ACA Blog

Well, I am home from my “trip of a lifetime to Israel.” The trip did not include tours of jails or mental health facilities but two days after I arrived, Haaretz, Israel’s Leading Daily Newspaper, in English, had a front page article. The title, Tel Aviv police backtrack, will investigate alleged gang rape on public beach. The article has some very strange twists and turns but the alleged victim of the gang rape has reportedly “received psychiatric care in the past, is reportedly in a difficult mental state, and had recently started drinking again.”

I am a Career Counselor. I have a master’s degree in Professional Counseling from Georgia State University. I have successfully passed the NCC and completed years of supervision. Career Counseling is my specialty, but I have the same degree as a mental health counselor. Sometimes I’m a tad bit disappointment when my colleagues don’t understand or appreciate the intersections of our work. Please allow me to straighten up a few misconceptions.

As someone who has practiced yoga for many years, I had often wondered earlier in my counseling career how yoga could be used therapeutically in counseling. Yoga has been shown to improve health and well being in many ways and the growth of Yoga Therapy – using traditional yogic techniques with the intention of managing health challenges to reduce symptoms, increase energy, and restore balance of the mind, body and spirit – has challenged me as a Certified Yoga Therapist to integrate the benefits of yoga into counseling. I became certified as a yoga therapist well before beginning my training in counseling. It is the lens that I see the world through and thus, my clients as well.

I want to celebrate. I want to celebrate curiosity because well… “why” not? I want to celebrate perspective because I can call it my own. I want to celebrate choice because the ability to accept the responsibility that comes with it is usually a challenge. I want to celebrate the nothings that turn into somethings because no thing is really a “nothing”. I want to celebrate education in all of its forms because ignorance is really quite a shame. I want to celebrate the moments that transform into teaching moments over time because they constantly guide me through my practice as a person and as a professional. I want to celebrate the people who create these teaching moments and remind me that we’re all lifelong learners. (Thanks Dean Diamond.) I want to celebrate difference because life would be boring if we were all the same.

It’s almost May – the month well known for great weather and flowers, graduations, and family barbeques. It’s also a month known as National Mobility Awareness Month. Did you know that? I didn’t for the longest time acknowledge or even know such a thing existed – which is odd considering the years spent working as a rehabilitation counselor for a state rehab agency. Looking back, even though we all spent countless hours of the day working with individuals with mobility challenges in their efforts to return to work or become job ready, I honestly think we likely acknowledged Administrative Professional’s Day…and maybe even Earth Day…as an office, bypassing such an incredible month that acknowledges and celebrates our clients and others.

A career counselor is hard pressed to have a counseling relationship with a woman without discussing appearance. Our relationship with image in the workplace is a touchy one at best. We are urged to watch the length of our skirts so that we don’t assume the image of office skank, watch the padding in our jackets so that we don’t look too manly and the amount of makeup, perfume and accessories that we wear so that we do not become a distraction. I cannot tell you the last time I had a male client inform me that his supervisor said that he was dressing too sexy on the job and people are starting to talk, but I have had that come up on multiple occasions with my female clients.

[caption id="attachment_4859" align="alignleft" width="150" caption="Jennifer Bingaman"][/caption] The first half of my internship is over. The 900 hours staring at me 12 weeks ago has now been sliced in less than half. It feels unreal. I’m three months away from finishing my master’s degree. When I was a little girl, all I wanted to do was go to college. That’s as far as I ever looked. Now, I have gone to college. I’ve gone twice. I’ve figured out (mostly) what I want to do with my life. With the realization about what I want to do with my life, I’ve also realized what I don’t want to do. I don’t want to work solely in addictions treatment.

No, this is not an infomercial. There will be no “act now, supplies are limited” or “now how much do you expect to pay” and forget about seeing me in a suit with question marks or some such nonsense all over it. This is just an FYI to hopefully help you reduce some of your debt while helping others. I am sorry to say that it will not help everyone but for those it does, it can be incredible.

According to StopMilitaryRape.org, a sexual assault or rape is reported as often as every four hours in the U.S. military. CNN’s Sanjay Gupta will feature a weekend report on sexual assault and rape allegations in the military. I was appalled (but not shocked) by what I read and heard in the online article, “Rape Victims Say Military Labels Them ‘Crazy.’” This article addresses the issue of how some survivors receive personality disorder diagnoses upon their report of a sexual assault or rape. I encourage you to read this article and to listen to the audio-recorded personal accounts of four military Service Women who experienced assault, rape, lack of support, and even a psychological diagnosis or military discharge: http://www.cnn.com/2012/04/14/health/military-sexual-assaults-personality-disorder/index.html?hpt=ju_t2

A few months ago the world was mesmerized by the wreck of the Costa Concordia cruise ship; today the last five bodies recovered were identified. This news announcement caused me to reflect on the importance of our need to grieve and the importance in many religions of having remains to bury. This was poignantly discussed last fall when I volunteered at the VOICES of September 11th 10th Annual Day of Remembrance Information Forum. I had been asked to facilitate a roundtable discussion comprised of survivors who had lost someone during the terrorist attacks. There were many themes of loss discussed with the central theme being the need to remember and to honor their loved ones. Frustration about the inability to do so for many, because of the inability to recover remains was a particular point of their inability to grieve.