Like a complicated piece of music, the interplay between Ben's hospital experience and the loss of Gary's mom (and the week of funeral related things) pulled my emotions in some many directions. And then the third--a very minor theme-was added in. It was my own private addition to the symphony (to continue the music theme). Due to privacy issues, I can only touch upon briefly, but it was an interesting experience and related to being a therapist. Maybe in the future, I will have a descendant who works in a related field and they might benefit from this brief experience.
As a social worker, we have very clear and important guidelines regarding our interactions with clients and former clients. In school, these were repeated often, loudly, and with emphasis. My professor, Susan, had served on the DOPL Board who reviewed violations of these ethics and randomly she would add, "Please don't sleep with your clients!" That is a big one, but there are hundreds of related concerns which mainly are summed up by "Don't have any interactions with clients or former clients outside of the therapy relationship." There are some exceptions which are needed for situations like in small rural communities where you might have been providing therapy for the only dentist where you also need to get dental care. But they are still guided by principles of ethics.
Now my story:
On the day of my mother-in-law's passing, we headed to the mortuary in the early afternoon. It wasn't until we were driving there that I realized that I had a former client who worked there as one of the funeral directors. If he was assigned our case, that would be a violation of establishing a business relationship with a former client. Although I usually had a conversation with clients about how if I saw them in public I would ignore them unless they wanted to approach me, it had been several months since I saw this particular former client and I wasn't sure how he would feel to see me at his place of business. My plan became that I would try to look for him and have the conversation with him, so he could decide if he prefer to not work with us due to that prior relationship. Fortunately, we had had a positive therapeutic relationship so I felt confident that he could make that decision in his best interests.
However, I did not see him in my walk through the building to the bathroom and back. As we were seated as a family in an office, I just was hoping that someone else would be assigned and we would "dodge this bullet." The situation is complicated not only by the ethics of the situation, but as a result of things that we had talked about related to his work. I needed someone to provide a specific type of services and I didn't not want to feel like I had to temper my expectations because of things I knew as a therapist.
But of course, he was the one that walked through the door and he immediately acknowledged me as a friend so I introduced him to Gary and my sisters-in-law and their husbands. One of my sister-in-laws said that it made the whole experience feel more personal and warm because "we knew each other." At the end of that first appointment, he shared with everyone that he was especially grateful to provide this service to us as a family because of how much I have helped him and his family. He, of course, has every right to disclose whatever he wants while I can not. That did make it a bit easier.
The next morning, I reached out to Dave, my boss at Family Services, and had a consult with him. After learning what not to do with former clients, the second thing we learned was to "consult" if we have a question. "Consult" was the correct answer on several of the ethics questions on the Clinical social work exam. It is an important part of being a social worker. It was good to talk it out. He asked me to have a private conversation with my former client which I did. Like he had expressed to our family on the first day and in a text to Gary, he felt it was a privilege to assist our family with his skills as I had helped them. Then he said, "I know I shouldn't have, but I told (his wife) that I had seen you and she said, "I love that woman." She was also grateful that he was able to help us at this tender time.
So it worked out...and probably in the best way possible.
So--"Avoid, Consult, Discuss"--the keys when your life and your work collide.
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