This is not a typical blog post for me. I’ve been debating lately if I should post
this here, and I’m really nervous about it, but I figured I’d finally take a
leap of faith and see what happens. If
you haven’t been following what I’ve been up to in some way, I have recently
started practicing family therapy as an intern to complete my Master’s degree
in Marriage and Family Therapy. I was
lucky to get placed at an agency where I could work with the population I
requested – children. I didn’t have any
experience working with kids as an adult and basically figured it was now or
never, and I could either sink or swim with the opportunity. Thankfully I did swim, and I am loving it. Obviously I’m still working on my therapy
techniques and learning tons of new stuff every day, but I feel absolutely
blessed to get to be a positive influence in these kids lives every day I go to
work.
One of the best things is that a HUGE part of my work is
based in play. If you have kids or are
involved with them, you’ll know they communicate best through play and it makes
something like therapy much easier to get through. Ironically, although I work at a family
agency, we really have a limited supply of toys, books, colors, rewards, etc.,
and what we do have must be shared and ends up in less-than-perfect
condition. In class we keep being told
to start stocking up on our own personal “bag-of-tricks” so to speak, and I
would love nothing more than to start building my own collection that I can
bring to the agency and then take with me after I graduate and find a full-time
therapy job.
The tricky part is that I really don’t have any extra money
to spend on these things at this moment in time. I took a lower stress job this year to offset
the new stresses of school and the internship, but it’s also a lower paying
job. I only have nine more months before
my program ends and I can take a full time job, and until then it’s pretty
tight financially around here.
So to finally get to the point, I have made an Amazon Wish List of some things I would love to have in my bag of tricks. I’m posting the link here NOT as an
obligation, but as an option. If you
have enjoyed Psychosocial Disney Culture in the past, consider contributing to
this tiny little cause of mine. Nothing
on my list is expensive and just the addition of any of these items would totally make
my day.
I want to reiterate that I do feel hesitant posting this and
purposefully don’t add advertisements or donate buttons to this site to avoid
any kind of obligatory feeling. This was
just an idea of mine to give my awesome readers the opportunity to have a hand
in helping these kiddos out. You all
mean very much to me and I thank you for your support over the past few years!
~C.
