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not specifically about intimate partner violence but i was talking to a friend this week who is going through a breakup. she said she liked the idea of polyamory and i curiously asked why. her reasoning was because she liked the idea of being able to have male friends, to talk and hang out with people, and not be questioned about this by a partner. there is just loosr rules, she said. at the same time, she said she could not see herself with more than one romantic partner. i told her it sounds like she wants a monogamous relationship with a person who simply is not controlling or jealous to an unhealthy extreme. she shared how she feels many people in monogamous identities tend to place controlling boundaries on their partners. i tend to agree. i think it is interesting the control has become so embedded in our realities of what is normal and i think this relates both to how people end up in relationships where coercive control happens ans why it is not taken seriously by enforcement

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we had two guest speakers talk about grief during this class. this class made me challenge my thoughts and beliefs surrounding hierarchy of grief. I belived that losing one thing/person over another can be "more" or "worse". Last night, I attended Laurentian's cancer relay event where during the illuminary, some walked composed, some walked while crying, and some chose to sit in front of the tealight that represented their loved one. Everyone chose to mourn their loved ones in a different way. in the same fashion, people will grieve a pet and a mother in different ways, but neither is worse or more worthy of grief than the other.

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An interesting concept I have been thinking about from this week's class is how Milli discussed in her reading facilitation how white men with mental illnesses are portrayed in hollywood as brilliant, but black people with mental illnesses are portrayed as weak and/or crazy. I believe that media and the things we consume in our daily lives both is a reflection of how we view things as a society and also shapes how we view things as a society. This is kinda a what came first, the chicken or the egg dilemma. I am not sure what the answer is, but I think of the majority of people who control what is made in hollywood, and it is primarily white people. This also highlights the importance of better representation for minority groups in all spaces, including media and hollywood

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I think fatness/weight is not a social justice issue that is often considered. In fact, I have had to complete more than one activity in the BSW program related to the wheel of privilege, and none of the handout wheels of privilege I have ever been given has included weight as a factor of privilege/oppression. This subject makes me think about a lot of things. Like how my life and how I am perceived have been different than my fat friends, how I perceive myself based on my weight and how this differs within my fat friends. I also think about how weight is connected to privilege in that access to gym memberships, physical healthcare, mental health care, healthy food options, etc, are all tied to socioeconomic and other areas of privilege/oppression. I also think about this line that has stuck with me from Rachel Wiley's opening line in her poem that goes, "I say I am fat, he says 'no, you are beautiful.' I wonder why I cannot be both."

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Rachel Wiley - 10 Honest Thoughts on Being Loved by a Skinny Boy

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I saw this TikTok and it reminded me of what we spoke about in class. Lives are shaped by the choices we make as well as the things we experience from a structural perspective. Older adults often work in precarious work, which is even more so for racialized and other minority older adults like I discussed in my facilitation.

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318.7K likes, 4882 comments. “82yr old Butch still putting in work. Has anybody seen the videos where a guy raised 180g’s to help an 82 yr old walmart employee retire. We ought to do that for Butch. Who would donate?”

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On Monday there was a campus-wide shelter-in-place order. This experience was both scary but also revealing of my own biases and lived experiences. I grew up in a very safe neighbourhood as a child, holding a lot of privilege in the world. I did not experience scary things. Cops were not scary or bad; they were there to protect me. The experience in the class, and more importantly, the experiences of others in the class and how the shelter-in-place brought back negative feelings and feelings of strong fear, made me realize that my tendency to be reckless, careless, and to have no sense of danger in the world is not a universal one, and it will not be a universal one for many of the people I will work with as a social worker. We all have seen different things and will cope and react to life according to those things and how they affected us. This class was a good reminder to broaden my lens and to think about why and how a situation like Monday will bring up very different thoughts and feelings for people that I might not even be able to fathom, but I must try to understand them. I have lots of learning to do still.

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Wade was discussing the precarious work and exploitative working conditions of Jamaican and other migrant workers. Migrant workers are only considered Canadian when it benefits Canadians; otherwise, they are cast aside and sent back to their home country. I thought of this today when I overheard one of my coworkers talk about how Canada has let in too many immigrants when it does not even take care of "its own people." I relate his to what I have learned in this course as well as what i have heard from international students. I think most Canadians are as Sakomoto says both subtely inclusive and more often, outwardly exclusive even if they do not admit it. Immigrants do not have it easy and Canada absolutely does not priorotize non-citizens.

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From the reading, I agree that being able to offer French as a language when providing a service to individuals is important. This is something I reflect on often since, though I went to French school up to high school, I can no longer speak French fluently. I was always told that being able to speak French was important, but it is only something I realize as an adult and especially as someone in social work. As well, in class we watched some examples of digital stories. It made me less nervous about completing the assignment. More, it also made me excited to have the opportunity to be creative again. When I was younger, I used to love writing poetry and photography, and I think this assignment will be rejuvenating for me.

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First class back after winter break. We went through expectations for the class, assignments, and check-ins of the group. I dont have any reflections from this class to relate to my personal/proffessional life other than reflecting on my thoughts and feelings pertaining to this being my first class back from break. I am excited for the semester and for what it means: getting closer to graduating. However, I also feel overwhelmed and stressed out in getting back into a school routine.

