Saving a Single Mother and Her Children - Essay Example

INTRODUCTION TO SOCIAL WORK: Saving a Single Mother and Her Children [Case Based Study and Analysis] Background Janet is a 39-year-old single parentwho is living with her two children. Being unemployed who needed to support her young children, she ended up being frustrated in her life. As a result of her frustrations, she resulted to being highly addicted to liquor making her less able to handle the needs of her children. Upon observing this, she had been reported by her neighbor to a social worker who specializes in dealing with cases such as that of Janet’s. Hence, as a result, the social worker intended to assist the said individual in handling her responsibilities. However, before any intentions such as this could be well dealt with, the need to know the patient deeper is indeed essential. Part 1: Why The Need to Subject the Patient to Assistance Who are to be blamed on the growing addiction of children to drugs and alcohol intake? Adult consumers are too. They should realize that drugs are poisons, and so use them only when their possible benefits may outweigh their harm. Yet if adults take drugs for every problem or tension, or even for pleasure, why should youths avoid them? Is it surprising that young ones should reason: ‘If grown-ups use tobacco, get drunk and take pills, why shouldn’t I enjoy myself smoking marijuana or taking “downers”?’ That parental drug use is a factor in children’s turning to drugs has been documented by various studies. For example, a major Canadian study calls drug abuse a “learned behavior.” “Adolescents modeled their drug use after parental use,” psychiatrists from Toronto’s Addiction Research Foundation explained. Surely, then, if you do not want your children to abuse drugs, you should not smoke, abuse alcohol or needlessly take pills. But more than a proper adult example is needed. Proper association outside the home is also vital. A study by Friends of Psychiatric Research found that eighty-four out of every one hundred addicts were introduced to drugs by their “friends.” When offered drugs, many young people take them out of curiosity. They may, at first, find the effects pleasurable. But then they become “hooked,” and soon are in terrible trouble. Yes, in the case of Janet, if her addiction to alcohol would not be well given attention, it would likely result to graver situations on the child. Approaching the Rehabilitation of the Patient Therapy Issues to be solved To be able to come up with the necessary useful process of dealing with the case, it should be noted that the process should first be outlines as to what needs to be addressed with the situation of the patient to be treated. The following points are the primary issues to be treated within the patient’s situation: Dealing with the denial of the patient with regards his actual situation Assisting the patient to understand how alcoholism affects his personal relationships with his family as well as with his work mates and friends. Making the patient realize the negative part of the situation that he is in Assisting the patient recognize the most possible process of recovery that is most convenient on his part Through these points, the process of treatment could be outlined and made certain as to how they are supposed to impact the process of treatment that is to be utilized to deal with the situation of the patient. It is undeniable that the process is supposed to be focused on the realization of the patient first then gradually assisting him to recognizing the hope that he still has with regards the aim of changing that he is supposed to adapt to during the treatment process. Part 2: The Pyramid A: Skills Integration The therapist should understand the personality of the individual and how the possible treatments would affect him and his behavior towards the situation that he is facing at present. Through the skills and experience of the therapist, understanding the case shall be based upon the past and the present situations that the patient is dealing with. B: Influencing Skills and Strategies The presentation of the skills of the therapist shall be given high regard in connection with the ability that he has upon the importance of allowing the patient decide on his own wanted process of treatment that he is supposed to receive. The therapist should believe, that as a grown man, he has to have a say on what he is supposed to receive from the treatment. C: 5 Stages of Interviewing 1. Conditioning: preparation for the patient’s availability and behavior towards the interview. The therapist is expected to prepare the patient in this stage of the interviewee. Making him at ease with the environment of the interview shall help him understand the importance of the preparation of the interview. 2. acquaintanceship: knowing the interviewee better In this stage, finding the common ground between the therapist and the patient is the focus of the process. The therapist should be able to encourage the patient to open himself up to the point that he is able to understand the fact why he is seeing the therapist and meeting the appointments for the treatment that he is supposed to receive from the therapy prepared by the proctor of the process [the therapist]. 3. Questioning: asking the questions for behavioral assessment The following questions are prepared for application: How have your drinking apparently affected your personal life and how do you measure your capability of controlling the results of your acts? Are you able to see the possibilities with which you are able to change for a better person that you could be in connection with the situation that you are facing right now? How are you planning to face the difficulties brought to you by drinking, or do you even see the dangers of your addiction? Are you willing to accept that you are addicted to alcohol beverages? 