Skip to main content

The Gray Part of Therapy

Some people see the world as black and white. You either do option A or option B. How boring would life be if there were only two options for everything?! Our lives could be somewhat unique, but there would always be someone who was the same.
As in life, there are shades of gray in therapy. These gray areas can be the way the therapists adapts the session specifically to the client or it could be a grey area because there is not much research on the topic. Before I got into OT school, I was observing in an out patient that specialized in the treatment of children with Autism. This clinic offers OT, PT, speech, and food therapy. I was observing a session with a therapist and she warned me that the next kid was a bit stubborn and would probably fight with us about some issue. We do the session and there were no issues. I thought the kid was having a great day. The therapist asks the kid to put on his shoes, cue the meltdown. The child started to stomp and scream that he was NOT going to put his shoes on and there was nothing we could do about it. The therapist asks nicely, a couple more times, for the kid to put his shoes on, but he continued to protest. The therapist then tries to do hand over hand to put the kids shoes on and the wrestling match ensues. I am standing back in disbelief that the therapist is having a wrestle mania session with the kid over putting on his shoes. Wouldn't it be easier to just let the kid "win" this battle and let him go on his way? The therapist then says "Ella! Either help me or go get someone who will!" So I join in on the wrestle mania session. Long story short, it took 4 adults to get the kid to put his shoes on. Later that day, I asked the therapist why she was so insistent on having the kid wear his shoes. She said "My mind set is if I ask a kid to do something that I know they can do,  I expect them to do it. This kid has an issue of defiance and if I let him get away with something once, he continually tries to get away with the same thing over and over. His Mom also has a disability and has extreme difficulty getting his shoes on. So me asking him to put on his shoes is something he is able to do and it helps his Mom. So that is why we wrestled."
At the time I thought it was easier to let the kid just leave the session without his shoes, but the therapist knew he needed to leave with his shoes on. This is an example of a gray area in therapy. Depending on your position, you might let the kid leave without his shoes or you could see the importance of the kid wearing his shoes. At the time, I thought the therapist was pushing the kid a bit too hard by asking him to put on his shoes, but once I got the background information on the situation I understood.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

What is the OTPF?

The OTPF stands for Occupational Therapy Practice Framework. It is composed of ideas, concepts, and philosophies that guide OT. It addresses domain of OT, the OT process, occupations, and client factors. The domain of OT is the areas in which OT's have a great wealth of knowledge and expertise.  This is what defines the focus of OT. Client factors, performance skills, performance patterns, context, environment, and activity demand are all under the domain of OT practice. Each part of the domain brings a different part of occupational therapy to the table.  The OT process is the actions that a practitioner takes when providing services that are client-centered and focused on engagement in occupation. This is what defines the delivery of OT. Throughout the process, occupation remains central. There is also collaboration with the client throughout the process.  Occupations are ordinary, part of daily living, and are often taken for granted. They can be special when the...

Foundations Project

Post Interview Review

How do you feel the interview went overall?  Overall I feel like the interview went pretty well. Of course there are questions that I wished I had answered differently, but overall I feel like it went well.  How did you prepare for the interview? I did a variety of things to prep for this interview. I read the articles that were provided by my professor prior to the interview. Most of them were really helpful and posed questions I had not thought about. Another thing I did to prepare was I thought back to the interview questions I had been asked during my interview for OT school and rehearsed my responses. I also researched cost of living in Memphis and CEU courses.  What went differently than you expected? The only thing that went differently than I expected was the types of questions I was asked. I feel like the questions I was asked were fairly basic and there were no questions that surprised me. I kinda wish I had been asked an off the wall question just to...