The Journey of a Social Worker
BY VIOLETA VILLATORO
Social work is a physically taxing, mentally exhausting profession. So why do people do it? How do they cope? Sarah Menzer, a licensed social worker, knows the challenges and frustrations, but also the rewards and the benefits. Essentially, a social worker is “a person people [come] and [talk] to and [want] to unload some things that they [are] dealing with and also looking for problem solving.”
Sarah Menzer, a social worker from Pennsylvania. Sarah Menzer
Ms. Menzer is a behavioral therapist with a Masters degree in social work (or an MS). She is licensed in the state of Pennsylvania and works with residents there. She works as a member of a mental health outpatient team, consisting of a nurse, a psychiatrist, two Master level positions, and two Bachelor level positions. Ms. Menzer holds one of the Master level positions. The company she works for helps people who have both mental health diagnosis and intellectual disabilities, are over the age of 18, and are in a crisis situation. Being in a crisis situation can mean a) that “we’re going to see, in the past year, more hospitalizations or more instances where police had to be involved,” or b) this is the individual's first time experiencing more challenging effects of their mental health diagnosis and their intellectual disabilities. They have also exhausted other forms of control, like medications or therapy. Her team helps a max of 21 people at a time.
Her day-to-day work schedule consists of meetings between her coworkers, sessions with her individuals, sessions with her individuals and their direct care staff, and discussions with the individual’s support team. The individual’s support team consists of the different people and agencies that help them. The individual's direct care staff contains people who do things for the individuals ranging from helping them walk or get dressed to managing medication and meal prep. She has at least three morning meetings throughout the week with her internal team about interactions, calls, and visits between the social workers and the individuals. After morning meetings, she will have either one-on-one sessions with the individual, a session with the individual and their direct care staff, or a meeting with the individual's support team. She usually has between 2-4 meetings throughout her day.
Social working “is a …field [that] is mostly dominated with women who are doing the groundwork but then you see a lot of males in power positions.” Another way to say this is that it is a “female majority, male-dominated profession.” Although women make up 80.5% of the social working field while men make up only 19.5%, women are not the ones in management positions. Ms. Menzer has “always been [frustrated] that it's a female led work but you see less women in positions of management and power.” She has also seen men gain management positions when they have no background in social work. Despite these divides in gender, she does not think that gender necessarily controls whether the person is a capable manager, saying that, “I've had some incredible leaders that have been male figures and then I've had a lot of the opposite of incredible … I would say that it's based off of an individual's characteristics.”
Social work can be a really overwhelming and emotionally draining work because social workers deal with very difficult emotions on a regular basis. Ms. Menzer says that, “A lot of the things that we see and what we’re working with are really difficult things to see, to hear, to experience.” Social workers have to find a way to balance the emotional stress that comes with their job and their own mental wellbeing and self care. She goes through meetings that are called “debriefs” where her team goes through any negative experiences they have gone through and help each other work through it. To cope with big emotions and experiences, Ms. Menzer says that she has “a toolbox of coping strategies that I use. It includes a lot of mindfulness practices, a lot of meditation, yoga, that relaxation to let go of things.” Some different breathing and meditation techniques that can help deal with stress are the box breathing method, alternate nostril breathing, and bumblebee breath.
Despite burnout and overwhelm being a big part of social working, it is also a very rewarding job because you are able to see people grow and overcome challenges. If you like working with people, social work is a great path to do that.
