
• It is patterned, repeated and deliberate. It is a myth that “he does not know what he is doing” or “it is caused by alcohol” or “it is just the way he is”…
• It often involves wearing down of the woman’s will, causing her to doubt herself and begin to believe he is smarter or better, and consequently she gives in to more of his abuse and gives up more of her rights.
• There is a myth that “somebody has to be in charge” of the relationship, there will always be one on the top and one on the bottom -win or lose, right or wrong. The need to win an argument is not often for the sake of truth but the sake of position. Stopping abuse is seen as being at the bottom, the loser, the wrong one. But it isn’t about that at all. Stopping the abuse is about bringing equality into the relationship. Most men and most women too don’t know what that looks like.
• A child’s experience of domestic violence is extremely traumatic – it involves the sights and sounds of the violence and abuse, it also involves the realisation that this is being done to my mother and being done by my father. Compared to witnessing violence in public where you can come home and be safe, it is not safe at home.

Yes, domestic violence makes me sick to the stomach.

Maybe some more reflections on domestic violence in the week to come.