The complete set of 198 Hints are available in paperback from the CYC-Net Press store.
Listen
We talked in the previous Hint (What
is being asked? – 1) about meeting needs – and noted that in any group
there are likely to be several different needs being expressed.
It is, of course, also true that some "needs" ought not to be responded to.
And it’s a tough call (when we work with a population with so many unmet and
urgent needs) that there are some needs we should disregard.
Consider the youngster who "succeeds" by manipulation and who tries a line like "but you and I have a relationship – surely you would take my side in this?" Or another who takes the "sick" role (in the Adlerian sense) to excuse himself from making his own effort or take his own risks to achieve some goal. Or yet another who seeks your "protection" when he gets into a scrape of his own making.
Consider the youngster who initially needed "holding" (in the Beedell sense) but who wants to remain in this regressed, more comfortable position. Or another who should be moving on but who plays the "poor orphan" role when he cannot get his instant gratification "needs" met.
In a recent CYC-NET discussion on whether we should have snacks always available for the kids, one writer commented: "These youth have so much taken from them ..." True, but the danger of such a view is that it groups all of the kids into this condition, and would imply that they will forever deserve this solicitous attitude. It fails to individualise those who may well still need this level of care – and those who should be moving on.
(We remember the Child and Youth Care worker in an earlier Hint ("Over-therapizing") whose real generosity lay in withholding the hug which might have distracted a girl from the efforts she was being called on to make.)
Responding positively to what is being asked is not simple. Knowing when not to respond is even tougher.
