Occupational Therapist And Social Worker

[lonelyheartemma]

I'm not really impressed with my social worker so far.

She phoned up and gave me a date for an appointment which I wrote down only to realise later that it was on a Saturday which is impossible. I thought I'd got it wrong so I phoned and asked them to check, they gave me another impossible date that existed in 2014 but not in 2015. I phoned back again and the next day my social worker phoned to say she'd decided to come with my OT to our meeting on Thursday. An hour before the meeting she phoned to say she'd decided not to come as it would be too overwhelming for me.

She has never met me yet she is making judgements about what overwhelms me. Well one thing that overwhelms me is phoning to change our plans at the last minute!

She also doesn't listen. I was saying things to her 3 or 4 times on the phone and she just wasn't hearing what I was saying.

My OT is a nice person but quite offensive. She asked to look into my bedroom, how dare she? That is my private space. She says I can't move out until I've proved to her that I can make a cup of tea, among other things. I AM BEING ABUSED HERE and she's asking me to make tea. She's saying I can't move out unless I can make tea. Ok so I have no problems making tea, I make about 10 cups of tea a day (not all for me), I have been doing this for nearly 10 years, I have even had a voluntary job as a tea maker but what is she saying? If I couldn't make tea I'd have to stay there being abused for the rest of my life?

She's coming back in a few weeks. I'm going to make her a cup of tea and a light snack and let her see my bedroom. I feel humiliated and degraded.

When the OT arrived I went to let her and her colleague in and I was greeting them and welcoming them to the house. The OT was patronising me but I didn't worry about that because the best way to deal with that is to talk to someone in as mature a way as possible. Then my mum comes bouncing out of the kitchen and starts talking over me, doing the whole welcoming bit and trying to show them into the living room, which I was about to do. The OT immediately stops talking to me and speaks to my mum in a non-patronising way instead. So I very rudely and offensively reminded my mum in a quiet voice that this was my meeting and I'm okay. She stalked off offended and was snappy with me for the rest of the day resulting in two self harm moments.

I went and sit down with the patronising OT who didn't patronise me for long. The cup of tea and bedroom thing was deeply offensive but she said it in a respectful way. It just happens to be an offensive procedure and she doesn't make up the procedures.

[walker]

we don't see it as offensive emma - although it no doubt felt like that to you

she wants to see your bedroom maybe for several reasons -

- an OT'S job is to see where people live and how they manage their daily life

- she may have thought you bedroom would be better as it is your 'own' space

- she may have wanted to just be with you in private away from your mum

especially if you tell them you spend most of your day in your room

(do understand it is a special safe place for you, and it would also make me feel uneasy, esp if the OT was a man)

ASK her why she wants to see your bedroom

you have a right to ask her questions

the tea thing - again she needs to see you managing on your own

or maybe we have this all wrong and she IS just a t*t

the SW should sort herself out for goodness sake - you must tell her how upsetting it is having plans changed like that, especially at the last minute

how did they get involved? was it through mh?

[Kitsune]

I am so glad you told your mother to butt out when she was doing her prancing pony 'look at meeeee' routine, well done you! Hopefully this will be the start of getting you out of that environment xxxx

[Threemoons]

Hello Emma. We see the bedroom thing as Walker do, there could be numerous reasons for it and they aren't necessary bad ones. As for the cup of tea, it would totally piss me off. I know they have to check that you can sort yourself but for God's sake, a cup of tea doesn't prove you can cook a meal (though we're sure you can). It seems ridiculous to me.

As for your SW, does she have a 2015 calendar? Seriously, we know she does but the fact that she made a mistake twice giving your appointment date isn't reassuring. And I would be upset that she dares to decide what overwhelms us without knowing us! It feels totally patronizing and inconsiderate.

Maybe we're too sensitive to things, we don't know. But it's also a possibility.

[lonelyheartemma]

I think they have their priorities wrong and it terrifies me.

Surely the most important thing should be helping me to get out of the abusive situation.

I shouldn't have to prove I have the right not to live in an abusive environment.

I have made thousands of cups of tea but the idea of being watched terrifies me. If something goes wrong they might decide I NEED to live with my mum. There is no reason why something should go wrong but what if it does? I'm going to be terrified so I'm going to be shaking. That could be seen as proof I can't cope. How will I ever get out of here?

[Threemoons]

Maybe you could open up to them that you did thousand of cups fine but that this one is going to make you nervous as you feel that all your hopes are weighting on it? They should understand if they have the empathy their job suppose?

