Damn, is it ever dreary outside. I don't think I've seen fog this thick since I was driving on some country road in northern Italy somewhere. It's hard not to feel meloncoly.
The weather used to always either bring me up or keep me down, but now, it doesn't affect me either way. I just roll with it for some reason. I suppose I'm just used to dealing with whatever anymore.
Nothing seems to shock me, yet so much usually does. Typical of the "Jacq phenomenon". Or is it rather, my life is a paradox.
I'm an extrovert by nature. Yet, I tend to have the basic introverted qualities as well at times. I'm often wanting to hybernate, veg and meditate just to gain some form of internal peace.
To be able to get that is a godsend. But I do find it to be rather easy to approach people I don't know and converse with them. In my line of work, that's a given.
You have to find out things. You have to confront people quite a bit. You deal with clients, you deal with other agencies, and you deal with families.
And what is it with families? It seems to be an ongoing battle within the family unit, for people to simply get along. I've seen people in families treat strangers better than their own sibling, parent, or child.
In my job, I network all over the place. I'm well known in the community. You don't need to wear the picture badge.
You're recognized by whatever trait you have when you interacted with the people. On average, they recognize me for how I dressed or who I reminded them of; other times it was how I went the extra mile for them, or how I was able to relate to their individual situation. You're not forgotten, even if it had been a few years since you last interacted with them.
At least I'm recognized for the good things. *PHEW!* Or better yet, they know who your boss is.
"Oh, you work for so and so. I remember him. He used to be the county's such and such.
" Yes, that's right. You smile, nod, shake the hands, and then go on your way.
When you're the bearer of bad news within the role you play, its even worse.
I often find myself *in the middle* of family squabbles. They want me to take sides. They want me to dissect their family dysfunction, find solutions to the problems that same day which have existed for decades.
Just by walking into the situation, I am instantly INVOLVED in it. And oh, how eager they are to keep you in the mix. To give you information.
I have to be curt. I have to be honest. And I have to be factual as well as offer an objective view, whether or not it's the type of thing they want to hear.
But often, it isn't fact they want. They are often aware of the facts but don't deal with them. They want you to SOLVE the problem.
Conjure up a magic spell and create a better life for them. If you don't have the answers they want to hear, they do NOT hear nor listen to your message. Even after you have expressed the statement in different ways, at different times.
Yet they will ask you questions that have been rephrased in an effort to get a different answer. The purpose is to trip you up, especially if you are much younger than they are. The belief seems to be that they have more knowledge and expertise and that you are merely wet behind the ears.
Sometimes, it's blatantly clear what they think. Most often, they have the expectation that you will give them the answer they want. Oh yes, folks.
Mind games at their finest. You tend to pick up on those things rather quickly in this field. Hmmm.
..mmm.
..
They want you to make the call to institutionalize whomever for whatever reason.
A person who is guilty of merely being cantankerous is not necessarily a candidate for placement. The person is cognitive, able to make decisions, and has the right to autonomy. They CAN make these decisions for themselves.
If the family member doesn't like how that person lives, they really have little say in it.
If I counsel someone for hoarding animals, will I leave it up to them to make sure they get proper homes? No.
They cannot be relied upon for that, because they do not recognize the problem. There's an agency to contact for animal protection. There's an agency for EVERYTHING.
I remember similar situations when I worked on the opposite end of the population. Only it wasn't with hoarding animals, but parents who would rather buy material things for themselves and their significant other than for the kids. Kids with ADHD.
The parents couldn't deal with it. You could start with talking to the kid and working your way into their trust. But when the dysfunction cuts so deep, it was tough to try to offer ways to fill the wound.
Then comes more squabbles. I don't know which situations are worse: children or the frail elderly. It's tough to see children in so much turmoil.
They're living in a world they didn't create, and a home they didn't get to choose in the first place. The elderly go from various stages. It's tough seeing someone who was relatively healthy one year, and then the next suffer so many health issues.
The deterioration is mind boggling.
And then there are the times when you must deal with the now middle aged adult children. This is fun, fun, fun.
Oh YAY! They want to be SO INVOLVED yet they live two states away. They don't see the situation unfolding on a regular basis.
They come for maybe three holidays a year and think they have the entire picture. Then you have at least two adult children who live within a five to ten mile radius but create a manifest of reasons as to why their lives are so hectic and they can't even pick up a phone to call their parent (s) to see what they're doing. How about when you have the kids who are involved because they want some sort of financial reward.
They feel it's "owed" to them, whether they express it or not. They demand a power of attorney, and yearn to sue for guardianship of an otherwise cognitive person. This is so the adult children can attempt to claim everything their now elderly parents have worked for all their lives.
Or you have the parents who spent their offsprings' childhoods battling whatever demons they had, and not doing their job as parents, but now they are ill and in need of help and the adult kids want no responsibility at all whatsoever.
All in in all, I've seen self neglect, and caregiver neglect; financial exploitation and abuse. And I've seen elderly people imprisioned in their own crippling grief of loss.
Their spouse of sixty years is gone. Even if that spouse was verbally and or physically abusive, they are entangled in their own dysfunctional grief, mourning the loss the person whom they loved and enabled. I can't say I've seen it all.
I really haven't. This is only a small portion. And I have a feeling there will be even more.
What makes my job so frustrating, endless and stressful are the mountains of paperwork and hoops that must be jumped through in order to make certain things happen. Its funding, budgets and politics that are more important than people. And a timeframe that seems impossible to meet.
You experience burnout after five years and hope there is an end to the pit. But somehow, in between the light in the distance and the fog you keep walking through, you remember what your purpose was. You remember what your reasons were for getting involved.
And when you nail that abusive, careless, neglectful caregiver, the feeling comes back. Temporarily, you had some form of mental edema, because it all seemed so endless and monotonous. You remember why the regulations are the way they are.
You know how tedious the faxes are and the countless hours on the phone, (which causes you to despise using your own phone for personal reasons) meetings and interventions are. But you see how the system works. You sometimes see how it doesn't work.
You may not always like the results, but some cases are as they are. There are consequences. And sometimes, you are the source of the remedy.
And you are then remembered. And appreciated.
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