Reflection of a Mental Health Therapist

In today's podcast, I just I just came across some notes that I jotted down. I have notebooks all over the place where sometimes I write thoughts and feelings, and I'm reflecting on some of the experiences I've been through as a mental health therapist. In one of my stops along the way in my professional career, I worked at a psychiatric hospital. Let me pull back the curtain a little bit on what it's like to work in such an environment. And and let me say also that I'm so grateful for those individuals who are willing to strive to be there to help others that are dealing with such unbearable life circumstances.

But here here's the notes, and this is the reality of what what went on where where I worked, and I think it's pretty pretty accurate to say it's it's in in at least the agencies that I'm aware of, the inpatient psychiatric hospitals. K. I started, anyway, I don't need the name where I worked and then, but I put down the date that I started working there. And then these are my notes. I just jot it down.

1st day on the floor, the Monday after orientation week, or at one of our adolescent therapists, we had an adolescent unit and an adult unit. Adolescent therapist walks off job. She just left. She just left, never came back. Next couple of weeks, certain, Jonah, another guy by the name of Don, they were fired.

A number of nurses continued to leave. Our top therapist put in her notice that she was leaving. Cheryl, who had the service excellent award, put in her notice. She couldn't deal with it anymore. Our risk management individual who kinda ran the whole hospital for risk management put in his notice.

It's like all of that happened in the very, first date on on the unit. Anyway and the clinical staff, what we would deal with in in the previous year, there was a 100% turnover. The intensity of dealing with, the mental health issues, the crisis situations, I mean, it it really takes strong individuals to be able to deal with that on a regular basis. It's not easy. So be grateful.

Any of you who have a mental health therapist that is working with you, realize that these are human beings. Us as mental health therapists, it's like we're looked at and people are coming to us as if we have the answers to all the problems in life. We are fellow travelers. We are giving what we can to strive and help. Oftentimes, we're judged if someone comes to us and and someone's not healed or put together the way that others expect them to.

And it's it's part of the reality of of serving in this capacity. But I am so grateful for mental health professionals. So grateful that they put themselves on the line. Emergency room doctors, nurses, and the staff that I worked with at at the psychiatric hospital. It was a crisis hospital, like, so ambulance would it it they would drive up or police would bring someone handcuffed, and we had no security.

We were the security. So we would be the ones all of us were trained in in being able to resolve, very, very difficult situations. And sometimes it it required physical takedowns if, you know, it was violence was gonna happen. And and I remember suggesting to the CEO, man, we gotta have police here. This is and and they refused to do it.

So, anyway, it was it's so be be grateful. If you're working with a mental health professional, be grateful. Be a little considerate of their life, their time, what they're dealing with, and realize that they they don't have all the answers. Nobody does. I've met some of the the the world's foremost authorities on trauma and recovery, spent some time with them.

1 in particular, you know, a few days. And, I've written books, New York Times bestselling books. And as I got to know them and be with them, you know what? The they're they're navigating through their life just like the rest of us are. No one has a corner on the market on the answers for everything.

They're just living. But one thing that I really am coming more and more to conclude, as I'm I'm growing a little bit older, I'm gonna be 65 this this year, It's just being fully engaged in your life. Being countable, being responsible, confronting the problems and issues that are right in front of you, not complaining so much. I go back to, you know, what I call a mindful warrior, becoming a mindful warrior. What is the mindset of individuals that really tend to make an impact on the world and are successful?

And it comes back to some basic principles. They have a can do attitude. I will figure it out. I will figure it out. In the end, I will prevail.

Even though I'm not sure how to get through what's confronting me right now, in the end, I will prevail, and I will continue to be fully engaged in the process to the best of my ability. Inner circle, what I can control. Outer circle, things I cannot control. I'm not gonna spend time and energy on that outer circle. I'm focusing on what I can directly control.

Can do attitude, healthy sense of humor. You have just got to find the ability to laugh and lighten up a little bit. Life is difficult. It's meant to be that way. Problems are not going to go away.

There's a really interesting statement by CS Lewis when I say that, and I just happen to have it here. So I'm grateful that I have this here. This is by CS Lewis, and he says, I'm not sure that God particularly wants us to be happy. I think he wants us to be able to love and be loved. He wants us to grow up.

We think our childish toys bring us all the happiness there is and our nursery is the whole wide world, but something must drive us out of the nursery to the world of others and that something is suffering. That interesting? I don't know any individual I've ever come across that doesn't have some some challenges, some suffering, some past trauma that they're dealing with. But and it it seems to be that's the course of life. There seems to be great purpose in fighting against opposition, coming up against difficult things as we continue to move.

And although we may pray over and over again for our challenges to be taken from us, the thorn in the flesh to be taken from us. I'm thinking of the apostle Paul, the great apostle Paul in the New Testament in the Bible. He had a thorn in the flesh that he importuned God to remove from him And at least 3 different occasions, and the answer was always no. No. No, Paul.

