This week was my induction week for my Social Work MA.
After a few logistical nightmares i am finally registered!!
It's been quite a fun, if perhaps slightly pointless few days but a great opportunity to meet the others on the course. There's about 30 of us and everyone seems really lovely. There's also a huge mix of backgrounds and although as expected, i'm one of the few without much relevant experience, there are at least a few others - one who worked in the DOH and one as a physio - there's also someone who is using the course to help her family law career, and an ex met policeman who spent 30 odd years in the force! Some pretty great experience across the mix.
We had one lecture with the Youth and Community degree programme about the importance of integrated working, looking at a case study in groups. And today and yesterday we spent some time looking at our research methods module - discussing the importance of research within social work, and experience we had in this field, and today designing a practice research project looking into people's perceptions of social work. It was a fairly laid back day designing a questioniarre and going out on campus to fill it in before presenting back results later.
I've been really impressed with how friendly the tutors have been. The course tutor put on a lunch for us all to bond with the tutors mingling with us all, discussing the course etc and it was also interesting hearing people's experiences with other universities.
Inevitably there is already a fair amount of placement comparison. There are others who are probably going to residential homes, and then one "student unit" off to the local authority - they were called out infront of everyone as the people being put forward for the statutory placement - but there's lots of politics - i.e those wanting to end up in C+F, don't want a children's placement this year so are trying to move to adults etc! WE've also heard from a LA who presented to us about their bursary scheme we can apply to in March - you get a position with them for your second placement and then a job for 2 years after...obviously will be hugely competitive!
Oh and we've been given our first assignment already - a reflective diary, that involves us writing every week of the term, and also some extra reflection on key areas of social work such as values, communication etc - it;s a pass or fail assignment apparently.
Anyway...lectures begin on Monday and i have a 9-5pm trial day at my potential placement on Friday. Having spent time with my coursemates and already started to become submersed in the SW world, i'm really looking forward to next week.
Friday, 23 September 2011
Thursday, 15 September 2011
Last week of shadowing in Fostering and Adoption
I’ve just come back from my trip across the country to shadow a supervising social worker in fostering and adoption. Before I get into the details, this week I also spent a day in a duty and assessment team. I’d shadowed there before and have posted about it in detail (it seems to be my most read post!) but this day was a bit different as I sat on the duty desk just seeing the different referrals that get made and which ones go through to social workers. It was really interesting as they get all the police reports through as a matter of course, many of which aren’t relevant to social services but if someone under 18 has been involved, they have to know about it. And then a huge variety of cases come in – from kids who went missing and have since come back but seem to be depressed (possible referral to children and adolescent mental health services) to possible domestic violence cases – some of which don’t need SS intervention because court proceedings are already in place for contact and the police are involved. It was just interesting seeing the behind the scenes work and the invaluable work of the social work assistants who input all these referalls onto the systems so if any case comes up more than once, it’s carefully noted – these are some of the people losing their jobs in the cuts.
Anyway, back to fostering and adoption!
A supervising social worker (SSW), supervises foster carers – supervising visits to check all is going well, helping to prepare reports for reviews, assess and recruit carers, help with life story books – and this social worker did a huge amount of other tasks too – working in adoption, (recruiting and assessing families to adopt), getting involved in life appreciation days, where all the professionals involved in a child’s life, get together with the family that is about to adopt them to tell them more about the child, and she does post adoption work – helping those who have been adopted, who want to know more and perhaps reunite with birth families. Among other things. That’s a pretty vague description of her job, having only spent 2 days with her.
The first day we had a meeting at the primary school of a child who is in foster care. We met with the foster carer, a teacher from the school, as well as a representative from another school where the child’s sibling goes, the child’s social worker and a few others. The meeting was to check how the children were doing in school, both educationally and from a social point of view – and as one had just started secondary school, it was a good opportunity to discuss in more detail the kind of support it was felt she needed and some of the things the foster carer might want to discuss with her – for example – did she like the idea of starting a clean slate and no-one knowing about her past, or did she want to feel a or several specific teachers knew about it and therefore she could turn to them when she wanted? Also, how to prepare the child for questions that would come up about her past. In biology, you tend to cover genetics and eye colour – in English they were going to be asked to write about their life so far etc.. things I’d always taken for granted.
There was also some additional things to consider about contact. These siblings had a younger sibling who was about to be adopted and whose family don’t want them to have any further contact. This issue has always been one I find difficult. I wrote a post much earlier about cutting off sibling contact – I find it a hard one to get my head around if the siblings don’t cause any risk to the child – and I could only imagine how hard it was to tell these kids that they could no longer see their younger sibling – or at least for many many years until they get to 18. It also brings up the role of social media – once they’re all on Facebook, who says how long it will take for them to reunite of their own accord, without support systems in place?
We then had lunch with the social worker I was shadowing’s old manager – where I heard more about many of the issues local authorities are facing at the moment – staff off sick, less managers about, overworked people – and much of the work getting privatized to more dynamic organisations.
After visting the foster carer from the school meeting again to get documents ready for updating CRB checks, and discussing risk assessments around the home, we went on to visit another foster carer. A kinda super nanny figure who has adopted many children and is now fostering many more. In many ways it was incredibly inspiring seeing how many lives she had changed. She was dealing with a whole spectrum of issues from disabled babies born from drug addicted parents, to teenagers dropping out of jobs, sleeping with their partners too young and everything in between. There were lots of interesting things for me:
- no one could sleep over at the house without being CRB’d – ie the kids’ friends
- she talked about going shopping with some of the kids in care and when random people came over saying “aahh cute, whats their names?” she has to change the names because of the situation
She was also having interesting challenges regarding contact. It seems that some of the children in the past had changed their behaviour drastically the moment contact with their birth parents stopped – they calmed down, they immediately stopped bed-wetting etc. I found this really interesting.
One thing that did concern me a bit, and something that came up in my mind the next day too, was that taking on all these children, could and it seemed sometimes did, have quite an impact on the birth children, or even older adopted children. Can you always give enough time to your own/older kids, when you have so many younger kids/kids who are quite demanding to focus on too?
