SUSTAINABLE
RESILIENCY DEVELOPMENT AND SOCIAL WORK
Leslie C.
McQuilkin, ABD
Copyright 2013
So you thought you were going to read a
boring article, or did you think you were going to get your hands on a
technical thesis that required a statistical interpretation to apply within
your practice? No, this research has been taken from a larger investigation
conducted as a part of the requirements for a doctorate in progress. Until
then, let us discuss the results, the model, and how the implications apply to
you the social worker. So much of what you have learned is geared toward the
client. After spending almost 4 years in research and 6 months in the field I
was overwhelmed by what I thought I
knew and what I was about to learn.
The journey started out as a management endeavor, and spanned three fields of
study (education, organizations, and social services). The expectation was
simple; the data would reveal linear constructs. Once data collection and
analysis had been completed, startling patterns discoveries had led to what
will soon become impactful revelations within your personal practice.
KEYWORDS: RESILIENCE,
SOCIAL WORK, SUSTAINABILITY
Resilience is primal, whether it is
inherent or learned; developing resilience and sustaining resilience requires
work and consistent practice. Adversity is subjective. The study investigated
resilience, in particular the traits of those who have faced adversity and
overcome adversity with the hope of
identifying a sustainability factor. The problems for many academics as they
look at the basic outline of this study were: How do you quantify adversity? How do you quantify resilience? The
answer came easy, you do not.
Even a brief fleeting moment of
emotional strength that brought a person through a rough time can be considered
resilient if they perceive it that way. Right now, it is important to wrangle
in the data and find a way to thrive. I once met a woman who had been
assaulted; she spent a good deal of time in the hospital and dealing with the
police officers while she was in the intensive care unit. Once she was
physically well and she survived the
event she was sent home. This woman explained that it took all the resilience
she had to make it through the assault and those days in the hospital, but
after she was released no one concerned themselves with how she would thrive. For her, this would be a brutal
5 year process but she learned to thrive thanks to counseling and a will to move forward.
Let us qualify resilience over
adversity. You may understand this within your own practice when you see
individuals who appear to face never-ending hurdles and manage to avert
emotional collapse. Do they come close to
emotional collapse? Yes. Are their
coping skills perfect? No. This is
how resilience looks like. Like a car, without adequate upkeep the coping
skills will begin to deplete. Sustainability is a lifelong endeavor. Conversely
you may have the client who faces smaller hurdles (from our perspective) and
collapses under the stress of the adversity. Due to the lack of resilience
constructs and the belief that resilience should be trained in a linear manner
individuals often find themselves without the coping skills necessary to
endure.
Along my quest for information I came
across many mental health professionals, at first I thought the phrase secondary trauma was a coincidental
connection until I entered the interview transcriptions into the coding
software. Secondary trauma came up
within the data 937 times. The observation of others as they endure, speak of,
or struggle through their traumas has a severe impact in the social service
profession.
All of your emotions, empathy, and
coping skills are honed in on training and guiding the client toward becoming
resilient and or reaching their therapeutic goals. A social worker must check
their personal feelings and emotional baggage at the door (as one respondent
once told me) and at the end of the day they have no one to share their day
with at home.
When a majority of the population has
an emotionally draining day they can go home and for the most part talk about
it in great detail. A therapist or non-clinical social worker is bound by law
to silence, sharing their day is not part of the deal. Important to mention, most
of their friends and all of their family know they are a therapist or work in
the social work field and they are likely the first person they unload upon
when they are off the clock.
Back
to the data.
Post-traumatic stress disorder is a prevalent problem impacting our returning
military; some retain their resilient nature from the battle field while others
cannot. You may see this hidden in cases such as spousal abuse, alcoholism,
drug abuse, criminal activity, and suicide. Does
it make a person any less resilient because they were able to maintain a
resilient mind for more than 3, 4, 5, 10, 15 years until they were unable to
thrive? The resounding answer is no.
A 44 year old soldier, a brave Blackfeet warrior (the most decorated Blackfeet
soldier in history) succumbed to post-traumatic stress disorder in June 2013.
The United States Army was his life; he chose to fight for his country since he
was 18 and worked for the Department of Defense in his final days. This warrior
suffered a traumatic experience during his final tour of duty where he lost
friends in an IED explosion while riding in a Humvee. Few survived, he suffered
a traumatic brain injury but was able to recover and return to duty. For the
next 5 years he was never the same and chose to suffer in silence. During his
funeral endless stories were told of his resilience and bravery. I have no
doubt that these stories were true. The data is now revealing that resilience
can be chipped away by factors out of our control making sustainability a necessity.
Social workers are like soldiers, and
like our soldiers we are learning that we have to be proactive in protecting
the mental health of these soldiers. Sustainability requires much more than the
knowledge of resilience, for the social worker it is more complex. The social
worker has the unfortunate nagging inner voice telling them that I can take care of myself, after all this is
my job. Here is what the data shows regarding sustainability and the social
worker:
·
Taking
responsibility for your personal resilience and emotions is significant.
·
Remaining
dedicated to the process of developing personal coping skills
·
Taking
the time to relax and evaluate your feelings and seek support (in a
professional environment)
·
Have
a desire to set short term goals to get through the day but have a desire to
ultimately thrive as an individual (being a social worker does not define you)
·
Follow
your instincts, when your body or mind is giving you a signal stay mindful and
take a break. Be decisive about this. Do not give up.
·
Give
yourself a break; display the same empathy to yourself that you give to others.
·
Understand
that being resilient is not a graceful process, be forgiving of yourself
I will
end this article with one question, what
is your life worth?
