Currently, my career has led me to a mental health facility where the job of Social Work is constant. The services provided are not only to the poor and homeless but also to those with higher levels of education and socio-economic status. It is an aspect of this field I had no interest to be a part of, but God. As I became more acclimated to the position, I have found a common thread in many of the mental health issues. For instance, if you’ve ever seen the television show, Hoarders, you realize that as the episode continues and delves into that particular hoarder, he/she has had some trauma in their life some sort of way and many of them have another common thread using thrift stores (estate, yard, or garage sales) as a means of escape. The facility where I am employed the common thread is the absolving trust within relationships. These relationships can be immediate family or long termed friendship or marriage. It takes therapy sessions before the patient can come to terms with trusting the individual to do the right thing.
Whether it’s the father deciding to leave the family when his daughter has become so close to him and grows up wondering what she did wrong to a cheating spouse justifying why cheating was inevitable when vows to avoid all others were made at a ceremony with the collection of family and friends to witness the event. Unless the matter is dealt with for the individual to get an understanding, it’s suppressed but will come out in other ways.
An elderly woman deciding to continue to work well into her 70’s was having issues with her
supervisor. There was nothing she thought she was doing wrong but her supervisor found a reason to harass her daily. After so many months, the elderly woman found it difficult to rest in the evening and would only get a few hours of sleep to eventually go through the same treatment the next day. Weeks later she would wake from a restless night to hives all over her body. Red blotches covered her face with her lip and eye lid swollen. She and her family thought there was an allergic reaction to something she ate. Going to get medical attention, it was found to be stress. The elderly woman believed that the harassment would eventually stop or someone else would step in to harass the supervisor or report the bullying. None of that happened. It was up to her to do what she didn’t want to do - say something. One morning, the elderly woman told the supervisor exactly what that supervisor has been doing and if she didn’t stop, the elderly woman was going to report her to administration. Once confronted, the bullying stopped, the hives went away, and the red blotches never came back. Know the elderly woman suppressed that anguish for 12 years before saying anything. What her physical and mental health went through, one can only imagine.
Understand, the title of this entry is to inform you that trust has been used in all sorts of ways. What we are realizing is that there is no one you can trust in but God. I recall writing a dissertation when in the last semester of receiving my degree. I wrote about the food industry from where is used to be and what it has become. My academic advisor read the essay and said that I went too far. That there is no reason to concern the community about a theory that may or not happen. It wasn't the purpose of the paper. My purpose was to fulfill an assignment but the educator was looking for an argument. I used the references that the institution had on sight. The theory where the food industry was going is now a reality. That paper was written in the early 90's. Nutrition labels were being enforced to be put on food items. 10 years previous, society was taught that coconut oil was the worst oil for the human body because the fats were so saturated. Now, scientists say different. Back in the 70's, there was liquid protein put on the market for weight loss. People became sick and were passing away. But the trust was there because the inevitable was unconscionable. Throw away that old thinking and acknowledge Him in ALL of your ways.
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