The next day we visited a family looking to adopt their first child – we had a general chat with them and then did some exercises about children’s behaviour . Some of it was quite interesting, ie a discussion about hitting your child. The exercise was clearly trying to make sure the couple thought it was wrong to hit a child – but, I just wondered whether it was quite as black and white as this. I’m not saying I think it’s right – but equally I doubt everyone thinks that a light hit is the same as child abuse. I know it’s a topic that comes and goes in different generations and that we have to be particularly careful about people who are about to adopt and their attitude but I still thought it was quite a tricky issue.
We also had an interesting chat about contact and options such as keeping contact with birth parents but without sharing photos. Also, what happens if the birth parents go on to have other children after you’ve adopted this one – would you allow them contact with their siblings? Contact is clearly an incredibly challenging and interesting part of adoption and I found it particularly so as I’m pro adoption for myself at some point so was often wondering what I would do in a given situation.
This couple were going to pre-approval training where they met others in the same position – I imagine this can form a pretty great support network, and certainly many of the foster carers we visited, seemed to know others they’d met at various training groups.
Finally we visited one more foster carer who had a number of her own children as well as those on placement. She seemed to be doing a remarkable job and I very much enjoyed sitting with a baby on my lap! One of their children is soon to be adopted so there was much discussion about that process and how to make the transfer smooth, in terms of letting them come into the house and start to look after the child as much as possible. The carer seemed to be incredibly thoughtful making suggestions such as texting the adoptive parents photos of the child when they wake up saying “morning mummy and daddy” – and she’d created a gift, a printed book of photos for them, as well as the life story book they’d worked on.
We discussed a template for an ideal life story book – something the social worker could create for all her carers if they wanted to use it. A life story book is a book that gives the child a sense of history and identity as they grow older, as well as some continuity for the next carers – it includes photos of them growing up, people important in their life – and anything from what subjects they liked in school, food or toys they like, to medical history.
What also struck me over this trip was how much time and money you needed to have to make fostering or adoption work. Fostering itself pays but as it doesn’t pay much, it certainly prevents people with less money from doing it. Although I know this is a contentious issue in itself – you’d never want people to foster for the money so it’s a hard balance to get right. But also having the time – if you work, and you’re adopting, how do you take time off for regular social worker visits – many of the people we met were stay at home mums or housewives which made meeting social workers more flexible – or people who worked shifts.
The broadest point though was that in every case, the change in the children being fostered was said to be remarkable - such an incredibly rewarding thing both to do and to observe.
Another great experience, and thank you to the fantastic social worker who not only allowed me to shadow, but to stay in their home for a few nights!
So that brings my shadowing to an end. I’ve done a mental health day centre, a social worker in community mental health and in fostering and adoption and some time with a charity who work with kids in care. It’s been a fantastic five weeks.
Next week is my induction week at uni and lectures begin the week after…I’m excited and nervous too – just the idea of being a student again after this time makes me slightly anxious…but I’ve been waiting for it long enough!
Anyway, back to fostering and adoption!
A supervising social worker (SSW), supervises foster carers – supervising visits to check all is going well, helping to prepare reports for reviews, assess and recruit carers, help with life story books – and this social worker did a huge amount of other tasks too – working in adoption, (recruiting and assessing families to adopt), getting involved in life appreciation days, where all the professionals involved in a child’s life, get together with the family that is about to adopt them to tell them more about the child, and she does post adoption work – helping those who have been adopted, who want to know more and perhaps reunite with birth families. Among other things. That’s a pretty vague description of her job, having only spent 2 days with her.
The first day we had a meeting at the primary school of a child who is in foster care. We met with the foster carer, a teacher from the school, as well as a representative from another school where the child’s sibling goes, the child’s social worker and a few others. The meeting was to check how the children were doing in school, both educationally and from a social point of view – and as one had just started secondary school, it was a good opportunity to discuss in more detail the kind of support it was felt she needed and some of the things the foster carer might want to discuss with her – for example – did she like the idea of starting a clean slate and no-one knowing about her past, or did she want to feel a or several specific teachers knew about it and therefore she could turn to them when she wanted? Also, how to prepare the child for questions that would come up about her past. In biology, you tend to cover genetics and eye colour – in English they were going to be asked to write about their life so far etc.. things I’d always taken for granted.
There was also some additional things to consider about contact. These siblings had a younger sibling who was about to be adopted and whose family don’t want them to have any further contact. This issue has always been one I find difficult. I wrote a post much earlier about cutting off sibling contact – I find it a hard one to get my head around if the siblings don’t cause any risk to the child – and I could only imagine how hard it was to tell these kids that they could no longer see their younger sibling – or at least for many many years until they get to 18. It also brings up the role of social media – once they’re all on Facebook, who says how long it will take for them to reunite of their own accord, without support systems in place?
We then had lunch with the social worker I was shadowing’s old manager – where I heard more about many of the issues local authorities are facing at the moment – staff off sick, less managers about, overworked people – and much of the work getting privatized to more dynamic organisations.
After visting the foster carer from the school meeting again to get documents ready for updating CRB checks, and discussing risk assessments around the home, we went on to visit another foster carer. A kinda super nanny figure who has adopted many children and is now fostering many more. In many ways it was incredibly inspiring seeing how many lives she had changed. She was dealing with a whole spectrum of issues from disabled babies born from drug addicted parents, to teenagers dropping out of jobs, sleeping with their partners too young and everything in between. There were lots of interesting things for me:
- no one could sleep over at the house without being CRB’d – ie the kids’ friends
- she talked about going shopping with some of the kids in care and when random people came over saying “aahh cute, whats their names?” she has to change the names because of the situation
She was also having interesting challenges regarding contact. It seems that some of the children in the past had changed their behaviour drastically the moment contact with their birth parents stopped – they calmed down, they immediately stopped bed-wetting etc. I found this really interesting.
