Significant Life Events Essay

2.3 The suitability of external sources of support to people affected by significant life events

Danielle Maestas June 16, 2015 CCU Application Essay Helping others has always been a core value in my life. I knew, at a very young age, that someday my role in life would be to help others on a daily basis. Over the years, I sought after employment in positions that would satisfy my passion for servanthood. As I got older, I felt like there was more I was capable of doing. My Grandparents have had a remarkable impact on my life. They raised my brother and I for a majority of our lives. In 2009, my Grandfather was diagnosed with prostate cancer, which was rapidly spreading throughout his body. During the last months of his life I took on the role as his caregiver. At the time I did not have any prior medical training. The ability to care

A support system is important to the healing process in that it surrounds you with caring people who are there for you when you need

carers system, procedures expanding information and mindfulness, suicide anticipation techniques, job opportunities, organizational working financial wellbeing, consideration destruction stigma, social attachment.

Social support was taken as the perception and actuality that one is cared for, has assistance available from other people (spouse, relatives and friends) and that one is part of a supportive social network (Odongo et al, 2015). To demonstrate, my grandmother was able to have a lot of support from the family in which this allowed her to detect the cancer earlier due to the awareness of breast cancer in our family history. Breast cancer runs in my family, in every generation, and the remission of my grandmother’s cancer has led everyone to help out and understand the toll that the cancer was taking on her body. This allowed the family to learn more and support her in what decision she has made in taking the steps of recovery. Several studies have also described how the patient’s concealment of symptoms may influence, delay of medical help-seeking, while discussing them with friends and family can facilitate the decision to seek medical advice (Odongo et al, 2015).

Mr. and Mrs. Thomas have a reluctance to ask for support from friends and coworkers. An intermediate stepping stone may be setting up a social network site in which to give updates and allow friends and coworkers to offer support and services. This can also be accomplished through churches or other groups the Thomas’s were previously or actively involved with. Psychologically, it allows the Thomas’s to maintain their sense of self-reliance by providing information about their situation without expectations of support. This allows people to be supportive in a variety of capacities and at various levels.

Client Sanchez has a very close bond with her family, and uses them as her support system. She will be going through the assessment process and interventions with the assistance of her daughter. This client has come into the office seeking help, empowerment and interventions in order to get control over her situation. This case study will go through her assessment,

“A crisis occurs when a stressful life event overwhelms an individual’s ability to cope effectively in the face of a perceived challenge or threat” (Arnold & Boggs, 2011, pg. 415). When people are in a crisis situation they tend to forget their normal coping measures. When people train on crisis situations, they tend to perform better during a crisis event. “A favorable outcome depends on the person’s interpretation of the crisis, perception of coping ability, resources, and level of social support” (Arnold & Boggs, 2011, pg. 416).

In the study of Greene, Paranjothy, & Palmer (2010), social support influences health and psychological contact among the participants who experience flood in England. It provides meaningful contacts and increases the sense of connections among residents that in turn

has a large support system of family and friends and Grey, Knafl and McCorkle (2006), state, “better family functioning has been related to social support, adequacy of resources, hardiness, the ability to find positive meaning in the experience, and fewer stressor (pp. 282).” R.C. has maintained close contact with family and friends and those reciprocal relationships have helped support her as her body has started to decline.

If an individual have a good social support system in their lives, it will cause for them to have a positive physical and psychological health. But, if there are a poor social support, mental illness have been known to affect a person health. Also, it have been known that people with a poor social support are more vulnerable to morbidity and mortality that comes from different medical illnesses. Perceived social support was negatively related to stress and predictive of health and well-being (Glozah & Pevalin, 2014). Individuals who have a

“Social support is exceptionally important for maintaining good physical and mental health. Overall, it appears that positive social support of high quality can enhance resilience to stress, help protect against developing trauma-related psychopathology, decrease the functional consequences of trauma-induced disorders…” (Social Support and Resilience to Stress) Throughout Departure and Return social affiliation was extremely important, Charlotte kept an optimistic outlook while experiencing horrific things. Charlotte was lucky enough to have been on this journey with her very close friends, they had already established a sense of trust and comfortability with one another and the fact that she wasn't facing this journey alone I believe gave her strength.

People we don’t know, or may never know, can have a tremendous positive effect on our lives. Sometimes, we discount the emotional support family and friends provide. The effects of a single moment in time could lead to a lifelong physical ailment, if not for the help of family and strangers. Having a strong bond with family and our community can make the difference needed to make it through a tumultuous time. Having to face a life-altering accident on our own can be scary, but, can be turned around in some of the most unexpected ways. Sometimes, from people we never expected help to come from.

When intervening with this population, the clinician is working collectively with the client and their environment to provide a multidimensional intervention to enhance their quality of life, mobilize strengths, establish relationships, and encouragement them to engage. The clinician may adopt a variety of roles throughout the process, depending on the diverse needs of the late adults. For example, if the client is old-old cohort, their families may need assistance navigating through the medical system, information about end of life decisions, palliative care, advanced directives, living wills, durable power of attorney, pain management. The individual

Even the authors recommend, “Your support team should be anchored by at least one person with whom you can be completely vulnerable and open, to whom you can expose all your flaws and still be accepted unconditionally” (George, McLean & Craig, 2008, p. 98). This was sound, spot-on advice from the experts. On the other hand, I was now analyzing commonalities in past and current people I’ve chosen for my support groups, the ones I’ve trusted with openness and vulnerability, but abused these imperative relationships. In thinking upon these specific people, unfortunately I recalled the abuse coming from professional mentors and close friends I used for personal support.