Stephanie Adams

“You don’t have kids.” “How long have you been married?” “What do you know, you get paid to talk to people all day.” All these statements are different ways of our clients telling us “You don’t understand my feelings.” We don’t, and we do. I am a young counselor. I don’t have kids, and so I have gotten a defensive remark or two that suggests “what do YOU know?” Thank goodness I’m married, or I probably would have gotten flak for that too. As a result of my current childless state, it can be more than a little intimidating when the mother of a teenager crosses her arms in front of me and scowls at my huge dearth of parental knowledge.

In the field of counseling, one must be constantly aware of one’s environment. An important aspect of the human habitat is the yearly phenomenon known as “the holidays”. Including Christmas, New Year’s, Hanukah, Kwanzaa and Thanksgiving, this annual ritual brings with it special challenges to those who study and treat the mental processes of the adult human. To aid in this practice, I have developed a short guide to the major groups of difficult holiday clients the counselor is likely to face.

I’ve been on both sides of grief. I’ve been the counselor, and I’ve been the one grieving. Sometimes at the same time. The first major loss I experienced came right before the beginning of my internship, and the second as my training period comes to an end. I found it interesting to reflect upon some of the things I’ve learned through the experience.

The subject I’m about to write on has been under much debate lately for many reasons, but as a practitioner of mental health care, I have significant concerns about how it will affect a certain group of clients. We all should. I’m talking about the new TSA security guidelines. We’ve all heard the horror stories. One that struck me in particular was about a breast cancer survivor (and flight attendant, no less) who was forced to remove her breast prosthesis in public after a thorough pat-down. She ended up having to do the physical search because she was afraid to expose herself to the radiation of the other new security method: full body scans.

To say it’s been a stressful week would be an understatement. My husband had three tests in his master’s of medical science program (any B could mean he does not get admitted to medical school). I’m an emotional absorber around people I’m personally connected to, so every pore in my body was soaking in the nervousness and weariness coming from my hardworking husband. He’s been working towards this goal against tremendous odds for seven years, and I know how much it matters to him. Because I love him, that matters to me, too.