4. Monitoring of Responses: Observation of the answers of the client Evaluation of the responses of the patient with regards these particular questionnaires shall help the therapist assess the possible procedures of treating the situation of the patient. It is undeniable that through this process, the therapist would be able to measure the capabilities of the patient and what is to be expected from him as the therapy is to be performed for his benefit. 5. Generalization and Summary: Gathering the responses and assessing their connection with the situation being faced by the client at present After the interview and the assessment of the patient’s responses, the therapist is now ready to prepare the treatment to be applied in the case of the patient’s situation. D: Reflection on Feelings Through the interview performed during the process, the therapist is expected to make assessments on the situation faced by the patients. He or she is supposed to evaluate the answers as to how they reflect the emotional disposition of the patient. From the motional assessment of the therapist, she or he would be able to take precautions as to how to treat the emotional status of the patient during the treatment. E: Encouraging Summarizing of the Narration The psychiatrist needs to encourage the client in narrating the experiences that he once had through a summarized procedure whereas the top most important part of the interview would be given ample point of attention. This could help the psychiatrist resolve the issue in a much easier and faster procedure. Most likely, this would allow the entire process to take a more certain path that could lead to more effective results. Part 3: TREATMENT APPROACH OUTLINE OF THE PROCESS: Introducing the patient to the response-contingent shock process: this is where the patient is to be helped to realize that he is under a destructive addiction. One process that could be used is the video-taping of her acts as she begins to turn from sober to drunk. Her actions shall be played over and over again until he says that she is already ready to face the consequences of her acts and that she is already willing to change. (Coon, 1999, 607) Once the patient accepts the treatment, the therapist shall go easy with the process as to gradually remove the addiction through reducing the in take of beverages until the totality of the treatment is completed. Since the patient despise taking medication, it could be applied that he be given an alternative to alcohol which could be both interesting and attractive to the patient in the same level that she is attracted to drinking alcoholic beverages. Part 4: Involving the Family One of the hardest and most critical branches of psychology is the observation it has to make regarding family relations. This is mainly because an observation such as this is not only concerning one or two members of the family. Instead it seriously deals with the family function as a whole. This is why the Family Assessment Device or FAD has been initiated to be able to scale the possible problems within a family, and also to see on how much a certain family could face a specific change of life due to many situations that govern the family living. The Family Assessment Device has been designed to measure improvements concerning the Family Therapy. In a busy and complicated world that families have to deal with these days, it is very vital every family be able to face the challenges of today’s world. Although at times, the hardships that families has to face makes it difficult for its members to keep close and intact relationship with each other. Aside from this, the results of such a complicated life leads to different emotional and physical depressions which makes it harder for every family member to comprehend to each other’s needs and be able to cope with life’s changes at the same time. This is why many families chose to undergo several family therapies to be able to solve the growing gap between their members and thus lead a better family life. The Family Assessment Device includes six major dimensions that are connected to family functioning. The said six major scopes of the said assessment device are the problem solving, communication, roles, effective responsiveness, effective involvement and behavioral control. The dimension on Problem Solving intends to measure the capability of a family to be able to face and solve certain problems that arise within the family. With the use of questionnaires having four possible responses on agreeing to the solutions suggested and disagreeing, each family is scaled depending on their answers. The other dimensions as well follow the same pattern of questionnaires. After answering the questions, each result shall be averaged, evaluated and concluded regarding the improvements of the family in the therapies they undergo. An Overview of the Standardization Sample The standard results for the Family Assessment Device which concludes that the family has already improved through the family therapy is based on how well they have comprehended with the activities they undergo during the therapy. There are major ways on how to evaluate the changes in a family. One is through the statistical significance of changes observed, another is through the percentage of dropping below clinical cut-offs and finally through the magnitude