Mental Health FW 1 Experience: Recounts & Thoughts

Hey guys, so as of Tuesday, July 14th,  I wrapped up my MH FW 1. To give you some background the FW took place at an psychiatric facility for short-term crisis stabilization. I was in a group with 2 other classmates. The FW was a total of 7 weeks with group once a week. The first week, we got to observe the current therapists at the facility conduct a group. I was kind of disappointed because the group we were able to observe was just a physical education group. They played "HORSE" -- not much to see. I was really looking forward to observe a psychoeducational group, but that didn't happen.

Every other week we were required to write a SOAP note on one of the group members. The most common diagnoses that we saw were bipolar, major depressive disorder, schizophrenia, and schizoaffective disorder with corresponding substance abuse. In order for the clients to participate in group they had to at least be yellow status. Red status clients were only allowed to participate in group if it was held in the outdoors part of the unit. We hosted 2 physical education groups, 2 media/craft groups, and 1 psychoeducational group. One week of our group got cancelled due to a newly admitted patient unknowingly having chicken pox.

Postive Affirmation Shoe Box

Waterballon Obstacle Course

Plastic Container Staining 

Ceramic Box Painting 

Foosketball

Piñatas 

We did a water balloon obstacle course, positive affirmations shoe boxes, ceramic box painting and plastic container staining, foosketball and knockout, and piñata making and hitting. Our best group was probably the water balloon obstacle course. The group members seemed to really enjoy it. Our least successful group was probably the piñata making and hitting. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't a bad group, but it was a little chaotic. For one, there were wayyyy to many group members for this particular session (16 group members). The room that craft activities and most groups take place is super tiny, with not a lot of room to navigate. Also, the members didn't have enough time to finish their piñatas, which I already anticipated. I had expressed my concerns to my group members prior to the session but they thought it would be fine so I was like okay. Also, the bootlegged piñata we made for them to hit was burst on the first hit. So 1/16 group members got to hit the piñata lol HOW FUN! The group with the worst turn out in terms of attendees was the foosketball and knockout games. There were only 4 people for foosketball and about 6 people for knockout. The staff decided to join in since participation was so low. Fortunately, those who decided to participate seemed to really enjoy it. I joined in during knockout and actually won the second game -- yay Bemo! ha Also, our large dice was complete crap lol -- it didn't roll effectively and it tore apart in less than 6 rolls. It was kind of embarrassing.

In my opinion, our sessions were not the most creative. I'm horrible with coming up with activities that I think others will enjoy, so I didn't contribute to coming up with the main ideas. My biggest role was making sure that whatever my group members suggested were realistic and could be completed within the 30-45 minutes or would actually last the 30-45 minutes we usually had to hold groups. Some of their ideas were pretty cool, but not realistic to last for an entire session. Some of the other groups that hosted sessions were MUCH more creative! Unfortunately, I don't have access to their pictures so I can't share.

My evaluation on how I did is Thursday, July 16th. I think I will be rated pretty average. I don't anticipate that I will be rated as exceeded expectations in really any category. I felt like I did a good job interacting and connecting with the members and my documentation was pretty good, but I don't feel like I did anything spectacular. I also didn't really ask any questions. One of my group members consistently asked the supervisor about their diagnoses after group. I'm not particular fond of labeling people so I never felt like I just NEEDED to know their diagnoses, especially not for the purpose we were there. Now, if I was actually establishing real goals for the members to meet, then yes knowing their diagnosis would be more important. I guess I just didn't feel like it was my business, since we weren't their to actually "treat." Probably a mistake on my part. I did ask one question about how to respond to when group members become visibly upset. The second group we held, a man was just sitting there. Since he came to our first group, I knew that it was not like him to be sad like that during group. I asked him if everything was okay, but that seemed to make it worse and he shook his head no and started tearing up. I didn't know if it was my place to keep at it, so I told him that I hope he feels better and backed off. The supervisor said it would have been okay to see if he was willing to step out of the activity room and talk about what was bothering him. I kept that in the back of my head for a next time, but there was no next time.

Update (07/16/15) -- So, I got my eval today and I -- am -- SHOCKED! I mentioned that I anticipated that I would be rated average. For our FW scaling that would equal a 3, which is "meets standards, performance is demonstrated 70-89% of the time when behavior is necessary." However, I was rated a 4 in all categories except for "discusses/selects/implements interventions that demonstrate knowledge of characteristics of client/population." Wow! The supervisor's comments were "[Bemo] is a highly dedicated and conscientious learner. She exercises good judgment in treatment planning and interactions. Documentation skills are outstanding and demonstrate good observation and assessment skills. She will need to work to control occasional anxiety that appears to be related to a desire for perfection." Her feedback is similar to the constructive feedback that I typically get...my feedback seems to always be related to either my lack of confidence or my anxiety. I know it's my biggest area of weakness and I'm not quite sure how to address it, but I will continue to work on it!

Anyways, that about wraps it up. All-in-all, I'm proud that the supervisor thought I did a good job. The first round of FW 1's are all done! Yay.

Assistive Technology Seminar Day is tomorrow (July 17th, 2015) so I will be taking tons of pics to share with you guys! Look for that post in the next couple of days!

<3 Bemo