What a week!

Well, what a week I had!  This week has been challenging in a way I never expected.  This week I had the privilege of attending and participating in a 3 day cultural awareness training on the historical trauma that was intended for Humboldt County social workers, supervisors, and management.  When attending the training I was expecting to be an observer, but I ended up being a full blown participator, and what a blessing that turned out to be.  When the training began, it started off with the boarding school experience and the effects of historical trauma, but the special thing about this training was we got the down and dirty version of it.  Statistic like 94% of native children that were forced into boarding school were sexually abused.  Video of survivors of boarding schools.  We also had local elders come in and give their stories about boarding schools and historical trauma.  Every day that I went home, I was sick to my stomach and my emotions were raw, but I have never had the privilege of having an opportunity as rich and powerful as this.
On the second day we had a panel of guest speakers come in to share their stories.  One of the panelist happened to be one of my clients who had successfully reunified with her children after having them removed by the Child Welfare System.  She was asked to share some of her experience of being in the CWS system and what supports helped her through and be successful.  She went into her story and told us that after her children were removed and placed into foster care her son was molested while in care.  The county refused to place her children with a family member and didn't tell her what had happened to her son for quite a while.  She told the story of how things started changing for her when her ICWA social worker from her Tribe got involved, and all of a sudden her eyes locked on me.  I realized that I was her ICWA social worker.  She talked about how me just being a friend to her and treating her like a real person was what made a difference for her.  She told the story of how finally after ICWA had gotten involved, her children were finally placed with her family, and it wasn't till then, knowing her children were safe with family, that she was able to get the help she needed to be able to reunify with her children.  She is now going back to school in hopes to be a ICWA worker one day.
This  story was so powerful to me because not only did I have no idea she felt this way, but for years I have carried around guilt that I had not done enough for this young mother.  At the time this case was going on I was the only social worker at the Yurok Tribe.  This meant that I was actively covering two counties, dealing with out of county cases, as well as participating in out of state cases.  At the time I had approximately 150 kids on my case load.  I was so overwhelmed and in a constant state of crisis mode that I gave the bare minimum to the cases that I had.  Looking back, I have no idea how I accomplished anything at all.  I guess it go to show that treating someone how you would want to be treated goes a long way.  Treating people with respect and listening to their stories is sometime all they need to feel supported and encouraged enough to make changes in their life.  I can't wait till this mom become an advocate for her people, I many ways she has already become one.  I am so proud of her.