One thing that did concern me a bit, and something that came up in my mind the next day too, was that taking on all these children, could and it seemed sometimes did, have quite an impact on the birth children, or even older adopted children. Can you always give enough time to your own/older kids, when you have so many younger kids/kids who are quite demanding to focus on too?
The next day we visited a family looking to adopt their first child – we had a general chat with them and then did some exercises about children’s behaviour . Some of it was quite interesting, ie a discussion about hitting your child. The exercise was clearly trying to make sure the couple thought it was wrong to hit a child – but, I just wondered whether it was quite as black and white as this. I’m not saying I think it’s right – but equally I doubt everyone thinks that a light hit is the same as child abuse. I know it’s a topic that comes and goes in different generations and that we have to be particularly careful about people who are about to adopt and their attitude but I still thought it was quite a tricky issue.
We also had an interesting chat about contact and options such as keeping contact with birth parents but without sharing photos. Also, what happens if the birth parents go on to have other children after you’ve adopted this one – would you allow them contact with their siblings? Contact is clearly an incredibly challenging and interesting part of adoption and I found it particularly so as I’m pro adoption for myself at some point so was often wondering what I would do in a given situation.
This couple were going to pre-approval training where they met others in the same position – I imagine this can form a pretty great support network, and certainly many of the foster carers we visited, seemed to know others they’d met at various training groups.
Finally we visited one more foster carer who had a number of her own children as well as those on placement. She seemed to be doing a remarkable job and I very much enjoyed sitting with a baby on my lap! One of their children is soon to be adopted so there was much discussion about that process and how to make the transfer smooth, in terms of letting them come into the house and start to look after the child as much as possible. The carer seemed to be incredibly thoughtful making suggestions such as texting the adoptive parents photos of the child when they wake up saying “morning mummy and daddy” – and she’d created a gift, a printed book of photos for them, as well as the life story book they’d worked on.
We discussed a template for an ideal life story book – something the social worker could create for all her carers if they wanted to use it. A life story book is a book that gives the child a sense of history and identity as they grow older, as well as some continuity for the next carers – it includes photos of them growing up, people important in their life – and anything from what subjects they liked in school, food or toys they like, to medical history.
What also struck me over this trip was how much time and money you needed to have to make fostering or adoption work. Fostering itself pays but as it doesn’t pay much, it certainly prevents people with less money from doing it. Although I know this is a contentious issue in itself – you’d never want people to foster for the money so it’s a hard balance to get right. But also having the time – if you work, and you’re adopting, how do you take time off for regular social worker visits – many of the people we met were stay at home mums or housewives which made meeting social workers more flexible – or people who worked shifts.
The broadest point though was that in every case, the change in the children being fostered was said to be remarkable - such an incredibly rewarding thing both to do and to observe.
Another great experience, and thank you to the fantastic social worker who not only allowed me to shadow, but to stay in their home for a few nights!
So that brings my shadowing to an end. I’ve done a mental health day centre, a social worker in community mental health and in fostering and adoption and some time with a charity who work with kids in care. It’s been a fantastic five weeks.
Next week is my induction week at uni and lectures begin the week after…I’m excited and nervous too – just the idea of being a student again after this time makes me slightly anxious…but I’ve been waiting for it long enough!
Thursday, 8 September 2011
Shadowing in a Community Mental Health Team
So this week I’ve been fortunate to have 3 days shadowing in a community mental health team – very different from anything that’s come before.
The first thing that I noticed and loved was the multi-disciplinary setting – we were sitting amongst occupational therapists, psychologists, nurses and social workers, which just feels like a really broad learning experience.
My first day involved going on two visits. I found the first one quite difficult – we were visiting someone with very developed dementia, and their child has given up their life to be a full time carer. This obviously happens a lot but I just felt so bad for them – they’re really cut off from the outside world, cannot engage with their parent at all, barely leave the house..and finally through creative use of their personal budget, have been able to get a laptop and hookup to Facebook – that’s the extent of contact. It upset me to think about – and I think one of the differences working with older people vs children is the ability to distance yourself. With YP – you can say, I didn’t have this childhood, poor them – with older people – it could be you, or your parents one day – and that’s quite a big thought to face each day.
The second visit was also an eye opener and comes back to the issue of taking things at face value, one I’ve discussed before. We met someone else with dementia who discussed her active daily life, amongst other things – and I went away feeling quite positive. It turns out that none of these elements are real. I guess they were a few decades ago, but not now…
It was really interesting to note little observations and checks the Social Worker does to monitor how the service user is doing – have they bought milk recently? Is it in date? They said they’re paying their bills – but can they show me they know where their bills are? Can we do a brief financial assessment – check how much they think their weekly food shop is for example; Check the carers logbook – have the carers been coming when they say they will etc.
I was fortunate to be shadowing a social worker with endless patience for my many questions. And with a huge variety of books for me to read – from psychiatric handbooks, to guidance on the mental health act and mental capacity act.
I learnt more about the differences between neurotic and psychotic conditions, about the MMSE – mini mental state examination - often done with people with dementia as a quick assessment.
On my second day I went to the multi-disciplinary meeting all morning, where each case is discussed. I really enjoyed this and thought it was so useful how each profession could chip in with advice about different cases. And for me, it was just interesting seeing different debates and protocols:
- one case was perceived to be a safeguarding issue, so a strategy meeting would be arranged asap, potentially involving the police
- in another instance it was unclear what more this team could do for the s/u so a case conference was going to be called involving everyone concerned with the s/u – family, people at the day centre they attend etc – and the s/u themselves would be invited
- they discussed the need for one s/u to go to residential care and how under s7 of the MHA, a patient can go into guardianship (with agreement of the closest relative, different to next of kin), the guardian may be a social services authority or any other person if the authority agrees to it. I have been reading about this further – the guardian must visit them at least every 3 months and the duration of guardianship is usually 6 months with the possibility of further renewals.