We understand that getting away from the abuse should matter more than proving anything but sadly professionals are nailed down their damn procedures. It's a shame cause then it takes longer to lift people out of the abusive environment. We really would like that for every abuse reported, people were lifted out in the next second.

We think that you don't have much time to live with your mum, dear. I can hear the bells of independence ringing.

[lonelyheartemma]

I'll try to explain but the OT is coming to my house. The kitchen is next door to the room my mum likes to sit in when I'm having private appointments. I can't ask her not to be there. I have to be so careful what I say in my house.

Theoretically the ideal thing would be to speak to the social worker about it on Tuesday. But she makes mistakes and she's not good at listening. I'm not sure I can trust her. If she phones and my mum answers she just talks to her instead of me. Also another time she phoned up and asked if I was Emma's mum and I said I was Emma and she carried on talking to me like I was my mum. She should not be asking to speak to my mum anyway, I am her client. But it scares me that she could phone up and ask to speak to me and then she could think my mum is me and give her private information. But I'll meet her on Tuesday. She might be lovely in person. Maybe she just hates phones like I do or has trouble hearing on the phone.

I have emailed my local domestic abuse place. I was supposed to phone but my mum is nearly always here during the times when the helpline is open. If she does go out I never know if she'll be five minutes or three hours and often if she goes out then my dad is here. Sometimes he asks her to go out with him but she usually refuses. So I found the email address today and I hope they will read it and respond.

[Threemoons]

Alright, we see the trouble now. Maybe you can write things in front of your OT instead of speaking so your parents can't hear? We're glad that there's emails today so you could write to the domestic abuse place and you'll get a reply, ideally sometime soon.

Have a nice evening, dear. It feels good being in touch with you again..

[walker]

good idea from threemoons about writing things down

also

do they know you are in an abusive situation?

is that why they are there? or is it following up from the mh stuff

[lonelyheartemma]

They ought to know. The social worker who made the referral said my mum said awful things and I needed to get out of there.

I think my new social worker can't know or she wouldn't start phoning my mum up instead of me. But I don't think I can tell her. I don't trust her at all. I don't mind her general incompetence but I'm terrified that her difficulty with listening is going to get me into serious trouble with my mum. The last time she phoned she asked me 3 times if I was sure I didn't want to bring my mum with me though that might have been because she didn't listen to my answer the first two times she asked.

I don't know what the OT knows. I couldn't ask her and couldn't say much. It is a good idea but I don't want to write anything down in case she refuses to take the paper with her. She doesn't speak Welsh unfortunately.

I can explain all this to the psychiatrist when I write but even that scares me because she probably will speak to the social worker about it and I just don't trust the social worker to behave in a way that's going to keep me safe. Obviously my feelings might change when I meet her in person but now I'm just scared.

I feel so invaded by the idea of my OT going into my bedroom. One of the symbols of my helplessness is the fact that I have no privacy and now my OT wants to do exactly the thing that my mum does. When I'm in my own flat I'll have to have 'support' and that will involve regular checks on my bedroom. No one ever goes in my bedroom. My best friend has never gone in there. When the doctor has visited when I've been ill he's seen me downstairs. At least my parents are actually related to me and they own my house. If I had the choice of showing the OT my bedroom or taking all my clothes off in front of her I would take my clothes off. That would feel less intrusive.

But what can I do but put up with it? I'm completely powerless. It's my only chance to escape.

[walker]

emma if it is making you feel THAT strongly then try to explain it to the OT - it is clearly not something you feel able to do

agree with not trusting the SW - certainly at the moment

its easy to say - but try not to panic

we understand because when we were dealing with mh/agencies and were still at home with hub we had little privacy and lived in constant fear of being 'discovered' telling them things

we made virtually all our womens aid calls OUT of the house when we were walking the dog

thing is emma

even if your mum found out that people believed she was an abuser - or that you had been telling them how life is for you -

you would still survive that, too

terrifying as it seems

you would

we live in fear

all of us that suffer abuse

we live in fear not just of how we are treated - but fear of what will happen to the other person, too

fear of their feelings, their pain, their thoughts about us,

its very frightening - but you WILL get through this and your life will improve and you will blossom

you know when we were taken into hospital - and away from hub - we were so terrified - we thought that we would be the cause of him killing himself - and perhaps the children killing themselves too

we thought his dad and maybe our parents would die of the shock

and more things

we were literally drowning in the fear of it all

but at that point

none of them died

isn't it stupid - we feel far far far far worse about the impact of what happened - ON OUR HUB - than we can begin to do on us

anyway

sorry went off on one there

just trying to tell you your fears are heard and real but may not happen

xxxx

ed.

