i quit

This week I mentally quit my field placement and grad school approximately 4,934 times. Why didn't I actually quit...well, classes don't actually start till this Wednesday so I guess you can't quit something that hasn't begun, plus being many thousands of dollars invested in this little endeavor provides an incentive to push on when others rewards are sorely lacking.

I want to quit because the ratio of things at which I feel competent and from which I derive satisfaction to the things that make me wonder why I thought I should go to graduate school or, well, pursue a profession where I must deal with humans has been skewed dramatically in favor of the latter. In the face of so much discouragement I can't help but think of my Myers Briggs results which state that my ideal careers include being a chemist, mathematician or computer programmer. (I'm a big believer in the Myers Briggs, check it out. If you take the test, tell me your type!). Maybe I was on the right track when I was throwing around the idea of being a chemist (during high school) or a forensic anthropologist (during my first stint of college).

The problems with working with humans and with social work:

1. no clear right or wrong, constant ambiguity
   
2. few measurable results
3. crap tons of paperwork, TPS reports, ill-devised forms and meaningless check boxes
   
4. i don't do that whole "talking about feelings" thing
5. i don't like talking to strangers
6. having to work with other social workers and people at other agencies

Bleeeeeeeeh.

I'm trying to be objective and remind myself that the whole point of field placement (an unpaid 24 hr/wk job for those of you unfamiliar) is to learn, and that making mistakes and not knowing what is going on is part of learning. Also, I keep telling myself that maybe it isn't that I don't have the right personality/skills for social work, but rather that I am not meant to do this particular kind of social work (casework with families). But it is so hard to maintain perspective when it seems I am getting almost no positive feedback about my work, and lots of negative feedback. Looking back over my notes from field placement experiences in undergrad, I can see that I had similar difficulties in one position, but I think this was buffered by having other things I was involved in, like volunteer work I really enjoyed and thought I was good at.

I think some of the criticism I've received is because I wasn't sufficiently trained on key aspects of casework, e.g. what reports I'm required to write, when they are due, who they go to, and what items are and aren't included in them. So missing this understanding or framework I'm left with the feeling that these requirements drop from the sky, and I don't find out what I'm supposed to do until someone comes into my office (hey hey, I've got an office, I guess that's something) to ask where the blahbady-blah report is. And I of course always answer, "what blahbady-blah report?" and they answer "the one you always do for clients by week 3, you were supposed to send it to the blahbady-blah agency" and then I fantasize about dramatically flinging my papers in the air and running out the building, never to return.

So I guess the training thing isn't my fault at least. It also doesn't help that I have two supervisors. In addition to getting mixed messages, I don't think I'm compatible with one of them so I find myself avoiding interacting with her. There's some people in this world that I just don't click with, where they don't like my sense of humor, don't understand my questions/way of thinking, and where just every interaction is...how to describe it...grating. Like an outside observer would just think, Ugh, isn't that f**king awkward. A third issue is that of my three cases I've been assigned, I have shared every one with another social worker, whereas normally social workers carry cases solo. While this could be nice for the crutch it offers as someone new to the job, this is faaaaar outweighed by the negatives:

1) Never knowing what the other social worker has done for/with the client (especially since I'm only in the office 3 days a week);
2) Never knowing what case stuff e.g. blahbady-blah reports is my responsibility, and which is theirs;
3) Triangulation issues with the client/other agencies and me and the social worker (triangulation is therapy speak for playing us off one another). Sometimes it isn't necessarily triangulation, just the feeling that I'm not being taken seriously and that the client/others aren't really working with me. The other day, for example, I called someone at another agency to ask about the status of a case and she said, "Aren't I working with [other social worker] on this one?" I explained that I'm a student so he covered for me while I'm out, but still she barely gave me any information and seemed irritated that I was calling. Which brings me to one last issue: I do on-going work with clients for 12 weeks, but of course as a student I have breaks, so when I come back from, say, winter break I have to figure out what has happened in the prior three weeks, and you would be surprised just how much can change with a family during that time.

So these issues make this work really hard for me. Then the agency vibe is quite a bit different from my past experiences. I didn't realize how liberal those environment were until coming to this place where coworkers rock out to gospel music and the Lord/religion frequently are mentioned in staff meetings and work with clients. At the risk of offending people, I have to admit that, well, Christians give me the heebie-jeebies (*see postcard, a nice summary of my sentiments. I got it from the confessions site postsecret, you should check it out). I am pro separation of church and work. I've pondered this a bit and wondered if my coworkers wouldn't feel equally squeamish if they suddenly found themselves in one of my former agencies, chock full of vegan lesbian feminists with wooden spirals in their earlobes and black frame glasses. Yeah, I suppose so. And I suppose that one of the things that makes me uncomfortable with my coworkers is the feeling that they are all in this God Club and view me as an outsider, and an outsider who is amoral and destined for a mighty smitin' at that. Maybe it isn't so different. I don't exactly look upon them favorably. Well crap, I really failed to make that point. Moving on.


Well, I guess the main thing here is no one is giving me positive feedback about the work I'm doing, and quite a lot of the time I don't enjoy the work that I'm doing. There has been one notable client I think I really made a connection with and helped, but it's hard to think of that when my experiences in the office/with paperwork/trying to figure out what is expected of me are so goddamn frustrating. I just feel so incompetent! GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

I don't know, maybe I should just focus on the fact that I only have 4 months left (spring term is over at the end of April) and next year I might end up with a field placement that not only teaches me a lot but is satisfying too. And I'm trying to get back into art and cooking, two things I haven't done since moving out here. All this ruminating is doing horrible things to my mood and motivation, and art is one of the best distractions for me -- plus it's something I actually feel good at! Oh, and tomorrow I'm going to bake. And right now I'm watching Lost in Translation. Cookies+collage+sad/funny/fabulous movie = field placement, what field placement?

Or at least that's the plan.