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Today in class I presented my first faciliation (re: professional regulation of MH in social work and nursing / madness studies). I was thinking about how wild it is to me that social workers of all people are complicit in fear mongering and oppression toward people experiencing mental health issues. I wonder how social workers challenge their own biases and assumptions about mental health and resist the norms that have been in the field since forever. I was talking to my placement supervisor who told me that theory is great for students and new social workers but not so much for people who have been in the field their entire lives. And I just wonder how social work will ever be able to resist oppression when there is an acceptability in stopping learning about waus that harm is caused + strategies

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We talked about asessments and how they always involve exploring a problem or issue. While this is important, it is also crucial to not steer towards a deficit-based approach. Part of my learning goals for my placement is to make a short case study paragraph of an example of a time during my placement where I used a strengths-based approach. I have been procrastinating this task. For some reason, I just can't think of an example. I have been thinking a lot about this. Today I was reading the chart of a woman who is admitted for a fall. She experiences substance abuse issues. (for some context). At first, I was focusing on the negatives of her situation: her mobility is declining, and her substance abuse issues are a problem both in the hospital and at home, affecting her care and how she manages. But then I thought about the flipside of it: she 1. voluntarily accepted that she needed help and called for an ambulance 2. she lives alone and has clearly been able to manage so far 3. she admits her substance use issues and has even asked staff to hide her phone from her because she realizes that she tends to gamble money on her phone when under the influence 4. it was a fall that she will recover from, she is still young. in this instance, both the class + my learning goal prompted me to change my approach and how I view/work with people

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What does someone who uses drugs look like? when asked this question,people often think of people who might be experiencing homelessness. I think at a certain point I might also have thought about the women at the selter I work at. but why is it considered so problematic for them to engage in substance use, while I can go home after a shift and do the same without facing negative stigma, police, or violence? I think this reveals just how skewed our image of a "substance user" has become.. People are addicted to their phones and to sugar, to the point of it negatively impacts their lives. or even acceptable drugs such as marijuana. Yet the answer to these behaviours is not abstinence or alienation from society—it's healthy management and support. stigmatizations of certain addictions vs others serves an oppressive purpose and is in no way coincidental or accidental

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I was thinking about how we were talking about deficit-based vs desire-based practice. Approaching my practice from a strengths-based perspective is a learning goal on my field placement learning contract. Thus, I was reflecting on how even though I aim to work from a strengths-based lens, I don't actually know if this is possible. In the hospital setting, the social work role revolves around doing assessments and then implementing interventions. How can this be strengths-based when we are still focused on problems in individuals? It is times like this where I wonder if I could work in a hospital setting.

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On the idea of the Western expectation for self-regulation vs co-regulation...At placement (HSN), I see many family members throughout the day. What I find particularly interesting (and upsetting) is that many of them go years caring for their loved one, being stressed and eventually becoming beyond burnt out. And throughout this time, they never once ask for help, even though Ontario Health at Home can organize PSW's, OT's, PT, equipment, and respite which would alleviate their burden of caring immensely and at no cost. And yet, people risk their own health (I am referring to the fact that increased/prolonged stress and lifting to transfer people can cause health issues here) without recognizing that it is okay, and even good, to ask for help. What a world we live in.

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I've been thinking a lot this week about our conversation in class about how it is all interconnected. How people who face oppressions in one system are probably facing the same oppressions when they navigate other systems… people do not exist in vacuums and intersectionality is always relevant. It seems so simple and obvious but it not something I had really deeply considered. I did my first placement at The Elizabeth Fry Society of Sudbury and honestly, starting my placement at the hospital, I did not think I would have to do any housing or ODSP applications. In fact, people who experience homelessness and low socioeconomic status, do in fact get sick and need the hospital (sarcasm) …. At Efry, they faced oppression in the way that their housing/income status caused them to be targeted and affected by the criminal justice system, and at the hospital, their oppression is visible in how they have to place to be discharged to (which is especially challenging for outpatient recovery and/or treatment) and with affording long-term care or retirement home. Also, this is to be expected since people with low socioeconomic status are at higher risk of health issues in life

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Reading Week

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I have been thinking about intersectionality a lot this week, since all of my classes have been focused around it this week. In particular, I have been thinking about in relation to power, as emphasized in this classes' reading. I was thinking about my privilege and oppression as a White cis women with a disability, but my perspective of power and intersectionality, I realize now, was black and white. In my Thursday class, guest speaker David Lewis-Peart talked about intersectionality and power as a balloon. The balloon follows us everywhere. The balloon represents power, and the meaning of the anecdote is that power moves. It is not black and white; I have different power in different places, situations, and with different people.

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No class (National Day for Truth and Reconciliation)

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No class (National Day for Truth and Reconciliation)

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I watched a keynote presentation on the Growth Mindset by researcher Carol Dweck for a piece of my field placement learning contract tasks. She talked about how a lot of times people are held back by a fixed mindset, and back away from challenges. This reminded me of how the readings mentioned a psychodynamic approach to critical thinking, and the ways we guard against recognizing what is painful or what we do not want

to be aware of. I think that we can learn so much from our mistakes and fears, but we will not learn without first putting ourselves in a growth mindset.

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To be perfectly honest, I am not someone that naturally thinks about class outside of school. But low and behold, the first day after class, I am having a conversation with my field placement supervisor about a service user that just made me think "oh my god this is just like what we spoke about in class". We were talking about an upcoming meeting with Behavioural Supports Ontario due to the "behaviours" one of the patients is exhibiting which is making it difficult to find them placement in long-term care. However, this patient is approached by nurses and other healthcare staff in the same way as everyone else, which is not what this person requires. The patient's behaviours are (in my opinion) not worthy of a meeting with BSO but of a change in care approach and further inquiry into the specific needs of this patient. This reminded me of the case study we spoke about in class (Yama? and how she was perceived to be difficult and disruptive in class, even though her issues clearly were not simply of bad behaviour but of attachment issues of not seeing her father and unfamiliarity of moving countries/language/etc).