YOU ARE NOT POWERLESS - you have shown how much power you have just by facing this and starting to talk/seek help

you have a right to tell those people how you feel - they are there to support YOU - NOT the other way round

[lonelyheartemma]

thank you Walker. I won't reply properly now because it always takes me ages to write a post on here but I wanted to say thank you so much for your post and for being my friend. It would be worse without you. It really would.

[lonelyheartemma]

I really didn't expect to be saying this but my new social worker is brilliant!

She's a great listener in person and she's really lovely. She was shocked I'd been on the housing list for so long so she's going to speak to the council and tell them I need to be a higher priority as my living situation is not healthy. She also thought it was very bad the CMHT have given me no support or advice about rape so she's going to speak to them about that. She says I will have to do the little tasks for the OT (though she thinks they should stay out of my bedroom) because they have their own systems and all you can do is go along with them but she understands my feelings and she says it's very silly that I should have to prove I can make a cup of tea when she can tell just from talking to me that I'm more than capable.

She thinks I'm mature and capable. She even thinks my literacy is amazing which is really weird because I'm sure everyone who knew me when I joined the site would agree I was not always literate! But it's lovely to hear her say that, especially as I basically taught myself. I'm starting A Level English Language and Literature now so maybe I can get even better!

Also she says they have a system where former service users provide peer support to current service users. She says I'd be an ideal peer supporter. She might have changed her mind about that as she'd only known me for 10 minutes when she said that so she couldn't really know if I'd be any good or not but I don't think I've been ideal for anything before. So to be ideal for 10 whole minutes is nice!

I do feel like a bit of a bitch though. I never considered that my family might die of shock if they found out what I'd done. I thought it would just increase the abuse and that they'd manage to convince people it was all a sign that I can't manage on my own. She's done that before. My mum gets a lot of sympathy by talking about everything she does for her poor 'disabled' daughter. Everyone thinks she's so wonderful. A lot of people (including my sister) have apparently said they wouldn't have the patience and they'd just make me get a job. I think she'd get even more sympathy if she told them I was telling 'lies' about her and I'd be more trapped than ever. So I'm really just thinking about myself.

The reason I don't want them to know anything is firstly because I'm scared of them and secondly because I do believe my mum wants to be in regular contact with her daughters. She doesn't have that with my sister so when I move out I'd like to give her the chance to have regular weekly contact with me. It might not work out of course but I'm hoping that once she knows it's possible for me to live apart from her and not behave like my sister, things might improve. I think losing my sister has made her tighten the net around me but instead of keeping me close, it's strangling me. If my mum knew what I'd done I would be much too afraid to have any contact with her. I think there are some abusers you have to get right away from but with others I think it is possible to create a new kind of relationship. I would like to try to do this. If we both have a home I hope we'll have a more equal footing. If nothing else, she will be upsetting me once a week instead of every day. I also want to keep seeing my dad and my grandad and I couldn't do that if I'd broken contact with my mum.

.

[walker]

have never thought you lacked literacy skills

you write well and communicate well

also especially for someone so young you give good advice and support to others which would make you a great peer supporter

although at the moment maybe you need to concentrate on getting your OWN support

also without dumbing down your difficulties - think you mum greatly overplays the sacrificial 'looking after my disabled daughter' line - she is very attention seeking and demanding and controlling

you ARE competent and capable

so VERY pleased that the social worker is good

[Threemoons]

Emma, we're very pleased that meeting your new social worker in person turned out to be a brilliant moment. By the sound of it, she's competent so we hope that things can move quicker for you from now. Always knew you literate and I suspect that you're underestimating yourself by saying you were not before. We can see that she understood you very well and that she has given you hope so we're really pleased for you.

[lonelyheartemma]

Thank you Walker and Threemoons

I completely agree Walker- it is really something former service users do and I'm definitely a current service user at the moment. But I thought it would be something really good to aim for. It sounds like something I'd actually like to do. I was thinking about doing a teaching assistant qualification and trying to get a job in a learning support department but this might be a good stepping stone. But for the moment, that stepping stone is right on the other side of the river. And it's a very wide river.

She's now taking the credit for my trip to London. Everyone thinks she encouraged me and talked me into it but she did not. I went because I wanted to see a hot actor in person, nothing to do with her! I booked everything up, got medical advice and looked after myself for 3 days. I'm not saying she did nothing but most of it was me.

I definitely use more capital letters and punctuation than I used to Threemoons. And my auto-correct spelling function (which just suddenly started working one day) is very useful. Maybe I'm just more careful now but I think I grew up a bit too. I was 19 when I joined the site and I'm now 23.