(no subject)

[geminigirl]

If yesterday was sexual assault day, today was STD day.

Yesterday's HIV results included a cluster of people who had all been sexually assaulted. Today included a cluster of people all of whom had been diagnosed with an STD.

I got asked, several times, "How could you do this?" People wondered how I could sit there and give people HIV results.

I don't have an answer. Practice, maybe?

Comments

[mhw.livejournal.com]

"If not me, then who?"

[tommx.livejournal.com]

because it must be done.

[tigerfemme.livejournal.com]

cubby once had the opportunity to hear me work when I was doing psych crisis - she had come to surprise me at work, and waited in a waiting area until I was done with my shift.

I had to take a very upset family member out in the hall, outside the unit, to try to calm her down (her husband or son or something was in a very depressed and angry and incoherent state, if I recall). This woman knew she was in a public space; it wasn't optimal but I had to go with her *somewhere* away from the unit to make sure she got space. She wasn't helping herself or the situation. So we ended up talking in the hall.

cubby, in the nearby waiting area, couldn't help but hear at least my vocal tone and how I sounded in handling an obviously stressful situation.

Sie said to me later, "you're like a different person when you're working." (as a social worker)

I think for me that's the answer. Handling difficult stuff is a different headspace entirely. It might be different for you, geminigirl, but that's what it is for this MSW.

[mhw.livejournal.com]

Handling difficult stuff is a different headspace entirely.

That's definitely part of it for me too, I think. When I'm counselling, I'm in some ways a very different person, in that I have a whole set of antennae and association patterns that are almost never deployed in 'downtime'. It's extremely weird when they start sliding into place at times that I'm not consciously putting them into action, and generally indicative that I'm picking up very low level distress signals from the person I'm talking with. I do know how to handle that, though, now it's happened a few times *relief*.

[cappyhead.livejournal.com]

Sie said to me later, "you're like a different person when you're working." (as a social worker)
Yup. Jeremy has said the same thing to me. He and I were walking home one night when I ran into a former client of mine. She and her boyfriend were having a fight, and he was threatening to hit her if she didn't leave him alone. I pulled her aside and got her to stop following after her boyfriend, who was trying to walk away. I talked to her for a few minutes, and afterwards, Jeremy said that it was interesting to see me instantaneously switch from my "normal" self (heh) to my social worker self, then back again.