Lived Experience Forum

[creative_writer]

@Jynx probably explains the achy head, my temples have been sensitive .

This guy I came across on placement. They’re referring him elsewhere since services like this aren’t suitable for people with criminal histories

[Jynx]

Oh true @creative_writer yeah that would've thrown me for a loop too. Glad he's getting referred out. 

Okay your words make more sense now. Is it a trauma history thing? Maybe, I guess. Maybe it's also the tension between desire to help vs. desire to protect oneself? Sounds like it's left you quite shaken in any case. Were your supervisors supportive and stuff? 

[creative_writer]

@Jynx I think it would’ve thrown a lot of people over the loop, it certainly threw my supervisor off the loop. She was able to debrief with others. I did debrief, but I might have held stuff back and it was still too early on the day. I take a while to process. I know my supervisor would be supportive, but I don’t like saying much about my what goes on in my head, it feels too personal

[Jynx]

@creative_writer very legit, even after a few weeks it's still a relatively new relationship with your supervisor. The way I sort of gauge it is that if something is resurfacing a lot outside of work hours, or if it's continuing to pop into my brain after a week or so, it means I'm still impacted and need to seek external support. But like you, I take quite a while to process things, sometimes a few days to a week! So I won't know how much support I may or may not need until I've actually begun to process. And that doesn't always happen straight away either.

Hopefully, if you listen to your instincts, you'll be able to ascertain whether this is something you can move through solo, or whether you may benefit from piping up. And you don't even have to go to your placement supervisor, you could always talk to your psych or even buzz the sane line! 

[creative_writer]

@Jynx it is still a new supervisor-supervisee relationship. I often want to do things alone, sometimes I do want to be too independent and it doesn’t work in my favour. I guess there is shame around how I’m reacting

[Jynx]

@creative_writer mm recovering from trauma-related desire for independence can be so tricky. Cos it's something you've had to repeatedly fight for I'm guessing, to keep yourself safe. So to try to go against that instinct can be soooo challenging. Baby steps though, you got this!

Empathy and warmth - antidotes to shame. Is there a way you could be warm and empathetic to the part of you that is feeling shame?

[creative_writer]

@Jynx my hyper-independence is a result of trauma and even cultural stuff. In some cultures people are in your face, so I withdrew to prevent boundary crossing.

I know trauma is part of being human. We all go through stuff to some extent. From what I’m sensing, my supervisor has probably had her own stuff to work through. I know it’s part of being human. Sometimes I feel like since I’m in this field there is an expectation that you have your shit together. I know nobody does. I don’t want to admit to what I feel is weakness in the workplace. It’s just that I’ve noticed trauma thoughts have been worse lately. I had a rough week with that client, I also was beginning to go into a mixed episode a week ago, got it under control, but depression persisted afterwards

[Jynx]

@creative_writer mm you've had to suppress, subdue, and ignore, quite a lot to protect yourself hey. 

Mm I think it can be a tricky line to walk, because like... we're in a field where we are always encouraging people to be open, to talk about their stuff, and yet also do need to bracket and compartmentalise our own stuff to ensure it doesn't have the potential to be negatively impactful to clients. 

But to my mind, I think one of the most important skills to have when working in MH is to know when we are not in the right state of mind to be providing care for others. Noticing that your reaction to that client has been a strong one is a strength, not a weakness. It means you can monitor (and nurture!) that part of yourself, you can ensure that if it does continue to linger, you may want to talk to your supervisor about it then, and you can now identify that this type of client would not be suitable in future. All part of the learning 😉

Good stuff, managing the mixed episode! Can imagine it was challenging, and obvs the depression has dug its heels in, but it won't last forever! Kudos 💜

[creative_writer]

@Jynx it’s certainly been a rough one lately. Manic symptoms are easy to control, an extra dose of antipsychotics helps. I needed it at the time, can’t exactly show up on placement suicidal. It can linger and erode my life if not controlled quickly.

I think I need to learn to cope with triggering situations. It is true situations such as the last week one shouldn’t even be happening at the workplace, but I do hope they take the feedback on board and take extra caution in the future. Staff safety is key. With people like that, you never know what they will do

[Jynx]

Yeah no kidding @creative_writer been a hard slog for sure. How far through your placement are you now? 

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@creative_writer wrote:

I think I need to learn to cope with triggering situations.

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Definitely a good recovery goal to have! So long as you remember that working towards 'coping' doesn't mean working towards 'being entirely unaffected'. In my experience, working on triggers doesn't mean they no longer trigger me, just that I've gotten a lot better at managing the emotional reactivity in response to it. I know you probably know all this but I'd hate for you (or anyone reading along for that matter) to feel like a failure because of still being impacted by triggers even after working on them 😉