In this Discussion, you work to seek meaning from the trauma your clients experience and the subsequent healing you help your clients achieve in your social work practice.
To prepare:
- Read about trauma-informed social work, and read this article listed in the Learning Resources: Vis, J.-A., & Boynton, H. M. (2008). Spirituality and transcendent meaning making: possibilities for enhancing posttraumatic growth. Journal of Religion & Spirituality in Social Work, 27(1/2): 69–86. http://dx.doi.org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.1080/15426430802113814
Post:
- In 1 sentence, identify an existential question with which you have grappled in relation to a client who has been traumatized.
- Reflect on your fieldwork, or perhaps identify an existential question that might arise in working with the client in the case study you have selected throughout the course.
- In 3 to 4 brief sentences, describe where there is potential for growth for the client as a result of the trauma.
- In 3 to 4 brief sentences, explain where there is potential for growth for you, the social worker, as a result of listening to the client’s stories and bearing witness to their trauma.
- Describe any challenges you may experience between the meaning you hold based on your personal beliefs and working within the client’s potentially different belief framework.
- Provide a suggestion for how a social worker could help clients to understand and make meaning of the trauma within the client’s values and belief framework.
Turner, F. J. (Ed.). (2017). Social work treatment: Interlocking theoretical approaches (6th ed.). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Chapter 20: Mindfulness and Social Work (pp. 325–337)
Chapter 37: Trauma-Informed Social Work Treatment and Complex Trauma (pp. 553–573)
Garland, E. L. (2013). Mindfulness research in social work: Conceptual and methodological recommendations. Social Work Research, 37(4), 439–448. https://doi.org/10.1093/swr/svt038
Vis, J.-A. & Boynton, H. M. (2008). Spirituality and transcendent meaning making: Possibilities for enhancing posttraumatic growth. Journal of Religion & Spirituality in Social Work, 27(1/2): 69–86. http://dx.doi.org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.1080/15426430802113814
UCLA Health. (n.d.). Free guided meditations. Retrieved December 8, 2017, from http://marc.ucla.edu/mindful-meditations