I grew up in the big city of Bristol, Connecticut (Population 60,062). We were a big city as I said; we had public transportation in the form of one bus that made a horse shoe pattern run several times a day that I learned about it when I was about 18 or so; though it did not run that close to me and I never used it, it was there. We even had a taxi company for a while. I never used that either but I heard it lasted a few years before it folded. We had a few buildings that were large and made of brick; some of them were over 3-4 stories tall. One downtown building which was once called the Bristol Hotel (no relation to the one mentioned in that rap song many years ago) was once home to the folks that had to be bussed into Bristol to supply labor for the largest employer at the time which was New Departure (GMC) and I believe is likely 10 stories tall or so. The factory is gone as is GMC , but the hotel has found life as an office building where you can apply for Social Security, visit the CT Marshals, Probation department and even get your teeth fixed. I am sure there are other offices as well but I never had a need to know as I did not have friends who worked in the offices (no, I never have been on probation or been on SSI but I was an intern for the probation department and have brought people to the SS office). Oh and the very first taxi cab built in the USA was built just a few miles from my home. When I was young I had woods behind my house that if I crossed a dead end street and one regularly used street, would allow me to walk into several neighboring towns without any other street crossings. I spent a great deal of my childhood in those woods, most of which are housing developments now. I remember watching the industrial encroachment as I was growing up in those woods. One day in the new industrial park I saw a “sky scraper” being erected. Bristol was to be the newest Otis Elevator testing site; God how I wanted to get out of the city. I was and am a country boy at heart. Bristol is a City to be sure. It is huge compared to Wolcott which currently boasts “over 15,000” for population on its official website. My part of Bristol abuts Wolcott and I spent a great deal of time in their woods as well when I was growing up. Unlike Bristol, Wolcott seems to have a respect for history. I frequent the area regularly as I have an art studio there and also attend a lodge in the town center. Bristol on the other hand has a tendency to tear down its historical buildings in order to build modern structures that “will bring progress, job growth, increased revenue and prosperity for the city and its residents.” The Centre Mall is one such example: they tore down historical buildings to make way for a new 17+ acre mall only it never really was ever 100% full. The city bought it for several million dollars recently, tore it down and will “soon” build the next big thing. The above could be a narrative from any one of our clients though it happens to be how I would likely describe my life growing up in the city. Yes, I really am a country boy at heart. Though Bristol lacks the 8.4 million or so people that call New York City home; though it lacks a subway (I took my first subway ride at age 36 when I visited a friend in NYC), developed public transit system or any of the features that most of us may associate is needed in order to have a city; to me, the City of Bristol is not a small or even average town: it is a huge place, one that is larger than I would prefer to live in but one that I have enough roots in that I never seem to reach the point of selling my home and moving to the country. My reality may not be your reality and my definition of a big city likely is different as well but still valid; it is still reality. As clinicians we often use an egocentric point of view when we develop our definitions, when we define “our” realities. I have seen many a new and on occasion even some very established clinicians get caught up in the divide between “realities.” It is for that reason and some others that as clinicians we need to get the client to define their reality from time to time. For instance, I grew up for a time in a low income housing project (two actually) but if I was to say that I grew up partially in a city low income housing project you would likely think of something far bigger and likely far more dangerous than the group of duplexes that made up the projects that I once called home. Bristol’s housing projects are far from what you may expect from such places as New York, LA, Boston etc. Clients often come from varying backgrounds. One person’s view of “normal” or “average” will not necessarily be the same as another. As clinicians we sometimes ask questions that we feel are clear but that are actually quite subjective. A case in point which happens to be a pet peeve of mine: when trying to ascertain the social abilities of our clients many “newbies” ask how many friends a client has. This in and of itself is useless to detect the clients’ perception of their abilities. I had a client years ago that responded “about 60 or so.” On face value this may have indicated “no issues in this area” on the check off style of the assessment form. When delving deeper however it was discovered that many of these “friends” were less than even casual, the client had few people they felt they could rely on but also was conflicted because they felt they needed “at least a hundred to be popular.” By delving beneath the surface of the question, the real issues started to emerge. The client’s reality was far different than mine. Their definition was different though the words were the same. When doing an assessment on a couple in the past, the area of sex showed how one person’s reality could be far different than that of most. When queried about their sex life, the wife responded “it is really suffering lately; we hardly have sex at all and when we do it’s distant, it lacks the passion that we always used to have (the past few decades).” On the surface one would think that the sex life of this client was almost nonexistent, that they rarely had sexual relations at all but when asked to define “hardly at all” the client responded that they had sex “only” multiple times per week but for decades preceding they had had sex on a daily or near daily basis. Her reality was that something was wrong because the frequency was severely reduced and while the marriage was indeed in trouble the actual frequency of sexual relations still exceeded that of the “typical” couple that was in their age group and married for decades. Reality can be relative. The issues our clients often suffer from are real to them; they are true to them, even if perhaps they are not seen as valid based on their face. It is important to remember however that our realities may be far different than the realities of those we serve; it is for this reason that we make every effort to understand our client’s definition of things so we can further understand where they are and where they are heading. With this understanding we can help them to make lasting change. It should be noted that there are times when our clients have lost contact with reality. Many of us work with those with severe mental health issues. Clients who are psychotic would not readily fit for this discussion. In the blogs that follow you can expect that I will delve deeper into the subject of reality and with topics that relate to counseling practice and with supervision. These topics are very near and dear to me as an educator and as an Approved Clinical Supervisor. I welcome your feedback, comments and ideas for future blogs.
Warren Corson III (Doc Warren) is a counselor and the clinical & executive director of a community counseling agency in central CT (www.docwarren.org).