Mental health workers need understanding, too

I am writing to give the public something to think about. I was talking to a friend the other day, and he was telling me about some problems he was dealing with. I started thinking: He works in the mental health field, so he should know how to deal with his problems. Then it hit me: Just because some people work in the mental health field (social workers, therapists and psychiatrists) they are just as human as you and I. Yet we take it for granted that, because of the type of job they have, they don’t have hard and trying lives themselves. We don’t realize that they, too, laugh and cry, get angry and frustrated and get tired. Yet they keep it together so they can be there for us. We don’t think of these things. All we think about is how they can get us through our tough times.

So I think the next time we come in contact with someone who works in the mental health field, we should take a minute and think not of what they can do for us, but realize that they are people, too. And, yes, they have feelings.

Marlena Boudreau Kelly
Jamaica Plain

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