- The guardian can send someone to residential care, or make a decision on their care regime, without s/u’s consent – but cannot prescribe treatment to them. (A community treatment order is used to ensure a patient is taking treatment while still being in the community rather than needing to be detained in hospital.)
- The use of an IMCA (independent mental capacity advocate) – they’ll be involved where serious medical treatments are proposed and no one else can be consulted about the patient’s best interests or where there is a proposal for the patient to be accommodated in a care home or hospital – they will represent and support the individual, ascertain his/her wishes and consider courses of action.
and lots of small but to me interesting debates i.e:
- different children wanting their parent to live near them in a residential care home – who decides etc? Although comes down to capacity of individual themselves
- those who are diagnosed with dementia cannot attend just any residential home – they have to be dual registered to specifically work with those with dementia
- hard to engage with one s/u but they spend all their day in church – should SW-er visit them there? Or actually is it good they have their safe space uninvaded by social workers….if it’s easy to monitor their wellbeing by calling the church
- the importance of updating risk assessments and discussing doubling up on certain visits!
I also learnt more about setting up mental health assessments – to section someone. And read a best interests assessment form to assess whether the deprivation of liberty in a particular case was the best decision made in that instance – i.e was it done to prevent harm to the person themselves or to others, and proportionate to the risk posed. (I’m not explaining this well as its actually pretty detailed – see Stuart Sorensen’s blog for lots of detail about deprivation of liberty safeguards/DoLS)
I attended a training session about the importance of reducing prescriptions of anti psychotic medicine to those with dementia – it seems its often prescribed for behavioural elements such as irritability and insomnia, rather than psychotic elements – and there are many side effects that are not always considered in the detail they should be, such as strokes – this is a national target.
My final day I spent doing lots more reading. Particularly lots of reports for mental health act assessments, observations of what goes on in a mental health ward, and interviews with people after they had been sectioned – particularly interesting. I enjoyed reading the reflective reports (part of the AMHP portfolio) discussing whether the social worker felt that the assessment had been carried out in an anti-discriminatory way and the importance of trying to match gender and race where possible between service user and those carrying out the assessment.
Anyway I’ve waffled on a lot in this post about the detail. I’ve learnt lots in a few days and its particularly interesting given that first mutterings this week about my first placement suggest it may be in a voluntary mental health setting – but will know more soon.
The first thing that I noticed and loved was the multi-disciplinary setting – we were sitting amongst occupational therapists, psychologists, nurses and social workers, which just feels like a really broad learning experience.
My first day involved going on two visits. I found the first one quite difficult – we were visiting someone with very developed dementia, and their child has given up their life to be a full time carer. This obviously happens a lot but I just felt so bad for them – they’re really cut off from the outside world, cannot engage with their parent at all, barely leave the house..and finally through creative use of their personal budget, have been able to get a laptop and hookup to Facebook – that’s the extent of contact. It upset me to think about – and I think one of the differences working with older people vs children is the ability to distance yourself. With YP – you can say, I didn’t have this childhood, poor them – with older people – it could be you, or your parents one day – and that’s quite a big thought to face each day.
The second visit was also an eye opener and comes back to the issue of taking things at face value, one I’ve discussed before. We met someone else with dementia who discussed her active daily life, amongst other things – and I went away feeling quite positive. It turns out that none of these elements are real. I guess they were a few decades ago, but not now…
It was really interesting to note little observations and checks the Social Worker does to monitor how the service user is doing – have they bought milk recently? Is it in date? They said they’re paying their bills – but can they show me they know where their bills are? Can we do a brief financial assessment – check how much they think their weekly food shop is for example; Check the carers logbook – have the carers been coming when they say they will etc.
I was fortunate to be shadowing a social worker with endless patience for my many questions. And with a huge variety of books for me to read – from psychiatric handbooks, to guidance on the mental health act and mental capacity act.
I learnt more about the differences between neurotic and psychotic conditions, about the MMSE – mini mental state examination - often done with people with dementia as a quick assessment.
On my second day I went to the multi-disciplinary meeting all morning, where each case is discussed. I really enjoyed this and thought it was so useful how each profession could chip in with advice about different cases. And for me, it was just interesting seeing different debates and protocols:
- one case was perceived to be a safeguarding issue, so a strategy meeting would be arranged asap, potentially involving the police
- in another instance it was unclear what more this team could do for the s/u so a case conference was going to be called involving everyone concerned with the s/u – family, people at the day centre they attend etc – and the s/u themselves would be invited
- they discussed the need for one s/u to go to residential care and how under s7 of the MHA, a patient can go into guardianship (with agreement of the closest relative, different to next of kin), the guardian may be a social services authority or any other person if the authority agrees to it. I have been reading about this further – the guardian must visit them at least every 3 months and the duration of guardianship is usually 6 months with the possibility of further renewals.
- The guardian can send someone to residential care, or make a decision on their care regime, without s/u’s consent – but cannot prescribe treatment to them. (A community treatment order is used to ensure a patient is taking treatment while still being in the community rather than needing to be detained in hospital.)
- The use of an IMCA (independent mental capacity advocate) – they’ll be involved where serious medical treatments are proposed and no one else can be consulted about the patient’s best interests or where there is a proposal for the patient to be accommodated in a care home or hospital – they will represent and support the individual, ascertain his/her wishes and consider courses of action.
and lots of small but to me interesting debates i.e:
- different children wanting their parent to live near them in a residential care home – who decides etc? Although comes down to capacity of individual themselves
- those who are diagnosed with dementia cannot attend just any residential home – they have to be dual registered to specifically work with those with dementia
- hard to engage with one s/u but they spend all their day in church – should SW-er visit them there? Or actually is it good they have their safe space uninvaded by social workers….if it’s easy to monitor their wellbeing by calling the church
- the importance of updating risk assessments and discussing doubling up on certain visits!
