The Clients

The caseload is growing.  So far, I haven't lost any clients.  I guess that's good.  This is my second week.

It is difficult.  The wanting to hug some clients for all they are going through.  This includes parents as well.  Facing the suicide of a parent seems to be a common stressor as is outside placement.  Regardless of what parents do, the children will always love them.  They seem to canonize the absent parent regardless of what happened.

Homelessness is the fate of another client.  Mom is so disappointed in herself for letting her daughter down.  They are so close, though.  They have no table to have a nightly meal on and discuss the day's events.  They go to bed in partitioned rooms in a shelter.  The daughter is afraid and sad.  She is picking up her mother's angst and depression.  I so want to let them stay in my house in that empty bed that is soft, allow them to have their own space and privacy.  I can't though.  Boundaries, you know...

Untimely death of a parent is a shocker for many families.  Moms aren't supposed to die that young.  Some dads don't know the first thing about being a mother.  She was going to stay home with the children until they were older.  Plans change.  Everything comes to a screeching halt then suddenly everything flies in the air and settles where it was never before.  There is no guidebook.  No contingency plan.  Dads working long hours to support the family are suddenly faced with these huge eyes looking out of these tiny bodies pleading for the answers that dad wished he had himself.  How do we communicate?  Moms are so often the glue of the family.  They are dispatch of family relationships.

Once again, I am also dealing with sexual abuse.  It is such an epidemic - or perhaps it was always there.  Who knows?  I know that it messes kids up in ways they will never understand.  The squeaky wheels are the ones we see.  There are those kids who don't squeak so much that I have the most concern for.  They are sworn to secrecy to protect most likely their parents in one way or another.

They say some odd things as well.  They experience life sometimes in more mature ways than their mentally ill parents.  Most of all, I see through the eyes of these children both pain and fear.  As Pat Benetar says, "Hell is for children".  Indeed it seems to be so.