SOCIAL WORKERS SHOULD FEEL ABLE TO TALK ABOUT THEIR OWN CARE EXPERIENCE
I
wish to state upfront that, in writing this, I’m not seeking to force anyone ‘out of the closet,’ as it were.
Likewise, I do not wish to push people with lived experience into discussions and public acknowledgements they’re not yet ready for. Rather it is my aim to assist in the creation of an environment that would allow for an easy admission, should someone ever wish to discuss their own care experience in the workplace. There are, of course, many definitions of what it means to be care experienced, but for the purposes of
this piece, my understanding of care experience is anyone that has been in care for a period of three months or more - whether that’s fostering, secure care, residential care, kinship care, adoption, or respite care. For most care-experienced people I’ve come across, their experiences stick with them, often shaping their lives far into adulthood. Over the last two years of my studies, through discussions and reflections, I have come to the belief that we do not actively engage in discussion about care experience, or the issues faced by care experienced social workers.
IT FEELS AS THOUGH THESE EXPERIENCES ARE ACCEPTED, BUT IN HUSHED TONES AND WITH A ‘DON’T ASK DON’T TELL’ MENTALITY. Many people qualifying as social workers are entering into a profession that is designed to support people with similar experiences to them, yet they feel unable to publicly acknowledge or speak about their own experiences. To qualify my interest in this topic, I should explain that I myself am care experienced, growing up under the