To find social work easy?

[hereforthecakeandwine]

Will try and summarise for length sake -

Qualified 8 years ago in social work.

Have a job in adult mental health.

All through my degree people would try and warn me off of social work, too many caseloads, high burn out, too much responsibility.

I remember as a student on placement finding social work so enjoyable and also very 'easy' for lack of a better word. Not what I was expecting at all. However, I assumed that was because I was a student with a low case load and also protected.

However, 8 years in my job and I still find social work to be a fairly easy job. I love interaction with the clients and equally enjoy the paperwork/meeting side of things.

I have 33 cases at the moment and do duty once a week and am able to keep on top of it all. If not it just gets prioritised and pushed to tomorrow. I can only do what I can do. I find my job really enjoyable and low stress. However, I do find I am very organised and manage my time well. I don't do overtime or think about work outwith working hours. I see some colleagues really stressed and I sometimes question, am I doing something wrong? Am I not giving it my all if I'm finding it (and have done since being a student) so easy?

Anyone else think that they really scare people off of social work and perhaps the reality isn't as bad as they make out?

CP, not CO

@Warriormum1 I think I get what you are sayinv and it was one of the things that frustrated me when I was a children's social worker. Where I was , children with additional support needs (solely)were allocated to a social worker who had child protection families, looked after children . Sadly ,the children with disabilities were not prioritised for services in both areas I worked on over 17 years . There just was no resources left. They had been cut to the bone . I felt these families were taken for granted and that if kne of the parents had a drug problem, they would get services. It was so unfair. I have a child (well he's a grown man now ) with additional support needs and I was also caring for my terminally ill mum, I made myself ill and I was out until half 9 every night with my job after starting at half 8. I couldn't do it. I made myself physically very unwell.

I just decided . Enough! And left.

I agree hospital social work is high stress; I had more abuse from families wanting to admit their relatives to a care home than families anywhere in children's services .

I think if the services were there to provide the support then jobs in Adult Social Work would be a lot easier. Long waiting lists to before the adults get an allocated to a social worker and by that time crisis has hit, then they go onto long waiting lists to get support in place. It’s the juggling managing the families in crisis and having no support, so I end up doing a lot of the support work on top of my usual job.

...well, it's less easy for families who are in desperate need for help but get thrown under a bus (no assessments , no support) time and time again in the name of saving money. Good for you you are happy with how social services work. They don't work for many people who need support. HTH..

There was a documentary a few years back about children in the care system. It must have been channel 4 and called '15,000 kids and counting' or something. I'm sure there was a social worker on that who showed all the horrific abusive text messages she received from one dad she was trying to help. Literally hundreds and hundreds of them. The mum eventually chose this abusive bloke over her baby and the baby was removed from their care. I imagine that social worker found it pretty tough. They said something like the average career for a social worker in child protection was 6 years. Which is just mind blowing to me.

I work with a lot of adult social workers and CAOs in a professional capacity. I don't think their job any more or less difficult than mine. We share the same frustrations of people not engaging in services when we know they need them, families having unrealistic expectations and there not being services out there for people who don't have family support.

@RowcheRascal Yes, it is understandable that children who are in danger have to be prioritised when resources are scarce. If you are a carer then you will have seen both sides of the coin. I don't blame you for leaving.

This is the point I was trying to raise. About services not being there for people who don't have families to support them. Who is the voice for these people? What organisations are there out there for people who have no family and have been let down by services as well. They are then let down by both families and society. This why I didn't really understand the comment upthread about there being plenty of support out there if people choose to engage - it seems there can be unrealistic expectation on both sides.

And as we squeeze services tighter, this pool must be getting bigger.