#150: It’s our 150th episode!!! This week we talk about how sometimes it doesn’t pay to do good. Also, Josué wants a nickname for members of the community.
A) Do Gooders
I can really relate to the do-gooder debacle. I’ve had a lot of experiences in medical school where my peers actively tell me to do a bad job on my patients because I make them look bad. I literally don’t do anything to compete above my peers, I’ve never done a gunner move. Gunner culture is very present in medical school. I actually try really hard to foster teamwork and cooperation; but I’m not gonna slack on patient care, or the time I spend with my patients just because it makes someone else look bad. I spent a lot of time in medical school trying to build programs to help early students get the hang of medical school, I started getting complaints from teachers because students stopped going to their classes. I never told the students not to go to class, but if they prefer to learn from a student than a teacher, there’s something wrong in how it’s being managed.
I’ve been called out for teaching well, for spending more time with my patients while still having my deadlines met in time, for caring enough about projects or oral presentations to actually commit to doing something thorough, for putting the needs of the overall student body, over the needs of a few students. It gets tiring, but holding on to my belief that the world can be better is all I have. If I give that up for an ounce of comfort, I’m reinforcing the flawed status quo. I created a week’s worth of classes on Transgender health, but I got so much resistance from the administration because it was “too controversial”. How is it controversial to cater health to a marginalized community? When the week turned out to be a success the administration wanted to bank on it and started giving out speeches about how progressive they are. It was the worst.
/rant
B) Name for Community Members:
Psychonauts!
We are astronauts of the wonderful world of psychology and geek culture. We live to explore the multiverses of geek culture and identify what these worlds offer us as humans in a small planet called Earth.
No relation to the game… Unless you want there to be… in which case, there is…
This is something we never talk about and I assumed some people could relate so thanks for sharing. I giess it’s not surprising you’ve been experienced this in med school too.
I have dealt with something similar in the field, with my clients… by my own boss. I hold myself to high standards when it comes to the ethics in my field. I have gone above & beyond for my clients and have been told to do things for profits that I believe is against my own ethical codes. I am a MFT the office has its own code of ethics, but I always go by what I have been taught is in my code of ethics.
Sometimes you have to do what is right to you. 1) I would not sacrifice my clients well being. 2) I’m doing treatment with them to help them reach a point where they don’t need as much care which is why we start treatment seeing clients at 3x per week and by the time we discharge it should be at 1x per week.
When I’m told that well we should but we have to generate revenue so see them 3 times I believe it continues the cycle of my clients not learning to trust themselves & develop & utilise their problem solving skills because they continue to rely on me up until the day of discharge.
I’ve had clients whose first language is Spanish and when the are frustrated or stressed I will use Spanish more frequently to help them destress and to help them comprehend easier (sometimes when frustrated translating is not easy). And I’ve been told that I shouldn’t make it easy for them to avoid speaking in English. Partly feel that’s prejudice. I have reported this problem… but I’d rather my clients feel confident, comfortable and trust me than add to their frustration.
I feel, sadly, that being a do gooder is frowned upon even in the helping field. Thanks for your post Gian!!!
Language is such an important concept and sadly its something you dont understand until you have that need to comunicate in an environment where you have to speak a tongue you are not proficient in. If had a lot of patients and families in the US whose whole interaction changes drastically when I switch to spanish.
I definitely get that whole loneliness aspect of mental health/helping profession work. Social workers can often be lone wolves wherever we work. But, similar to what Ali said, my foundation field work experience was actually amazing because it was at a psychiatric hospital where I was surrounded by multiple social workers, psychologists, psychiatrists, and students, among other staff. There were many in my cohort who weren’t so lucky with their field placements.
On top of that, a lot of managers and directors don’t have a clear understanding of what a SW’s job actually is, and they stick their SW employee(s) with miscellaneous tasks that are either beyond the SW’s scope of practice or that aren’t actually related to social work. So, I have that to look forward to after I graduate, I guess.
As for a name, the only thing I could think of was “fan-gooders.”