I also learnt more about setting up mental health assessments – to section someone. And read a best interests assessment form to assess whether the deprivation of liberty in a particular case was the best decision made in that instance – i.e was it done to prevent harm to the person themselves or to others, and proportionate to the risk posed. (I’m not explaining this well as its actually pretty detailed – see Stuart Sorensen’s blog for lots of detail about deprivation of liberty safeguards/DoLS)
I attended a training session about the importance of reducing prescriptions of anti psychotic medicine to those with dementia – it seems its often prescribed for behavioural elements such as irritability and insomnia, rather than psychotic elements – and there are many side effects that are not always considered in the detail they should be, such as strokes – this is a national target.
My final day I spent doing lots more reading. Particularly lots of reports for mental health act assessments, observations of what goes on in a mental health ward, and interviews with people after they had been sectioned – particularly interesting. I enjoyed reading the reflective reports (part of the AMHP portfolio) discussing whether the social worker felt that the assessment had been carried out in an anti-discriminatory way and the importance of trying to match gender and race where possible between service user and those carrying out the assessment.
Anyway I’ve waffled on a lot in this post about the detail. I’ve learnt lots in a few days and its particularly interesting given that first mutterings this week about my first placement suggest it may be in a voluntary mental health setting – but will know more soon.
Tuesday, 30 August 2011
Work experience with children in care
After a week’s work experience at a mental health day centre, I’ve this week moved onto work experience with children in the care system – mainly observing and contributing to some meetings with YP, about the current changes to Ofsted inspections within children’s services. And today also observing part of a children in care council meeting. I was supposed to be attending a session tomorrow run by the YP for myself and another soon to be SW student, telling us what a SW-er should know, from the YP’s POV. Unfortunately I’ve had to pull out after a friend of mine lost her father earlier in the week, so I’ll be attending the funeral but I know it will also be a great session.
I’m always amazed by quite much can be learnt even from one day’s work experience. The typical workie reference is from when we were 16, where work experience meant filing and getting people coffee but this couldn’t be more different.
For a start I’ve just learnt so much from talking to the professionals, not only about their roles but other roles within SW and opportunities that I didn’t even know about , as well as understanding in more depth some of the merits and pitfalls of different SW departments. And then of course there’s meeting the YP – which I’ve loved.
I’ve heard from them some of the things that make a good or bad foster placement – some of the details being things you wouldn’t necessarily think about (don’t gossip on the phone to your friends about the latest kid in your care…) heard about their hopes for the future, today I heard more about the role of an IRO (independent reviewing officer) as the YP told a LA IRO what their team could be doing better.
Oh and meeting an IRO who after decades in social work still seemed incredibly passionate and inspiring – that in itself is incredibly helpful as the course gets closer.
I don’t think it’s possible to come out of some of these sessions with YP and not feel inspired by their resilience. That may seem patronising but it’s certainly not intended to. The concept of living at 16 independently , or having been moved around from placement to placement with no stability and then dealing with SW-ers disappearing without saying goodbye, or IRO’s asking them who they’re having sex with in a huge review meeting infront of a million strangers…and then turning up at these meetings chirpy – is frankly amazing.
And boy does it make me excited to start.
It also reminds me constantly quite how smart and astute they are. It’s so easy to talk to a YP like a child, forgetting quite how much they know. But they have opinions on everything and informed ones at that – whether it be their views on politics (“ Cameron, his role is to make rich people richer” - there were others, I just quite liked that one!) and views about the riots, to understanding in detail the laws around living in care, what they’re entitled to, and how they should be treated – rightly so. So many of them have just grown up so much faster than I’ve ever had to – they’re used to having to chase this company and that person to get the free computer they’re entitled to – or people coming and going from their life – in ways that fortunately many of us don’t need to worry about, at least until later on.
The YP help to make this change in my life feel real. They bring up a lot of the concerns that I’ve had and have – “SW-ers are all about the paperwork”, “they’re so stressed all the time”, “ you’re going to be a SW-er, start praying now” – “Sw-ers can’t change anything, that’s why we don’t like them, they just tell you what their managers tell them”…. But they also tell you firsthand what the difference between a good and bad social worker is, and I feel lucky to be having these conversations – both with people in the mental health day centre last week and with the YP this week…
Now I just need to be one of the SW-ers they rave about!
I’m always amazed by quite much can be learnt even from one day’s work experience. The typical workie reference is from when we were 16, where work experience meant filing and getting people coffee but this couldn’t be more different.
For a start I’ve just learnt so much from talking to the professionals, not only about their roles but other roles within SW and opportunities that I didn’t even know about , as well as understanding in more depth some of the merits and pitfalls of different SW departments. And then of course there’s meeting the YP – which I’ve loved.
I’ve heard from them some of the things that make a good or bad foster placement – some of the details being things you wouldn’t necessarily think about (don’t gossip on the phone to your friends about the latest kid in your care…) heard about their hopes for the future, today I heard more about the role of an IRO (independent reviewing officer) as the YP told a LA IRO what their team could be doing better.
Oh and meeting an IRO who after decades in social work still seemed incredibly passionate and inspiring – that in itself is incredibly helpful as the course gets closer.
I don’t think it’s possible to come out of some of these sessions with YP and not feel inspired by their resilience. That may seem patronising but it’s certainly not intended to. The concept of living at 16 independently , or having been moved around from placement to placement with no stability and then dealing with SW-ers disappearing without saying goodbye, or IRO’s asking them who they’re having sex with in a huge review meeting infront of a million strangers…and then turning up at these meetings chirpy – is frankly amazing.
And boy does it make me excited to start.
It also reminds me constantly quite how smart and astute they are. It’s so easy to talk to a YP like a child, forgetting quite how much they know. But they have opinions on everything and informed ones at that – whether it be their views on politics (“ Cameron, his role is to make rich people richer” - there were others, I just quite liked that one!) and views about the riots, to understanding in detail the laws around living in care, what they’re entitled to, and how they should be treated – rightly so. So many of them have just grown up so much faster than I’ve ever had to – they’re used to having to chase this company and that person to get the free computer they’re entitled to – or people coming and going from their life – in ways that fortunately many of us don’t need to worry about, at least until later on.
