Having a hard time at clinical practicum
I started my final placement before I graduate in August, but it's unfortunately clinically focused and all the other interns and I at this place are therapists. I already hated doing the mock sessions in class with the classmates I was paired with, so I already know that I do not want to be a therapist post-grad.
I have 8 clients and I already did my first sessions with 3 of them. Two of them went so bad, there were lots of periods of silence and I felt like I was going in circles repeating the same validations but phrased differently and "the here and now" at the end. I felt like the ishowspeed and talking ben/talking tom clip.
I'm expected to have a biopsychosocial and treatment plan completed by session 3 (which honestly I believe that that social worker who took on the client's referral during intake should've conducted the biopsychosocial, however they just only get info on their situation). My supervisor hasn't honestly been the best, they didn't even know my name until I sat down for supervision. They just asked me to go over a client's problem that got them referred them to the agency, and what went on during our first session. My supervisor has access to my progress notes, and I genuinely would've preferred for them to have read my progress note and given me feedback. It was a very unproductive supervision - granted, it's my first time ever sitting down for a formal supervision. At my first practicum (generalist) I never once had supervision and my supervisor pretty much stopped caring about me and left me to figure out everything by myself, which was stressful, but I learned from the other social workers and asking them if I could shadow them. At the end, it made me want to pursue social work in the legal setting.
After reading the session's summary to my supervisor, I brought up how I felt like I was going in circles with the client and couldn't get them to open up as much (again understandable). They suggested if I wanted to sit down and shadow a real therapist. Mind you, earlier this week they were shit talking to the intake-social worker lead about another MSW intern who had requested to shadow a therapist😭
Getting this degree has been the hardest thing ever, and it's not even the courseload that's bad, it's these unpaid practicums and my field liaison who has NEVER been useful.
Pros of this clinical site is that the training (paperwork, administrative stuff, legal stuff) was elite, but now I'm here doing therapy and I'm so lost. My generalist never had training and I was left to figure it out on my own, so I'm kind of thankful for this.