Follow the trail

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Mind the Gap

I hope any and everyone reading this is happy and healthy :)

A little bitty law with a great big impact...

I found out some news in my class last night that is beyond frustrating. I'll try to explain it as simply as I can without boring people or confusing them. I have to preface it by saying I don't know all of the facts yet and everything I am saying here is based solely on my own personal opinion and experiences.

When I graduate from NYU with an MSW I will then go on to get licensed after which I will be an LMSW (Licensed Master Social Worker). From there I am required to go on and get 3 years of clinical experience under supervision. I then apply for my LCSW (Licensed Clinical Social Worker) and can go on to have my own private practice. NYU is geared toward clinical work in a private practice setting, that is why I chose this school. Other schools in NY are geared toward agency work. Although my field work will be in agencies it is important that I am able to have 3 years of supervised experience in private practice after getting my degree so I am fully trained to be in this setting.

For reasons unknown to me as of now, New York State passed a law about 4 years ago that makes it illegal to get the 3 years of supervised experience in private practice, it is now required that we do it within an agency. This holds down anyone looking to go beyond what they did in the agency setting during fieldwork, and it strips many patients of appropriately instructed mental health professionals. So why would they implement this new law? Is it because they want to keep social workers in agencies, paying them between $30-40K a year while they are working 50-70 hour work weeks? Is it because insurance companies don't want to pay for mental health services in private practice and so they are putting pressure on the state to place social workers back in the restrictive box of only being able to work in agencies? Is it because they feel social workers have overstepped their boundaries in how they have become the backbone of the mental health profession? Social Workers outnumber psychiatrists and psychologists (I learned this from one of my professors but it is not a fact I've actually seen in writing to be clear). Social workers form an army in dealing with the vast majority of the population needing care. At a conference addressing this very law, it was claimed that the powers that be in New York State would be more "comfortable" if social workers remained in agencies. What exactly does it have to do with their "comfort"? Is it impossible to actually go back and remember the goal here is to help people within our community? That is what we are educated and trained to do.

The biggest victims of this new law are those who graduated 3 or 4 years ago and are just now completing their 3 years of supervised clinical work. They are getting their papers from their supervisors and handing them into the state to get licensed as LCSW's, and they are being rejected. Imagine completing 3 full years of work and then being told it "doesn't count". The requirement states that you must "have at least 3 years of post M.S.W. supervised experience in diagnosis, psychotherapy and assessment-based treatment planning acceptable to the Department".

I set out a little over a year ago armed with a dream that had finally been realized. I know my skill set and I know where my gifts lie and I am confident that private practice is where I belong. I am now faced with the choice of going to a different state to get certified, going into a different program altogether, or waiting it out and hoping something will change by the time I graduate.

As surprising at it may seem, the latter option is the one that seems most appealing to me, terrifying, but also self satisfying. I love the school I go to, I love the curriculum and I love the direction I am heading in. At 26 years old I have a passion for something that comes solely from knowing who I am. Why on earth should I give that up?

The follow up:

I know my last post was a bit dramatic and I apologize for that. I especially apologize since it was the first time I had posted in a few months, and out I come with this dreary, mysterious post about mistakes and moving on.

The mistakes I was speaking of were not my own but someone who used to be very important in my life. I hadn't known the details of how my heart had been mangled but was then given them out of the blue a few days ago.

Luckily I moved on a long time ago and so hearing this news was no more than a temporary sting. It's a beautiful thing...the passing of time and how healing it can be.

So moving on...it's a rainy day here in New York and I am in the midst of finals. A few more days and I will finally have a few weeks to myself to relax, read leisurely books instead of academic articles and spend hours with the people I love doing nothing and everything all at once.

I'm thankful spring is here even though it is hiding today, and I am thankful for my new and wonderful job in the midst of the recession we are headed into...

And so, with a new season that brings flowers and sunshine back into this city, my life continues to surprise me and make me happy.

The good fight

We do things in moments of weakness sometimes that go against who we are and how we want to live our lives. We say things we don't mean, we let our impulses take precedence over our rational thinking and we fall. We make mistakes. We overindulge in things that are bad for us and we avoid the reasons why we are doing these things in the first place. That's what we like to think at least, especially when we have been wronged by somebody else's mistakes.

Then we wake up and we attempt to pick up the pieces. We have to clean up the mess we may have made or wipe the tears from our eyes, and move on. We have to forgive ourselves because we're human, and we are bound to fall from time to time.

But we also have to figure out why we did what we did or said what we said, so that hopefully we can stop it from happening again. We also have to realize some mistakes are unforgivable and unthinkable. We have to accept the fact that we may not deserve the people we hurt anymore. We can forgive ourselves, but we have no control over getting other people to forgive us.

The truth hit me like a ton of bricks last night. Literally and figuratively. Answers to questions I had been asking for over a year were finally given to me. It came without warning and while my back was turned away from it. Turns out it was what I needed though to set me free from the last bit of pain I carried around with me.

I found the truth, I got my answers, and frankly, it sucked. But now I can move on.

The poison will slowly slither out of my being and I will clean up the mess that this event has created in my soul. The dust will settle and I will turn back to the beautiful things in my life that have been born since walking away from the wreckage of disaster. Some things in life are worth fighting for, and others...others it turns out never were.