Bhs320 Gcu the Person and Paraprofressional Essay

The Person and Paraprofessional Essay

Taylor Higgins

Grand Canyon University: BHS-320

5/19/2019

The Person and Paraprofessional Essay

There are a lot of different stories I heard about people entering the behavioral health field as a profession because they have personal experiences regarding that area. Personally, I don’t think personal experiences are necessarily important. However, personal experiences when shared appropriately can beneficial in supporting clients but it’s not a requirement by any means. In this essay I will be discussing my personal reasons for entering the behavioral health field and how it can benefit or detriment to my future clientele.

I’ve had my own involvement as a teenager after losing my grandmother, and again much later in life. Although my own experiences had a role in my interest to study in the field of behavioral health, it wasn’t the main reason for my decision. The basis of my decision came from a sincere interest in cognitive processing and how trauma and disease of the brain alters mental and behavioral functioning in adolescents. I lost the lady who raised me, my grandmother when I was only ten years old. At the time of my grieving, I was lucky to have a huge support in family, friends, and different programs. If I needed to talk or just to have nice company around there was people in every direction that would’ve been happy to help. However, having a large support system doesn’t mean a lot to a kid if they aren’t comfortable enough to go to any of them with their thoughts and feelings. There was one person though. She listened, talked, called, came to my house, and genuinely cared. If I didn’t want to talk about my grandmother that was ok, if I did that was ok. That’s what I needed. Someone who wasn’t walking on egg shells waiting for me to break, but if I did she was ready. I want to be that one person to another person who experienced trauma in their life. I want to be the person I needed when I was younger.

My reasons for entering the behavioral health field will be a benefit to my future clientele because I can relate to what a lot of them went through or still going through which will form therapeutic bonds. A good therapist has a deep interest in their client as an individual and will see and relate to them in ways that are sensitively tailored to the person’s specific needs. When clinicians develop strong therapeutic bonds with their clients, they are more likely to have sufficient influence to accurately assess the risk, diffuse violent impulses, and reduce the risk of acting out (Welfel 2016). Therapeutic relationship itself is essential to the success a patient experience. Some studies have even called it the most important common factor to successful outcomes. (Firestone 2016)

I believe a lot of children I work with will remind me of myself when I was their age going through my own traumatic experience. Without knowing it, I may treat that person kindly, and even engage in more in-depth conversation than I would with an older client because I am projecting my feelings of me as a child onto this person. In a counseling relationship, transference gives the counselor an insight into how a client might interact with someone in public. However, once I am a skilled paraprofessional in my field I will be able to both recognize when transference is occurring and use that transference to guide a therapy session, allowing the client to work through emotions with the me that they may not be comfortable discussing with other people.