I’ve come to a humbling realization in recent weeks…

For being a therapist, I really SUCK at change.

Honestly- I haven’t been sleeping, I’ve been panicky, distracted, forgetful, grouchy.

I really need to take my own advice. Why is it always so much easier to help other people with their struggles than to help ourselves?

     I begin my new job on Monday and I am feeling ALL the feels– Such a professional term, I know. Leaving my current job has been much harder than I anticipated. The nature of the job makes it very difficult to leave, and you have to put much more notice in to wrap up with your clients and either discharge them or transition them to a new clinician. It’s not as easy as putting in your two weeks and boxing up your stapler and house plants. This process has been a month in the making, and because of that, I don’t think it actually *hit me* until a week ago. I was going through the motions, but I wasn’t really connecting with what I was doing. Alas, anxiety and ambivalence has ensued. Hard.

The work that we do at our clinic is difficult, to say the very least. We work with families facing mental health issues coupled with extreme poverty, substance abuse, trauma spanning multi generations, homelessness, violence, and overall chaos in their daily lives.

I’ve laughed, I’ve cried, I’ve laughed so that I wouldn’t cry, and I’ve laughed so hard THAT I’ve cried. Over the past few years, I have become a bonafide social worker, a real therapist, because of that clinic. I’ve learned and experienced more than some clinicians will throughout their entire career because I was lucky enough to have a boss, coworkers and clinic that encouraged me to get in there, roll up my sleeves, and help these beautiful, authentic people, who needed it; I am more grateful than I could ever put into words for that experience.

On my difficult days, I strive to remember how fortunate I am that someone chose ME to open up to, ME to tell their deepest, darkest secrets, ME to listen to their worries, fears, and vulnerabilities. What a gift. I heard something one day about therapists “holding” others’ pains, and I haven’t heard it put much better than that. If even just for a little, I’m able to hold someone else’s burden or make life a little bit more manageable for them, I consider myself so fortunate. People ask: how do you handle it? It must be horrible, the stories you hear…and that’s true, I definitely have those days where I’m utterly discouraged by the human race. But I also look at my clients, and their resilience, their abilities to remain strong and active participants in their own lives, sometimes when all the odds are stacked against them. Just coming to therapy, just walking in the door is SO hugely, unimaginably difficult. Many people go through their whole lives never really dealing with their demons. Committing to therapy, doing the work and sticking with it requires an insurmountable amount of courage and strength. My clients make me braver. They make me stronger. They inspire me. They form a connection with me, but they have no idea how much they inspire me. They may learn from me, but they have no idea how much I learn from them, too.

I am sure that I will meet new clients and form connections with them, and that those clients will teach me new and different things, too. But there’s something to be said for your first, real job. A job where you really felt alive, like you were doing what you were meant to do. I am so lucky to have had even the smallest taste of that feeling- I realize some people never experience that in their lifetime.

I may not be making boku-bucks, but my heart is full, and my life is richer for having known these people. Jobs will come and go, but this one has assured me that I’m in the right field.  And, if the new job doesn’t work out, one of the beautiful things about this work is- there is plenty of it!

Today, reflecting on my clients, I think about their resilience, their bravery, their strength, and I feel those things, too. That is what will get me through the next few weeks.

Never underestimate your power to impact others.