THE SECRET DIARY OF A SOCIAL WORKER ON CHRISTMAS EVE...

Christmas Eve is a Friday this year so, once again, I’ll be working it.

Being a (relatively) young, single, and childless woman there’s always this assumption that I’ll be fine working Christmas Eve because I don’t have anything better to do.

I mean I could see my friends for pre-Christmas prosecco, do some last minute shopping, visit my niece and nephew, or go on a date with a Jude Law-type, sipping on mulled wine as we walk hand-in-hand through a snowy Christmas market…

But, no, I’m single and I don’t have kids, so I work in order to give the mothers in the team the chance to spend Christmas Eve with their little ones. And I’m only a little bit bitter about it.

THIS YEAR, MY SEVENTH WORKING CHRISTMAS EVE IN A ROW, WILL BE SPENT IN ROOM 215 OF MY LOCAL AUTHORITY’S SPECTACULARLY BRUTALIST SIXTIES CONCRETE BEHEMOTH OF A HEADQUARTERS.

What’s it like? I hear you ask. Do you rescue children from grisly fates like the plot of a Hallmark movie? Do you flirt with the handsome Colin Firth-lookalike in the mail room? Do you sit there, crying inside as you drink a pint of Baileys hidden in your coffee?

The truth is, Christmas Eve is pretty much the same every year:

7am: Wake up and check your email on your work mobile. Notice that four of your colleagues have kindly asked you to do a ‘quick check in’ on a family they apparently haven’t had time to visit before taking two weeks off.

8am: Breakfast is coffee and a cereal bar on the drive in, while listening to ‘All I want for Christmas ’ on the radio for the 789th time this season.

8:25am: Arrive in the office to another three emails relating to ‘quick visits.’ If this continues you’ll be seeing more children than Father Christmas himself this Christmas Eve.

8:45am: Email from the head of service wishing everyone a happy Christmas and thanking us for our hard work this year. An email you suspect he sent from his all-inclusive knees-up break in Benidorm.

9am: Second coffee of the day while eating a stale cupcake from the mound of sweet treats that have accumulated on the spare desk.

9:10am: Send a passive aggressive email to all of the team in relation to covering visits for social workers who had ample time to do so themselves. Get eight out-of-office responses and immediately wish you hadn’t bothered.

9:20am: Debate whether your seven visits should be announced or unannounced. Decide that the last thing people want today is an unexpected visit from ‘the social.’

10:50am: Spend 28 minutes on the phone explaining to a health visitor that just because a mother didn’t answer her phone it doesn’t warrant an emergency welfare check.

11:51am: You rationalise that taking some presents with you will soften the blow of an unannounced visit from a social worker they’ve never met before, and trawl through the last presents left from the Salvation Army charity gifts - mostly Lynx or Dove gift sets.

12:15pm: Spend your entire lunch break in a Starbucks drive thru, but at least you have a venti gingerbread latté to go with the three cakes you pinched from the office.

1:10PM: VISIT NUMBER 1. THE LIGHTS ARE ON, THE TV IS BLARING, THE DOG IS BARKING, AND YOU CAN DEFINITELY HEAR CHILDREN ARGUING, BUT THERE’S NO ANSWER.

1:20pm: Visit number 2. More lights, TV, and dog barking, but no answer.

1:40pm: Visit number 3. Hallelujah, someone answers. As there are neighbours in their garden, you politely try to explain that you are ‘from the council’ but when this fails to grant the requisite entry you mouth that you are a ‘social worker.’ Inside there are four children looking healthy and happy, and mum reports she is ‘fine.’

Awkwardly ask if you can have a look around the home, and you’re out of there in 7 minutes. 2pm: Visit number 4. Wrong house. Computer records need updateig.

2.20PM: VISIT NUMBER 5. “YOU’RE NOT THE USUAL ONE” IS THE OPENING GAMBIT, FOLLOWED BY A 40-MINUTE TIRADE ABOUT HOW TERRIBLE THE USUAL SOCIAL WORKER IS.

The kids seem displeased with their Lynx and Dove gift sets.

3:05pm: A duty call has come in from the housing service after a teenager turned up announcing that they are homeless. You head to the town hall housing department to deal with it.

3:11pm: Sixth cake of the day.

3:14pm: First tears of the day

3:45pm: 45 minutes of solution focused therapy, family mediation, and motivational interviewing sees your teen in the car with you heading back to their parents’ home.

4:50pm: Teen’s father thanks you, and offers you a glass of sherry. You’re tempted but remember that this duty call, which has taken just over an hour, will involve at least the same amount of time spent on actioning the referral and recording your involvement. You’ll likely have to open a bloody child in need assessment too and, even though you’re way over capacity, you’ll get the case because you ‘already know the child.’

4:51pm: The teen refuses the Lynx gift set on offer.

4:52pm: First sherry of the day (joke).

5:15pm: Visit number 6. The children’s father answers and, quite rightly, questions both why you are working Christmas Eve and why you are visiting on Christmas Eve. You don’t have a decent answer for either but he lets you in. The children are happy and healthy. You’re out of there in four minutes.

5:50pm: Visit number 7. Nobody’s home. Dump the rest of your Christmas gifts by the front door and push a council compliment slip through the letterbox which reads: ‘Happy Christmas from your social working Santa.

5:55pm: Listen to ‘All I want for Christmas’ on the radio for the 790th time this festive season.

6:20pm: Log on and record the visits you’ve completed, and the support offered to your teen.

7:30pm: 12 and a half hours after you began, you finish for the day.

7:31pm: First sherry of the day (for real)