Yeah, I was referring more to being alone in your values or your identity as someone who does the right thing but being surrounded by people who don’t understand what a social worker (or counselor or mft etc) does is also so frustrating.
Oh, I know that’s what you were saying. I was commenting on something Ali said about loneliness in the mental health profession.
As far as feeling alone in doing good, I can’t say that I do feel that way. But at the moment, I’m in grad school with a bunch of people who, as Gracie Hart would say, “really do want world peace,” lol.
Outside of school, it’s complicated. I think “goodness” is incredibly subjective. I’ve spent my whole life around religious fundamentalists who have completely different ideas of what counts as “doing good” because of their worldview. We both think each other’s version of “good” is mislead, but it doesn’t serve me very well to think of myself as alone in doing good just because I have a bad taste in my mouth about their version of goodness. We have to coexist somehow.
I’ve learned to think less about who is/isn’t doing good, and more about how most of us are probably just doing the best we can at any given moment.
I totally get what you mean about versions of goodness and the need to coexist. I have many peers with whom I disagree with on philosophical matters or matters of procedure.
Sometimes however varying ideas of “goodness” can actually cause great harm at times when not tempered with research. I’ve had experiences where per example I’ve worked with Antivaxxer nurses in a pediatric ward; nurses and doctors who encourage queer youth to looks for religious services to “help sort out” their “sexual confusion”; doctors who practice a lot of “tough love” with patients who need to lose weight and only manage to get them to trust their doctors less with disclosure; surgeons who foster a bad relationship with nurses (treating them like crap) over trivial things (To the point where nurses are not fully able to disclose mistakes that happen on the floor out of fear or reprimand); a whole lotta sexism; doctors who poke fun at their patient’s diseases because they actually think it fosters a friendly humorous atmosphere when you can definitely see the shame on the patient’s face; Psychiatrists that aggressively threaten psychotic patients with shots if they don’t stop being psychotic; doctors who deliberately misinform to cash in on more unnecessary services; radiologists who comment on patient’s breasts on film to “foster camaraderie” and friendly conversation in an obviously predominantly male field; teachers telling students to pick easygoing medical specialties so they can make room for motherhood and childrearing in their lives; doctor’s who wont treat opioid addicted patients with pain relief because they “have to learn from their mistakes” when medical ethics dictates that absolutely everyone is entitled to pain management.
The list really goes on and on and on… I’m sure all of thee people think that what they are doing is acceptable or even good. But the scientific/academic nature of our field can determine which of these actions cause more harm than good. We can measure and predict harm! We can know what is actually good and what does more harm than good. I am uncomfortable coexisting in an environment where we are all supposed to be healers and work towards benefitting the patient’s quality of life and my peers care so much about their own individual beliefs of what is good that they impose it on others and actively ignore the evidence that states that their actions actually cause harm.
Awwww you guys are too adorable and I appreciate the shoutout and no Lauren you guys aren’t knuckleheads lol
Ali I would never subtly dig at you, I’ll leave that to Josué
I agree with the whole do gooder stance and like you all I too was and still am that do gooder when it comes to school projects and work projects. I always end up getting really frustrated because if I don’t understand something then my group is no help. Plus if I make a mistake they gang up on me for letting their grade drop
I just want to thank everyone again for being a part of this community. It really is amazing to have this show going for 7 years and seeing the community continuing to grow. There was a geektherapypodcast dot com before there was a geektherapy.com. My initial aspirations were not much bigger than just this show. My hope is that this show can be a reflection of the community at all times so I’m sure it will change over time.
I finally listened to the episode I missed! My thoughts:
I love you guys too! Bummed I missed out on a milestone episode! Thanks for the peer pressure to be on the show, Josué! I’ve really enjoyed it and look forward to hanging out every week.
When I tell people I’m a therapist, I usually get a really positive response. People are usually curious and want to know more about how I’m able to do such difficult work. They also usually acknowledge that’s “noble” or “important” work.
The X-Men are like the biggest example of heroes that get dumped on. They have to go into hiding. They’re called muties. People hate them! How did you guys miss that?
Possible name: GT Heroes. I’m better than you guys at names, and I suck at names.