Scratch social worker off the list.

If this Craigslist entry is to be believed, this social worker's finally had enough. It's an interesting read, but at the same time it mentions a few of those horrific things that make you hate humanity quite a bit more.

http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/sfo/65806895.html

Wow.

Note to self: Avoid angry Social Workers.

Well that's just... god damn...

I hope some of that is exagerated.

Although I really doubt it is.

I was actually considering a masters in social work too.

It never surprises me that I can still be surprised at the horrible way some people treat their own children. It makes me think that requiring some sort of parental license wouldn't be such a bad idea.

The punishment should fit the crime, especially in cases such as those.

Jesus.

My mom worked in social work for about a year, but had to get out fast because it was too much for her.

I can tell you from personal experience in the field, that none of that shit was exagerated. Luckily I don't have to deal with the parents, or I would have snapped a long time ago. I just have the kids to care for. And yes, you do get some kids as screwed up as the boy who saved his feces in that example.

I have a few stories a bit worse than the ones in that listing, and I tell you that it does some weird shit to you, just knowing how prevalent this behavior is out there.

My sister's finishing her master's in SW right now, and plans to set up shop in San Francisco. Hoo boy.

Just tell her to pick her jobs carefully.

I was a social worker for one year....after long training and build-up, that was as long as I could last.

I never ran into stuff to that extreme, but variations on the themes of the essay, certainly.

By the end, I was burned out...an empty shadow really. My friends didn't want to hang out with me anymore, my parents were worried sick. My back hurt all the time, my hands shook. I did almost no physical activity all day, but I came home feeling like I'd worked a 15 hour shift at a steel mill.

It sucked. I never faced down a crack addict demanding her children back...but Meth is an extreme problem out here in Oregon, and that was always in my face. I was not in the position to take kids out of homes, but I was in the middle of homes in order to connect familys to greater services. I saw more than my fair share of abuse, addiction, and above all else, neglect.

Neglect is what makes poverty a cycle. It's what keeps kids from developing the skills they will need to be productive people. It's what makes those kids tommorrows parents who do not know how to parent.

Descriptions of parents opening the door with crack pipes in their hands may be intense and disturbing, but understanding and recognizing the results of neglect can be far more important (if less dramatic). Neglect is far more expansive, and socially costly.

I do believe that there are certain kinds of people who are built to work as social workers with a much higher success rate than I had. I wanted to do it so much, but more because I wanted to put my hands and heart where my mouth was, than really any inate skill. I was good with the kids. Excellent, even. But I was horrible with the troubled parents whom I could somehow understand but never forgive.

Now I work as a lowly Youth Advocate, and a waiter back at the country club that I worked at years ago. I feel a combination of relief and shame at leaving my social work job.

I wasn't in the healthiest and most comfortable palce myself when I was there, and did not have the strength or stability to be involving myself in other family's lives.


The person who wrote this craigslist post absolutely needs to get the fuck out of the job, and let somebody else come into it who has more time, more reserves of strength, or larger support in his/her non-working life.

I don't know if the post is authentic, but those things all go on in some way or another, so it doesn't really matter if it is or not.

Social workers are, from my experience, amazing and beautiful people, who take great satisfaction from their jobs and the lives they help stabilize.

They also tend to have alcohol problems....stress disorders....and terrible sleep patterns. I know only a few who were born to do it, and function fully within it. They are the only ones who should be doing it in the first place.

caring is ok. she'll learn to develop distance.

how strong is her personal life? that's what counts.

I'm not even going to read that shit. Growing up my mom was a childrens social worker. I've heard enough of those stories to last me a lifetime.

........

......

Shoot, from those stories, I could see me burning out in a week, and I'm hardly an idealistic youngster.

As much as you want to care and think about the kids/clients you work with all the time, the most important skill I've learned in my 9 years working with the kids is this: leave it on the doorstep when you go home. You have to separate your life from theirs, if you want to stay healthy. Too many social workers/child care workers take the job home with them.

Which is exactly why I couldn't do it.

same here

In other news, I'm looking for a similar job...

With the right job, one that understands the stress of it's employees, and sets up a proper support system, the job can be a lot easier to deal with.

I agree with eighzeroone.......WOW.

I did social work for just over two years. While my experiences weren't nearly as severe as the one in this story...they were enough to lead me to believe that they probably weren't blown out of proportion by much if at all.