Photo Courtesy: Army Medicine
Social work isn’t an easy field to work in. You’ll need an unending reservoir of compassion and patience to be successful and make a career in this field. You definitely need to have a thick skin also, but the impact you can have on people’s lives is incomparable.
As a social worker, you can choose to venture off into a number of more specific arenas where there are people in need.
Here are just three of those.
1. Helping People with Substance Abuse Problems
No matter what environment you decide to work in, as a social worker, you will help people with addictions in getting their whole lives back together—from improving themselves to improving their relationship with their family to getting their job and living situation straightened out. Clearly, a social worker isn’t just a counselor. Social workers are also often brought into an addict’s life as part of team. Don’t be surprised to find yourself communicating with the patient’s doctors, therapist, etc.
The satisfaction you get out of working with a person with substance abuse problems never ends. You not only aid in ridding them of their addictions, but you help them get back on their feet and turn their life around. It’s about the bigger picture here.
2. Helping Children
Nothing is more heartbreaking than a child without a voice who’s being abused in one way or another. When a social worker receives notification that a child is being hurt or neglected in their home, they will visit the family to figure out whether or not it’s safe for the child to remain there. If the child does have a situation, then the social worker can continue to offer guidance and resources to strengthen the family and improve their lives—whether that means helping with finances, jobs, health, or the home.
Sometimes, however, the child ends up having to be removed from the home. In this case, the social worker finds a temporary home for them until a more permanent decision is made.
For obvious reasons, this is a very delicate situation. A social worker can largely shape the future for a child in this position, so it takes a special person to step into this role—one with compassion, patience, and strength.
3. Hospitals and Other Health Care Facilities
As was the case with social workers helping addicts, this type of care is very “well-rounded.” Social workers help in hospitals aid in numerous aspects of a patient’s life—such as recovery, post-hospitalization care and supervision, and helping families cope with their loved one’s disease, injury, or illness. Also in this team of specialists are the patient’s doctors, nurses, etc.; so be prepared to be communicating with and working as a team!
If you’re strong-willed and don’t mind multi-tasking (to say the least), you’re going to make a great social worker. In this position, you can change lives for the better and oftentimes, save people from destruction. No one gets to do what social workers do!
Angela George writes for higher education sites. Learn more about social work at BestSocialWorkPrograms.com.
