Eye of the Storm

"Well, when I was lost, I suppose it's good advice to stay where you are until someone finds you. But who'd ever think to look for me here?" -Alice


I've known I wanted to be a therapist forever, it just seemed that I fought my passion at every new twisty turn that my life took (hence my uber-beneficial english lit degree). It took the entire summer after graduation of sitting on my duff, chain-smoking on my patio, with my parent's watchful and judgmental glares from inside my house for the fire to be lit under my ass. I quickly enrolled in classes to fulfill many essential pre-requisites I needed in which my degree didn't come close to fulfilling. It was at this community college that I began asking questions for the first time ever. These weren't just any questions. They were the heavy-hitting questions that I can only assume many 20-somethings begin to ask themselves when they wake up and realize, "Wait a second, so, not everyone's like ME? Not everyone has been given the same opportunities that I have?" What a grade A douchebag I was.

Obviously I knew that not everyone is blessed with carefree lives. What's that saying about the sun is brighter after it rains or some stupid shit like that? Well anyway, all of a sudden I had an epiphany...Um, Hello, Earth to Caitlin; You want to be a therapist, and yet, you have never experienced anything outside of your comfortable, homogeneous, popped collar-clad world? I shouldn't be surprised that as soon as I left my safe bubble I began questioning things that I never thought to question before. I like to think life works like that- when you're so immersed in an experience, you don't think about (or maybe don't WANT) to question anything that would possibly disrupt the experience you're having. I think it's like getting out of a shitty relationship. When you're in it, you're in it. But when you finally open your eyes and walk away, that's when you begin to question everything, and realize that you probably should have started asking questions A LOT sooner than you did. But alas, I was 22, naive and now extremely curious about the different kinds of people that I had yet to experience.

When I began my program at school, I was surprised at how quickly we were able to choose our very first internship sites. This struck me as a daunting task, and when I arrived at my scheduled meeting with our clinical coordinator, I still had no clue what population I wanted to work with. Partly because of my unexplainable connection with the elderly, (more specifically, the dying elderly), and also due to a magical experience that Allie had when her Grandfather was ill, I've always known I wanted to work in a Hospice care facility. But I also know my own limitations. It would not have been a wise choice for me to work in Hospice during my first experience with clients. (Come to find out, Hospice is not a choice for first-time internship sites, for this exact reason.) So there I was, knowing for certain where I wanted to end up, but knowing that I had far more to learn before I was able to get there. It was then that my professor asked, "What about teens?"

A lightbulb went off in my dimly-lit, dusty brain. DUH. Why hadn't I thought of that? It was when she explained that the alternative high school that I could possibly intern at was located a mere 10 minutes away from my beloved undergraduate university that I was sold. Of course the universe works like that. I was about to enter the "other" world that I had blatantly ignored for the 4 most intensely fun, carefree and fantastic years of my life.

I began my internship working with the kids in January. Everyday has been fun, rewarding and difficult. The challenges I face day to day are personal ones- nothing compared to what my kids face when they leave the safety of the school. These kids push me in every way possible, and it's been intense to say the least. I won't lie, I was frightened to begin. I was certain that they could smell my anxiety and fear and I was right, they definitely could. But I've learned more about myself in the last 4 months than I could have ever hoped to from reading a book, or listening to a lecture.

I've learned that I lack boundaries with other people (I'm working on it). I struggle with wanting people to like me (not everyone, especially not every teenager, I meet is going to be receptive to a weird woman asking them personal questions about their artwork). I struggle with loud and chaotic environments (I need to get over this one, asap). I struggle with things that are unexplainable and unfair (like when one of my kids was absent and his friend told me he was stabbed in his lower back in his front yard because someone didn't like what he had said to them). I struggle with gang violence and murder (Obviously. But when a close friend of many of my students was killed over the weekend by a rival gang member, and I walked in Monday morning completely unaware, I finally had to take off my rose-colored glasses and see straight up what my students live with everyday.)

Have I had bad days so far? Yes. Have some of these bad days caused me to weep messily and loudly and openly while driving on I95 on the way home? Yes. Have I left my internship insulted, disillusioned, and battered? Yes. Have I lost hope for these kids? No fucking way. They have been the coolest teachers I've ever had, teaching me more about myself than I ever thought possible.

Although the bad days suck, there have been many glittering moments of beauty and passion sprinkled throughout my experience so far, and I've been lucky to recognize them while they are happening. I've learned many new slang terms that give me a lot more street-cred (or so I've been told); I've learned that when I don't do my hair in the mornings, people notice (I've been told); I've learned to think before I speak, and not to ask silly, ignorant questions (I've been told); I've learned not to make judgments about groups of people before I get the amazing opportunity to meet them (this one's all mine).

Whether it's been watching with my own eyes the entire student body beat boxing on command for a dance battle with an abstinence dance troupe from D.C. (I will never forget this as long as I live) to listening to a 15 year old girl's parenting advice to me: "Wait to have kids until you have a job, and if youcan wait 'til you have a husband, even better!", they've helped make me a better, stronger, more compassionate person.

Come June, it will be time for me to move on. School is not in session during the summer, and in September I will be beginning my internship at the Connecticut Hospice. I'm not surprised that I've had such an amazing experience working with my kids. In fact, nothing surprises me anymore. I should have known that when I began questioning things about the world, the universe would come through once again, and put me in the eye of the storm. For better, or for worse. But, mostly for the better.