Consistency in supports - help please

Apparently they try to limit personal connection between participants and workers

It's not healthy for the workers to get attached to clients. And it's not healthy for clients to get attached to workers. So they implement professional boundaries

@Bow it's rough going... images of being in a small boat in choppy seas come to mind.

I tried to restart with a support worker recently but after coming once she cancelled repeatedly, then cancelled the contract. I can't face trying to establish rapport and trust with someone else atm. I'm also trying to navigate uncertainty with my medical and mh people.

Continuity of care and stability and reliability should be no-brainers.

I didn't read your link. If both you and your current SW are happy to continue the arrangement and it hasn't been precluded by a change in the provider's business can you appeal? When is the change due?

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@Bow wrote:

how does change in your supports effect you?

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My case demonstrates that it can be a double-edged sword. I was delighted to be rid of my two therapists.

Although I wish that the first one hadn't been so abusive when he released me from his "care". But even though it was a rough exit, it was still better then the prospect of remaining stuck with him.

I still wish the system had been more helpful in getting me out of the "care" of my second therapist. I tried all manner of combinations on that "K-10" form to try to get the system to decide that I needed a better therapist, but I guess I just never found the right one. That's the problem with trying to brute-force a combination key code.

I get that there are some people who are lucky enough to have great therapists, and so obviously it is really terrible when the system removes them from that therapists care. But the same process also probably liberates a lot of patients from terrible therapists they can't wait to be rid of.

The problem is that we have a lot of patients in need of quality care, and only a small number of quality therapists who are able to provide it. So I guess the system can't do anything but ration the services of those therapists, hoping that everybody gets a fair share, even if very few get all they truly need.

Thanks for responding @Dimity

My support worker sat in my living room for about an hour today and talked at me about how she has no issues at all staying with me on her caseload. She doesn’t want to change. She believes we have just finally got to a point where we are working well together. I didn’t really have much to say cause I have unfortunately gone into shut down mode and have very few words.
My SW has encouraged me to take it further. The team leader has apparently already spoken to her manager about it and has still decided that I need to change. So I can take it directly to the manager but I’m not sure what else I can say? I can then also take it to HR. All the other ‘customers’- I really hate that they call us customers, but everyone else was having an immediate transition. Like this would have been sprung on everyone on Monday when I was told and everyone is doing meet and greet and handovers this week. No notice at all. That in itself is very poor. Freaking heck! I was actually originally told via text message on Monday morning. I was told by my SW that she was bringing….. with her on her home visit this afternoon to do a handover cause they are going to be my new SW!!
So I can apparently do a slow transition over a couple of months. I just don’t have the capacity though. Like you there is always instability in my mh and the support I receive from community mental health, the stability and consistency I had from my SW was something that I COULD rely on. But now I don’t have that either. It’s gonna be a huge loss and goodness knows what’s gonna happen.

Everyone being changed over all at once @Bow ? I wonder what their agenda is.

Ah yes I know shutdown mode, been there.

I'm sorry this is happening to you. I trust you can look to the forums for some reassurance. I know you were concerned a few weeks ago when PSWs and moderators seemed to go very quiet for a while. I think some of them are more responsive than others - have things improved here for you?

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@Bow wrote:

The team leader has apparently already spoken to her manager about it and has still decided that I need to change. So I can take it directly to the manager but I’m not sure what else I can say?

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If you have the energy, @Bow , might it be worth writing a letter to your MP about it?

They're always banging on about how their being so generous with their funding to mental health (hoping it'll win them votes, of course), but cases like yours highlight that there are beaurocratic issues with the system that are still screwing patients over.

If the support worker and you are both happy to continue on as you both have been, but the order's come from on high that you have to be shifted to someone else, then that's clearly not a resourcing/funding problem, but an act of bad management. Which means that the politicians need to do more then simply throwing money at the problem, they need to talk to the managers running the system and get them to stop making terrible decisions like the one that's interfered with your relationship with your support worker.

A lot of the politicians in charge still don't realize that they need to change the whole way the system is managed. They think that all they need to do is hand over more funding. They think that the system's only problem is a money problem.

But maybe if you let your MP know the nature of your problem, they could get involved and help get you back with your good support worker?

I have no idea what the agenda of a @Dimity and sorry for my delay in responding, it’s been a really rough week and it only got worse with some bad news regarding my brother fighting cancer.

my community mh case manager came to visit today and she was aware of the pending change and she asked me how I found out about it…. I told her via text. She told me that she had received a fare bit of feedback about the changes as some people found out about it when their new SW rocked up at their door!! I think that’s appalling! Totally not ok.

I don’t think there is much more I can do about the situation. My SW said I could go directly to the manager, but she’s already read? Supposedly my letter and there isn’t much more I can add to that. I could send the letter onto HR, let them know. But will they really care enough to do anything?

around here…. Look there is one psw that I’ve noticed is around a little bit more of an evening. But that is not every night. And there is pretty much no one around during the day. I know there is supposedly moderators floating around, and I’ll notice the odd psw make one post or reply randomly, but it’s absolutely nothing like it used to be. And there just isn’t the forum members around here like there use to be- I can scroll back through latest posts and they are hours old unlike the minutes old previously. It’s sad.

hope your doing ok

@Bow dunno why bad things come in waves. Sounds like someone in management is overzealous - a big organisational change like that sometimes comes from mergers or change at the top.

Very sorry to hear about your brother, I hope he's getting good care, it's hard for all of you, including your mum.

I agree the forums seem quieter. Quite a few established threads seem to be keeping on going under their own steam but as you say there's little staff interaction except from a handful of people. Volunteers are trying to shoulder some of the load.

I hope you're going OK, I'd picked up things hadn't been easy, and the change of SW is very bad timing. Happy to chat further if you like, no rush.