As a charity, we recognise that emotional support is what underpins any practical support that we can offer to any of our clients. Without it, they would not be able to make the changes they need to make which would enable them to make the transition from being a rough sleeper to living a more emotionally stable life. One of our support workers wrote this piece about her understanding of what it means to both give, and be able to receive, emotional support.
‘Simon on the Streets offers many forms of support to those people who have nowhere else to turn, but with a more focused emphasis on the giving of emotional support. However, emotional support can be tricky to define and can come in many different forms. For some, emotional support is all about the provision of care and empathy while for others it might mean simply listening to someone, helping them reflect, and giving encouragement. For others it may be a matter of being there, the familiar face, the friendly hello or the welcoming handshake. Either way emotional support is a vital and necessary means of human communication which forms the basis of all our positive relationships. Emotional support is essential for someone to be able to deal with their problems, fears and concerns and increase their ability to care for themselves.
Successfully providing emotional support requires a significant level of skill, commitment, perseverance and ingenuity from support workers if they are to find the most productive way of engaging with the individuals they encounter on the streets. The aim is to deliver a tailored response to individual circumstances and needs. However, the giving and receiving of emotional support are two entirely different things, neither of which is easy or straight-forward to do.
Some people living on the streets are emotionally numb and out of touch with their feelings. Often as a result of childhood trauma they can find it difficult to connect with others emotionally and can develop a profound sense of detachment. Consequently they find it difficult to ask for emotional support or even to recognise that they need it. Instead they will actively avoid emotional connections in order to prevent overwhelming anxiety and the situations that can trigger other distressing symptoms. They can even feel ashamed about their feelings and see themselves as burdens and not worthy of attention. Many of course resort to self medicating either through drugs or alcohol as a means of keeping a lid on their deeply painful emotions.
Others can become emotionally dependent on their support workers. For some the difficulty of dealing with their emotions becomes overwhelming. They can end up with no sense of personal ownership of their lives and subsequently they come to regard the support worker as being responsible for their well being. In extremis people can lose the will to act independently. This can often lead to anger, resentment and frustration from the individual when the support worker is perceived as failing to provide the care and support that they think they need.
On the other hand support workers, faced with the demands of being emotionally available to others are also at risk of losing perspective and blurring emotional boundaries. Workers are exposed day in and day out to stories of hardship and heartbreak which can take its personal toll. When this happens, the support on offer can become ineffective, counter- productive and at worse even detrimental by inadvertently exacerbating an already difficult and challenging situation.
In order to minimise such risks and to provide the emotional support we ourselves need as workers, we regularly take part in team meetings where we can discuss best practice and any particular issues or concerns we may have. We need to remind ourselves that although emotional support is frequently taken for granted, can often be intangible and overlooked, we need to regard it as a priority for all our sakes, for without it we are lost.’
#Simon