The YP help to make this change in my life feel real. They bring up a lot of the concerns that I’ve had and have – “SW-ers are all about the paperwork”, “they’re so stressed all the time”, “ you’re going to be a SW-er, start praying now” – “Sw-ers can’t change anything, that’s why we don’t like them, they just tell you what their managers tell them”…. But they also tell you firsthand what the difference between a good and bad social worker is, and I feel lucky to be having these conversations – both with people in the mental health day centre last week and with the YP this week…
Now I just need to be one of the SW-ers they rave about!
Friday, 19 August 2011
First week in Mental Health
So I have completed my 3 days at the mental health day centre.
I’m not sure what I thought – had so many mixed feelings. I loved the experience in many ways – it was a real eye opener for me, insightful, thought – provoking..
I wasn’t sure what I thought about the concept of the day centre. I kept thinking, is this helping? Is this any way to rehabilitate? This doesn’t fit in the ideal of social inclusion. But then, does it entirely matter? Is the idea of a safe haven, somewhere to be accepted and to meet others you get along with, a bad thing? This is my first experience in a mental health setting of any kind, so I have very little reference.
The structure is mainly that it’s a place to socialise and talk to other guests and volunteers while sessions are run, mainly by guests upstairs i.e art, poetry etc and then there are some speakers who come in – i.e we had an “ask the GP” session and a guests meeting where they could give feedback about the centre, chaired by another guest. And they got a 3 course meal for £2 which they all cited as one of their favourite aspects of the centre.
In addition there was quite a badly run session, where the commissioners from the LA came to try to find out what the guests liked about their service so they could use that feedback to write a proposal for the tender process…because of the cuts. However, this day centre will actually be affected very little by the cuts as it’s mainly funded by donors not the state. This wasn’t explained well enough to the guests so it just created huge fear and uncertainty as to whether the centre was going to be shut down.
I met great people. Both guests and volunteers. The guests were so generous – after 3 days I came away with a list of books recommended by one guest about sociology that would be good for my MA, a poem to thank me for my time there, a list of classical music that would make a great mix tape and a short story. I had great conversations about philosophy and sociology – one guest asked me what I did my dissertation on, and when I mentioned Platos’ Republic, it turned out he had it in his bag….another Oxbridge educated guest brought in the poetry he’d been writing to share. For most people reading this, none of this would be particularly surprising, but not really knowing what to expect, it was all quite a learning experience.
On the most part, people seemed happy. But there were definitely some people who stuck in my mind in terms of their sadness and vulnerability. People you couldn’t engage with beyond a few sentences – and I was always left wondering can these people get better? And how?
I learnt a huge amount from some incredible volunteers. One had been an OT for 15 years and told me about the different types of mental illness – neurotic and psychotic and some of the differences. Another actually changed career from business to social services age 47 and now decades later is still volunteering in this day centre which she herself founded. She’d been a guest at the House of Lords and lobbied outside parliament – very inspiring.
Anyway, I took a huge amount out of it from just 3 days.. a great first week out of advertising.
Possibly my biggest and perhaps most amusing faux pas…we were having a bit of a sing along to Sound of Music and one of the guests said “let me turn off the music and you can do a solo..” and I said “ Are you mad?!”…
I’m not sure what I thought – had so many mixed feelings. I loved the experience in many ways – it was a real eye opener for me, insightful, thought – provoking..
I wasn’t sure what I thought about the concept of the day centre. I kept thinking, is this helping? Is this any way to rehabilitate? This doesn’t fit in the ideal of social inclusion. But then, does it entirely matter? Is the idea of a safe haven, somewhere to be accepted and to meet others you get along with, a bad thing? This is my first experience in a mental health setting of any kind, so I have very little reference.
The structure is mainly that it’s a place to socialise and talk to other guests and volunteers while sessions are run, mainly by guests upstairs i.e art, poetry etc and then there are some speakers who come in – i.e we had an “ask the GP” session and a guests meeting where they could give feedback about the centre, chaired by another guest. And they got a 3 course meal for £2 which they all cited as one of their favourite aspects of the centre.
In addition there was quite a badly run session, where the commissioners from the LA came to try to find out what the guests liked about their service so they could use that feedback to write a proposal for the tender process…because of the cuts. However, this day centre will actually be affected very little by the cuts as it’s mainly funded by donors not the state. This wasn’t explained well enough to the guests so it just created huge fear and uncertainty as to whether the centre was going to be shut down.
I met great people. Both guests and volunteers. The guests were so generous – after 3 days I came away with a list of books recommended by one guest about sociology that would be good for my MA, a poem to thank me for my time there, a list of classical music that would make a great mix tape and a short story. I had great conversations about philosophy and sociology – one guest asked me what I did my dissertation on, and when I mentioned Platos’ Republic, it turned out he had it in his bag….another Oxbridge educated guest brought in the poetry he’d been writing to share. For most people reading this, none of this would be particularly surprising, but not really knowing what to expect, it was all quite a learning experience.
On the most part, people seemed happy. But there were definitely some people who stuck in my mind in terms of their sadness and vulnerability. People you couldn’t engage with beyond a few sentences – and I was always left wondering can these people get better? And how?
I learnt a huge amount from some incredible volunteers. One had been an OT for 15 years and told me about the different types of mental illness – neurotic and psychotic and some of the differences. Another actually changed career from business to social services age 47 and now decades later is still volunteering in this day centre which she herself founded. She’d been a guest at the House of Lords and lobbied outside parliament – very inspiring.
Anyway, I took a huge amount out of it from just 3 days.. a great first week out of advertising.
Possibly my biggest and perhaps most amusing faux pas…we were having a bit of a sing along to Sound of Music and one of the guests said “let me turn off the music and you can do a solo..” and I said “ Are you mad?!”…
Monday, 15 August 2011
An intro to mental health
Today was my first day since leaving my job, and I have four days lined up this week with a mental health charity, local to me. They have some shops in the community, as well as their office from which they do a great deal of community and outreach work both including hospital visits, in-home support and education sessions – they do one called mental first aid, in schools . They also have a day centre which is where I was to be spending some time.
