From Our Archives
Child and Youth Care practice is not a verbal counselling activity. In fact, we already know through recent brain research that most abused and neglected youths have neural brain patterns that block verbal input about trusting others or being too hopeful. We are most effective when we avoid trying to influence youths through their brains, and instead focus on communicating physically, through the heart or emotions. This is one reason why I do not use the label Child Care Counsellor and prefer to see our professional task as being an experience arranger.
Mark Krueger has described the focus of our work as “creating moments of connection, discovery and empowerment” for youth, and I heartily agree with him. Many CYC writers and thinkers of the past decade define the practice as relational and developmental, not behavioural. The life space work that we do is ideally suited to communicating physically, a process that I have called analogue, not dialogue communication. The goal is to create moments where a youth is staying close to you even though his brain is warning him to move away, because his body/heart is feeling safe and comfortable with the closeness.
The process of becoming a capable, strategic experience arranger is not simple. Inexperienced Stage 1 workers cannot be expected to do this. More mature practitioners, the Stage 2 workers who are able to fully focus on the youth and are not self-consciously preoccupied with doubts about safety or personal competence, can become better and better at using the multitude of daily events to create experiences that promote connection, discovery and empowerment.
The needs of the youth we work with are quite simple, the ability to provide the help they need is quite complex. Fritz Redl said this over 60 years ago, describing the mundane medicine which is needed, and the superhuman skill needed to get it out of the doctor’s bag and into the youth’s body. We can readily describe the experiences we hope to provide to our charges; a message of being cared for un-conditionally, a hopeful attitude about the future, a desire to learn and become competent. In sum, Connection, Discovery and Empowerment. An example may be helpful.
A CYC practitioner (Level 2) is observing a youth who is supposed to do the dishes after lunch on a Friday. The youth is getting very agitated because he is going for a home visit in an hour, but he sees the van which will take him leaving the parking space and he believes that he will be left behind. Even though he is told that the van is only going to the gas station and will be back soon, he cannot control his anxiety. The other CYC worker is a Level 1 practitioner, and he begins to insist that the boy finish doing the dishes before he can leave. Unfortunately, the predictable result of this demand is that the boy will lose control, possibly break several dishes or worse, and probably not get through the afternoon smoothly. Level 1 workers are preoccupied with keeping things safe by insisting on the rules and routines. In-stead, the Level 2 worker moves closer to the boy, puts his hand on his shoulder and says that he will finish the dishes and tells the boy to go and get ready. The Level 2 worker knows that the only problem with this interaction is explaining it to his colleague, who will be challenged to see the value here. If we believe that chaos will not result by having this boy abandon his chore so that he can manage his anxiety (a belief which is not so easy for a Level 1 worker), then the experience arranged by the Level 2 practitioner is that the boy will be relieved and empowered by being able to focus on his trip home and puzzled by the caring gesture of taking over his chore. He may begin to connect more easily with the Level 2 worker and will certainly have a better start to his home visit.
Once we have established a safe environment there is little need for insisting on behavioural expectations when they are counter-indicated by the situation. In fact, our treatment efforts should build experiences of connection, discovery, and empowerment, not adherence to a predetermined schedule. Level 1 workers are not free to think this way and are more focussed on their own experience than the youths’, which is a developmental journey that cannot be rushed. The Level 2 practitioner, the Treatment Planner and Change Agent, often has the difficult task of keeping the Level 1 worker safe while arranging this type of experience for the youth.
The physical experiences arranged by skilled workers look simple after-the-fact, but the level of thinking is quite complex. In fact, truly skilled practitioners know that they are continuously improving in this complex ability and never reach a final level of skill. The interesting parallel result of this interaction is that it also enhances the connection, discovery and empowerment experience for the practitioner.
First published in CYC-Online, 169, pp41-42
