A People’s Person: social work struggles and other things we don’t talk about
I am a social worker. Despite my self-proclaimed hatred of people and introverted tendencies in my personal life, I have found myself in a profession that is almost entirely centered around my interactions with people. I spend my days working with people and talking to other people to coordinate the care of even more people. Each of these people and the people related to these people bring with them their own needs and opinions and agendas and look to us, as social workers, to fulfill them. From the patients we serve and the interdisciplinary teams we collaborate with to the community agencies, insurance companies, management, and everyone in between, we are tasked with meeting the needs of other people.
When I entered the social work profession, I knew I would be entering a field where interactions with other people would be required. In fact, I became a social worker because I wanted to help people in some capacity. Naively, I wanted to make a difference, to change lives, to spread positivity in a broken world. I wanted to be a person who inspires people, a person people can count on. I was unprepared for the implications this would have on me and for the physical and emotional toll it would take.
When you work with people in the capacity that we as social workers do, these continuous interactions with people can have consequences over time. It starts small, staying at work late once or twice to fulfill a last minute request of a supervisor or skipping lunch to meet with a patient and family member. Over time, these requests and the expectations increase because you have demonstrated that you are a person who knows how to deal with people. You become the person everyone turns to when something goes wrong. You become the fixer, the one to pick up the pieces and to handle the difficult situations no one wants to tackle. The responsibility builds and you are left leading a life that is entirely dictated by other people. You do what you are told to do and you do it with a smile on your face because this is your job. You are a people’s person. You are, what feels like at times, the only person.
I signed up to be a social worker; I made the conscious decision to go to social work school and to accept a position in this field. Yes, in a sense, I signed up for this. I did not sign up to be overworked, underpaid, and under appreciated. I did not sign up to be belittled or to have my needs neglected for a system designed to appease other people. Yet, for whatever reason, I do my job in spite of these things. Why? Why do we in the helping profession continuously allow ourselves to be subjected to stressful work environments, to neglect ourselves, and to jeopardize our own mental health to serve other people? It is not enough to say that these are merely conditions of the profession. We in the social work field are conditioned to accept that our job is worth less simply because we are social workers.
People tend to assume that social workers are content with the stressful lives we often lead because, again, we chose this profession. We are praised for our organization and time management skills and are judged based on the results we yield. These results often come at too high of a cost: tears, panic attacks, depression, anxiety, insurmountable stress, burn out, strained relationships, declines in mental health, and in my case, nightmares. In maintaining the needs of other people, we give up pieces of ourselves and are met with resistance and passive remarks when we attempt to make our needs known. We are led to believe that our well-being is not a priority, that a giant statue of a Dalmatian and cleaning robots are more important than proper staffing and resources for a department that is already neglected.
But your job must be so rewarding they ask? Yes, BUT what would be truly rewarding is being compensated adequately for the crucial and draining work that we do. Being able to afford decent housing and basic living expenses without having to forfeit “luxuries” such as the therapy needed to cope with the high levels of stress associated with our jobs. Like many of our colleagues, we hold advanced degrees and are licensed providers, yet we are paid a mere fraction of our counterparts. In actuality, it will take me 80+ years to pay off my student debt, and my total debit is nearly 3x my annual salary. These are the things we don’t talk about because we are expected to be superheroes and work miracles. We cannot appear weak or vulnerable or incapable, and if we do then we are at fault; we are looked down upon and made to feel as though we are not strong enough to manage the pressures of a field designed to break us.
Despite what you may believe, we cannot do it all. We are only human. Each of us is only one person with two hands and eight hours in a workday. Please respect that. Do not take advantage of us and manipulate us to meet your own needs. Let us leave work on time without making us feel guilty. Respect our boundaries when we say no, and treat us with respect and as your equals. We are fighting our own battles against a broken system, short staffing, and corrupt policies. Fight with us, not against us. We are trying the best we can.
I have given up too much of myself to be apart of a field that should be promoting positive well-being and empowering others, and I have seen too many of my friends hurting. Changes are needed. Will I always be in this field? Probably not. I don’t know what my future holds, but I am no longer willing to take on the needs of other people while neglecting my own. I refuse to compromise my own mental health and sanity to uphold hospital metrics, and I refuse to bend myself to manage unrealistic and unmanageable expectations. We cannot adequately advocate on behalf of our patients if we cannot advocate for ourselves first.
Dedicated to N.T: thank you for being my biggest supporter and my rock through it all