When I arrived I met the OT who talked to me more about the work that the charity does and a bit about the history of mental health. She qualified 25 years ago and told me how different it was then. Most patients were sent to asylums, and it was much more about protecting them and caring for them rather than empowering. They’d all be in a bit of a “daze” and have a few arts and crafts classes etc. She told me how day centres have also now become old fashioned, they used to have many more – because of the concept of social inclusion. They’re now trying to shift many of the practices in the day centre away from arts and crafts and 50 people on a coach to southend and aim to make it much more collaborative – getting the clients involved in creating their own sessions and she talked of how they all took themselves to Brighton by train last week.
This split or change in how mental health issues have been dealt with was particularly interesting when we talked about the work they did with carers. They have an older age group of carers for whom their children have spent so many decades in more of an institutionalised setting that the only help they now want is a place to vent. And a younger set of carers for whom their children are being treated with more modern techniques and who are watching them start to get better or be able to cope more effectively. Apparently because these sets of carers have had such different experiences, they run very different sessions for them.
The session that was supposed to take place today was specifically employment advice. The lady leading the session is a recruitment consultant by trade and now works for the charity, from this angle, discussing with clients how they can get back into jobs, or if they’re not ready, into voluntary work – giving them help with CVs and interview tips and sometimes going into the workplace to discuss issues with employers. We had an interesting conversation about equality and how employers handle the issue of mental health. I know I’ve read on the Community Care website lots of people who say they wouldn’t tell their bosses about depression for fear of discrimination. Apparently she tends to advise people who are going into the private sector not to declare if it they don’t need to, but in the social care world, she explained that if they met the job spec, and have a mental health issue, many are guaranteed an interview – a form of positive discrimination – or perhaps just additional experience with the fields they’re looking at.
We had a chat about the benefits trap too and how she’d found in many cases financially there was no advantage to these people working and they often lacked the motivation if it would only give them £20 more than benefits did.
Unfortunately, no one turned up to the session today, they usually get a few – one had called to say they couldn’t make it and the other 1 or 2 didn’t show. So I was sent home but am back tomorrow for next few days for when the rest of the programmes open up at the day centre. Apparently they get around 25 people so I’m looking forward to that.
When I arrived I met the OT who talked to me more about the work that the charity does and a bit about the history of mental health. She qualified 25 years ago and told me how different it was then. Most patients were sent to asylums, and it was much more about protecting them and caring for them rather than empowering. They’d all be in a bit of a “daze” and have a few arts and crafts classes etc. She told me how day centres have also now become old fashioned, they used to have many more – because of the concept of social inclusion. They’re now trying to shift many of the practices in the day centre away from arts and crafts and 50 people on a coach to southend and aim to make it much more collaborative – getting the clients involved in creating their own sessions and she talked of how they all took themselves to Brighton by train last week.
This split or change in how mental health issues have been dealt with was particularly interesting when we talked about the work they did with carers. They have an older age group of carers for whom their children have spent so many decades in more of an institutionalised setting that the only help they now want is a place to vent. And a younger set of carers for whom their children are being treated with more modern techniques and who are watching them start to get better or be able to cope more effectively. Apparently because these sets of carers have had such different experiences, they run very different sessions for them.
The session that was supposed to take place today was specifically employment advice. The lady leading the session is a recruitment consultant by trade and now works for the charity, from this angle, discussing with clients how they can get back into jobs, or if they’re not ready, into voluntary work – giving them help with CVs and interview tips and sometimes going into the workplace to discuss issues with employers. We had an interesting conversation about equality and how employers handle the issue of mental health. I know I’ve read on the Community Care website lots of people who say they wouldn’t tell their bosses about depression for fear of discrimination. Apparently she tends to advise people who are going into the private sector not to declare if it they don’t need to, but in the social care world, she explained that if they met the job spec, and have a mental health issue, many are guaranteed an interview – a form of positive discrimination – or perhaps just additional experience with the fields they’re looking at.
We had a chat about the benefits trap too and how she’d found in many cases financially there was no advantage to these people working and they often lacked the motivation if it would only give them £20 more than benefits did.
Unfortunately, no one turned up to the session today, they usually get a few – one had called to say they couldn’t make it and the other 1 or 2 didn’t show. So I was sent home but am back tomorrow for next few days for when the rest of the programmes open up at the day centre. Apparently they get around 25 people so I’m looking forward to that.
Thursday, 4 August 2011
Another shift in the shelter...and getting closer to student-dom
I did my third shift in the homeless shelter yesterday. And I really enjoyed it.
At the start I felt a little useless as due to the warm weather, pretty much everyone was asleep but I soon moved outside to chat to the smokers – I always find it really interesting just learning about people’s lives and stories and how they came to be where they are. I guess its one of the privileges you get when you’re just volunteering, with no real timelines or pressure to get anything else done, just to be able to sit and chat with people.
I spoke to three such different people last night – one that really struck a chord was only 20 and was so easy to get along with – it just makes you think about what really makes you similar or different to people. I found it much easier to chat to him than I do with some of my own colleagues – I guess who is to say what barriers or labels make you similar to someone. He was an incredibly passionate guy – and was really excited to get himself back on his feet and hopefully back in drama, the one subject he’s always loved. We also had quite an interesting chat about religion. He was asking me if I believe in god and he was saying how important religion is to him. I asked him if he sometimes wondered how there could be a god when he’s had to go through so much shit. He just talked about how others have it so much worse and that there must be a reason, maybe he did something wrong. The amount of hope and positivity I find in this shelter, among people who frankly have every right to just have a moment of wallowing and despair, is incredibly inspiring. As he was from Cameroon he also spoke French and so I got a mini French lesson – it’s been 10 years since I’ve done any so that was interesting but he had a lot of patience!
