Jill Presnell

[Note: this is a long blog but I believe it is an important issue for all Counselors] Recently, during morning report as the nurses were being assigned their patients for the day, a relatively new day nurse looked at her list and groused “great, I have the Borderline Brigade.” My jaw clenched. Several staff members looked at me, knowing that these kinds of derogatory references infuriate me. I held my tongue, choosing to pick my battles.

Several settings come to mind when one thinks of a counselor. A small, comfortably adorned private office. An even smaller, less comfortably adorned office at a school or community clinic. A somewhat chaotic family home. Or perhaps the more subdued residence of the elderly or infirmed. One of the last settings that comes to mind is that of a psychiatric inpatient unit. I mean, don’t psychiatrist and psychologists do that?