P Is For Patience

If I had to isolate one virtue that has been strengthened since the beginning of my summer patience would be it. Patience is always something that I struggled with growing up. Not being unnecessarily impatient over little things such as my water taking too long to boil, but mostly within myself, and goals that I set for myself not being achieved fast enough. In the case of my role as a one-on-one support worker this summer my patience has been pushed, pulled and tried in many different instances of which has strengthened it overall. Having to be patient with my student, remembering that he is not a stagnant object, but a growing human being. I must be patient with him in his times of trials and even in his rejoicing. When he is being overly difficult, not listening, and more emotional than normal, rather than getting upset with him for not doing what I am requesting of him, and being frustrated with myself for not getting through to him the way I hope to be, I must remember that due to his diagnosis, and the nature of man-kind that, we are always evolving, working through things, and do not remain in one immobilized state. He may listen and behave very well one day, but not the next and that is ok. Each day is a new challenge to be worked through. I really had to learn this lesson this past week. I ended up feeling quite sick, causing me to leave my student without a support worker for three days. This was very difficult for him to adjust to causing my return to be a very rocky experience. When I returned rather than being greeted with a big smile and a hug I was not acknowledged, this set the tone for the rest of the day. Everything after that felt like war had broken out and I was right in the middle of it. The violence, choice of language, responses, and actions were all much worse than normal, causing me to feel quite defeated as it was shown to me that we were back to square one with building our relationship, and with the progress we had made. I quickly learnt that this boy has had teachers consistently come in and leave quite quickly as he is a handful. This pattern of no one sticking with him for a long period of time keeps him on edge, and when I left for three whole days he must have figured that I too had given up on him. Therefore when I returned he was shocked, and realized that he had to be accountable to someone once again. His actions reflected this disapproval, but also I think reflected his expression of feeling neglected (i.e. assuming that I had left him). I have been processing all this, feeling let down with myself as I was not as far along with him as I thought that I was. My being away for three days was an indicator that with support, he does great, and without support he struggles—which was exactly where he was before I got there, which makes me feel like I have not changed anything. It has also shed a light on the priority that I now have of implementing all these lessons, skills and expectations that I am working through with him and how they need to be taught in a way that he will carry on when I am finished with him, and no longer working here. I am unsure of how I will do this, but I feel that I have not done my job adequately if he is continually unable to act appropriately without me, or any support worker present. Moving forward I will begin by researching and finding creative ideas to implement more independence for him—an exciting challenge.