I find it quite difficult to tell fact from fiction – and it’s sometime halfway through someone’s story that I realise they’ve contradicted something they said earlier and that perhaps I need to be a little less naïve/trusting. I’m sure often it’s not intentional lies at all – they’ve had plenty of time to come up with their own versions of stories and many also have mental health issues so I’m not trying to make it black and white – I just think it’s a learning for me.
Another slightly odd situation was after I’d been chatting to one guy for quite a while, one of the other volunteers came up to me and said she’d been told not to sit with this guy alone as he was a potential sex offender. I thought perhaps I should have been told that when I arrived! But fortunately the setting is very safe and you never feel too alone - plus I have an alarm round me so I wasn’t too worried!
I also spent time chatting to the other volunteers, who because it was quieter, had more time than normal. It was nice to meet one volunteer who is currently a journalist but about to make the same move as me into social work – but in a year’s time. It was great to just chat about the journey of moving back home and giving up our salary and share some of our fears and excitement –the things we’d miss about our job (for me the creativity) and the things we wouldn’t (the soul-lessness and general sense of making up crap most of the time!). And chatted to another guy who is working as a support worker there. One of our conversations was about how the shelter was being run. They don’t have any beds or bedding there because they don’t want to encourage people to stay longer than necessary – it’s very much a hub to assess and reconnect people. But we weren’t sure how comfortable we were with this and thought their should be more of a balance – I had to tell an older guy that he’d have to sleep on the bare wooden floor because he didn’t get to the soft chairs in time…(in the end they did give him a duvet to lie on but they tend not to.) I understand some of their rationale but there’s an element of humanity to this matter – and although they’re not supposed to stay long, the truth is there are cases where they are there closer to a week or even two, and if that’s the case, it’s feels like providing them with some basic bedding would be the compassionate thing to do.
But anyway.
I have a week left of work now, I leave next Friday, so it’s all getting closer and more exciting. I’m waiting to hear news of my first placement at uni – and I’m spending my first week after I leave work, volunteering in a mental health day setting. I’m also going to hopefully be working on a mini project for the WhoCares trust – speaking to children in care about some government consultations, and I’m off to Nottingham to shadow @fluffosaur which I’m very excited about, among other things. Plus lots of pre reading to keep me busy…along with my upcoming birthday…and my charity event (I run a charity and we have a big annual 10k run/walk coming up in Hyde Park in 2 weeks time) so it’s busy and exciting times!
At the start I felt a little useless as due to the warm weather, pretty much everyone was asleep but I soon moved outside to chat to the smokers – I always find it really interesting just learning about people’s lives and stories and how they came to be where they are. I guess its one of the privileges you get when you’re just volunteering, with no real timelines or pressure to get anything else done, just to be able to sit and chat with people.
I spoke to three such different people last night – one that really struck a chord was only 20 and was so easy to get along with – it just makes you think about what really makes you similar or different to people. I found it much easier to chat to him than I do with some of my own colleagues – I guess who is to say what barriers or labels make you similar to someone. He was an incredibly passionate guy – and was really excited to get himself back on his feet and hopefully back in drama, the one subject he’s always loved. We also had quite an interesting chat about religion. He was asking me if I believe in god and he was saying how important religion is to him. I asked him if he sometimes wondered how there could be a god when he’s had to go through so much shit. He just talked about how others have it so much worse and that there must be a reason, maybe he did something wrong. The amount of hope and positivity I find in this shelter, among people who frankly have every right to just have a moment of wallowing and despair, is incredibly inspiring. As he was from Cameroon he also spoke French and so I got a mini French lesson – it’s been 10 years since I’ve done any so that was interesting but he had a lot of patience!
I find it quite difficult to tell fact from fiction – and it’s sometime halfway through someone’s story that I realise they’ve contradicted something they said earlier and that perhaps I need to be a little less naïve/trusting. I’m sure often it’s not intentional lies at all – they’ve had plenty of time to come up with their own versions of stories and many also have mental health issues so I’m not trying to make it black and white – I just think it’s a learning for me.
Another slightly odd situation was after I’d been chatting to one guy for quite a while, one of the other volunteers came up to me and said she’d been told not to sit with this guy alone as he was a potential sex offender. I thought perhaps I should have been told that when I arrived! But fortunately the setting is very safe and you never feel too alone - plus I have an alarm round me so I wasn’t too worried!
I also spent time chatting to the other volunteers, who because it was quieter, had more time than normal. It was nice to meet one volunteer who is currently a journalist but about to make the same move as me into social work – but in a year’s time. It was great to just chat about the journey of moving back home and giving up our salary and share some of our fears and excitement –the things we’d miss about our job (for me the creativity) and the things we wouldn’t (the soul-lessness and general sense of making up crap most of the time!). And chatted to another guy who is working as a support worker there. One of our conversations was about how the shelter was being run. They don’t have any beds or bedding there because they don’t want to encourage people to stay longer than necessary – it’s very much a hub to assess and reconnect people. But we weren’t sure how comfortable we were with this and thought their should be more of a balance – I had to tell an older guy that he’d have to sleep on the bare wooden floor because he didn’t get to the soft chairs in time…(in the end they did give him a duvet to lie on but they tend not to.) I understand some of their rationale but there’s an element of humanity to this matter – and although they’re not supposed to stay long, the truth is there are cases where they are there closer to a week or even two, and if that’s the case, it’s feels like providing them with some basic bedding would be the compassionate thing to do.
But anyway.
I have a week left of work now, I leave next Friday, so it’s all getting closer and more exciting. I’m waiting to hear news of my first placement at uni – and I’m spending my first week after I leave work, volunteering in a mental health day setting. I’m also going to hopefully be working on a mini project for the WhoCares trust – speaking to children in care about some government consultations, and I’m off to Nottingham to shadow @fluffosaur which I’m very excited about, among other things. Plus lots of pre reading to keep me busy…along with my upcoming birthday…and my charity event (I run a charity and we have a big annual 10k run/walk coming up in Hyde Park in 2 weeks time) so it’s busy and exciting times!
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