of change between intake and termination. These three major evaluation processes helps the psychologists to scale the improvements that the family being observed has already incurred. The Pros and Cons of the Assessment Many experts have proved the reliability of tests and family assessments such as the Family Assessment Device effective. True, at times, the application of this assessment may not be that easy but the cooperation of the family under therapy programs would really help in making assessments such as this a successful program. At times, there might be some family members who would rather depend on their own understanding of the problems they are facing than referring their problems to experts. Usually, this makes the FAD application harder to apply, but as said earlier, constant assistance and assurance to the families that they are being helped and not exploited or whatsoever, the Family Assessment could be concluded to be successful. Family counseling and its effective application certainly help in the process of helping the young substance abusers in becoming highly influenced by the said addiction. More likely, these young children are or the environments that surround them easily influence young adults. Hence, involving the family in the process of gaining them back into the right path of living would directly assist them in leaving the said vice and becoming health-clean again. At times, personal family help could be given just as soon as the parent find it necessary for application. It could be observed that even when professional work is not applied, success in rehabilitating the children from the dreadful effects of drug abuse could still be won. As an experience on the matter has been related: “Consider the experience of yet another Brazilian father. Recalls his son Roberto: “When my father discovered that my brother was abusing drugs, instead of harshly criticizing or disciplining him, Father showed himself to be a friend and gained my brother’s confidence. He got to know my brother’s friends and the places that he frequented, and he began to reason with my brother that he neither needed drugs nor such friends. Father told him that he did not want to spend sleepless nights searching for him.” In an attempt to recover the troubled youth, his stepmother gave full support to her husband. Both agreed that they had no time to lose and decided to help him at home.” Addiction is a growing global dilemma. The young ones, being the vulnerable generation to such influential situations, is being directly targeted by the said social problem. As a result, the lives of the young generation end up as wasted creations, which are supposed to have been lived in a better way. Considerably though, after many years of investigation and observation on which solution works best for this particular situation, experts began to see the strength carried by family-based help given to the particular patients being treated for rehabilitation. The application of family counseling has been believed to have better results compared to plain rehabilitation procedures. The fact that the young patients feel that they are strongly supported by other people that they love, they are more motivated to take the steps in recovering form their present situation. The family has indeed a great role in the personal developments of the individuals within the human society. This is the primary reason why empowering this basic section of the society is a must. Strengthening the link keeping the members of the family together could be observed as one of the most important issues needed to be addressed by psychologists in an aim of reducing the potential prospects of young drug abusers within the human society. Part 5: Conclusion Certainly, the case of Janet involves the need to assist her and her children in a therapy. It could be noted that involving her family’s role in the process could also increase the competency of the social work approach to handle the needs of the patient and those who are dependent on her. For the mean time, it is indeed assuring to know that the children are to be handled considerably by the social workers who are likely to be appointed to handle the situation. When the right time comes, and the patient could already prove that she could already handle the needs and demands of her children making her more capable of handling her life as well. In this particular case of addiction and children’s welfare, the role of social workers are certainly identified well, making the entire process of recovery for the patient more relatively effective and long lasting. References: Coon, Dennis. (1999). Introduction to Psychology: Gateways to mind and Behavior. Wadsworth Publishing. Pfendler, B.A. (1997, April). Validation of the McMaster Family Assessment Device (FAD) in an intensive family therapy program. Psychological Association, Washington D.C. Ridenour, T.A., Daley, J.G., & Reich, W. (1999). Factor Analyses of the Family Assessment Device. Family Process, 37,38. Sluttery, J.M. (1997). Predictors of Family Therapy Outcome. Unpublished data, Handout. Kabacoff, R.I. et al. (1990). A psychometric study of the McMaster Family Assessment Device in psychiatric, medical and nonclinical samples. Journal of Family Psychology. Ernest Harms. (1989). Drug Addiction in Youth. Elsevier Science B.V. Hazelden. Learn About Youth and Drug Addiction. (1985). Hazelden; Pamphlet edition. Sandra Rasmussen. (2000). Addiction Treatment: Theory and Practice. Sage Publications, Inc. J. C Parikh. (1992). Drug addiction, a psycho-social study of youth. Friends Publications (India). Read More