I'm not gonna remove this thorn in your flesh because if I did, you would become exalted beyond measure. You just get too full of yourself. You need to have this so that you depend on me. And you keep struggling and you keep working towards things. Anyway, so back to the mindset.

Can do attitude. Healthy sense of humor. Learning to roll with things and just cut up and bust up and laugh when nothing else will do. The third attribute of those who seem to be extremely capable and successful and powerful are a zero victim mentality. They refuse to be victims.

They do not believe the world owes them a living. For for some reason, I've come across so many people who feel that they're victimized. They feel like they shouldn't have to go through what they're going through. That bad things shouldn't happen for whatever reason. And so they they become victims, and they become beaten up by these things, and they kind of lose hope, and they give up because the world is such an unsafe place.

I just don't think that's a healthy place to be. It's a fact. The world is not a safe place. But, inner circle, what can I control to be as safe as I possibly can? Outer circle, I cannot control all the crazy people in the world, all the negative things that are happening.

But I can do what I can do to protect myself and my family, and I will be engaged in doing that. So can do attitude, healthy sense of humor, 0 victim victim mentality, The world doesn't owe me a living. I need to earn everything that I can for myself and all. Yeah. And I need to do what I can to engage in other people and ask for help when necessary, but I choose to do that.

And then the 4th attribute is when bad things happen, they just don't let the bad things take center control of their attention. They you know, I'm thinking of a of an interview I recently heard with William McRaven, Admiral McRaven, who was over all the Navy SEALs in Afghanistan. And listening to him talk about he he mentioned some of the horrific things they have to deal with, but he just mentioned them kind of in passing. It's not like they took center stage. Of course, he does not like the horrible things that are happening.

But if if they're not out there protecting freedom, then freedom would not be available to us. And I'm also reminded of and I love the mindset of a warrior. I'm thinking of Jim Mattis, who was the secretary of defense and wrote a book, call sign chaos. And he he said this, I have seen no case where weakness promotes a chance for peace. So think about that.

I've seen no case where weakness promotes a chance for peace. And so our our daily engagement and activity and hope would be to make ourselves strong, as strong as we possibly can. Keep working on things. Keep trying. Have that mindset of overcoming the challenges that we face.

Bad things happen to all of us. Horrific things happen to all of us from time to time. And we cannot compare crosses. It it's just how we interpret things, but we are responsible for our own lives. And if there's if there take a look inside yourself.

I constantly take a look inside myself. Is there any victim mentality within me? Of course, there has been. Tons of it. And, you know, certain betrayals that I've dealt with in my life and it's left left horrendous scars.

It's hard to trust sometimes at because of some things we've been through. But the only way through is through. And you keep you keep working on overcoming, keep working on being more fully engaged, but it seems like the most helpful thing to do is just get fully engaged. Jump in. Go to work.

Whatever it is you're dealing with, do what you can, and and just, you know, just just be grateful that there are, people out there that are willing to strive and help. Back to as I'm wrapping this podcast up, just back to, you know, how I started it when I started work at the psychiatric hospital, how difficult and challenging things are. They just are sometimes. Nobody likes to deal with confrontation. That reminds me.

I'm squirreling a little bit here, but maybe I'll touch on this more fully in, a podcast later. But I had really interesting experience in high school. I was fortunate enough to be on a basketball team. We were one of the best teams in Northern California in history. Our our senior year, we won 26 games and lost 2.

And and then the following year, I stayed at a a local junior college, and I played basketball there. And it was completely the opposite. It's a brand new school. We didn't have any centers, you know, and so, man, we're playing in junior college level, and these some of these guys are 6668, and our tallest guy was, like, 63, and which was me. And and, anyway, anyway, had a horrible year.

We won 3 games and lost 28. And at the end of the year, I remember when tryouts came for to for the team and there were walk ons. There's, like, 50 guys trying out to play on our team. And as the year went on and we kept losing and losing and losing, interesting thing happened. People would just drop off.

They would stop coming. They would quit. They would give up. And at the end of the year, we had 7 players at our last game in in a junior college game. Seven players.

It just got tough. It was horrific to lose. It just felt, oh, felt so sick. But we did the very best we could with what we have and I'm grateful for the 7 guys who stuck together. So it's like we all got to just ask ourselves the question at the end of the day, man, what are we going to do?

What are we what are we going to be committed to? What are we going to engage in? I'm not saying that you need to stick with something. If it's not working, sometimes we need to course correct. But I'm saying in the one little basketball team analogy, it's like, yeah, that totally stunk, but still stay with it till the end of the season then move on with your life.

The world's not gonna come to an end, but it's like they couldn't tolerate losing. And sometimes you just learn a powerful lesson in losing. It's extremely painful, but often what I found is character is truly developed in the low times, in the times when you're beaten down, and the times when you really don't have much of a chance to beat the team you're playing because you're out mad and you know it. And what do you do? Well, you just show up and you do the best you can with what you have.