Description
Dalmage (2013) writes, “Parents and teachers should be aware of the unique forms of discrimination faced by multiracial children and the White supremacist system in which discrimination flourishes” (p. 101). As social workers, we should be aware of our own understanding of what it means to be multiracial in society. This awareness includes a review of our own potential biases that might exist. We need to challenge our own personal ideas about how we categorize individuals and those assumptions that follow along with those categories. Rather, we must respect our client’s experience as a multiracial person in the world, beginning with asking him or her how they would define themselves when completing an intake or assessment form. Further, a social worker must be aware of the many forms of racism and prejudice a person with a multiracial background might experience. As Dalmage discusses, judgment comes from many sides with different intentions and expectations. Being aware of the particular forms of racism that a person who is multiracial will experience will give you the ability to do your best to understand their experience and empathize.
By Day 7
Submit a 2- to 3-page paper. Describe the impact of discrimination on individuals of multiracial backgrounds. Describe the impact of biracial/multiracial or multiethnic distinction on our society. Justify your response. How do these distinctions relate to social work practice with individuals, families, groups, and communities? Be sure to use APA formatting and references from the Learning Resources and two additional peer-reviewed resources from the Walden library about the discrimination against biracial and multiracial individuals.
Reference (need 4 references) I will send you info on 2 Walden references tomorrow)
Plummer, S.-B., Makris, S., & Brocksen S. M. (Eds.). (2014). Social work case studies: Foundation year. Baltimore, MD: Laureate International Universities Publishing. [Vital Source e-reader].
- Working With Individuals: The Case of Mary
Mary is a 47-year-old, single, heterosexual Caucasian female. She lives with her 52-year-old
sister and 87-year-old father in the home in which she was raised. She also has a 45-year-old sister
who lives 10 minutes away and a 23-year-old daughter living on her own. Mary and her family
members do not maintain friendships outside the family. Mary has been unable to work for the
past 3 years because she says she has felt too frightened to go too far from her home. As a result,
she has been financially reliant on her family members for these last few years. Prior to this lapse
in employment, she had been a school bus driver and an administrative assistant at a warehouse
distribution center. Mary has no history of drug or alcohol abuse. She is well groomed and
physically fit with a diagnosis of hypoactive thyroid, for which she is treated with Synthroid . Mary
was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and adjustment disorder, not otherwise
specified (NOS) by the clinic psychiatrist.
Before meeting with me, Mary saw a social worker in a private practice for 2 years. She entered
treatment with that clinician because she said she was traumatized by a romantic relationship with
a married African American man she had met at work. Her trauma symptoms began 6 months after
she ended the yearlong romantic relationship. Mary said the romance occurred because he had
“brainwashed” her, as there could be no other reason she would have slept with him. Mary believes
that bad people are capable of “brainwashing” good people to perform bad deeds. Mary was raised
in a home that espoused racism, and she and her family members believe that African Americans
and other people of color are untrustworthy and bad. She said, “I take after my father, and he thinks
black people are just evil.” Mary said she understands her feelings about race are not right.
Mary considered her initial attempt at treatment unsuccessful for two reasons. First, she felt the
therapist (a Caucasian woman) judged her and her family harshly for their racial beliefs and this
got in the way of the two of them building a trusting working relationship. Second, she did not feel
relief from her PTSD symptoms. Mary ended the relationship with that social worker 6 months
ago. Mary then approached her primary care physician about her symptoms, and the doctor
prescribed an antidepressant. When, after 3 months, Mary asked to have her dosage increased, the
doctor suggested that she get a psychiatric evaluation and consider returning to therapy. Mary’s
insurance company suggested our agency for the psychiatric evaluation and approved 10 sessions.
Mary said she felt sad, frightened, and anxious most of the time. She had no appetite, slept most
of the day, had no interest in dressing, and rarely left the house. When she did go out, she felt the
need to be accompanied by of one of her sisters.
Mary presented as angry during our initial sessions. She requested that one of her sisters attend
the sessions with her, to which I agreed. My intent in agreeing to have her sister in the room was
to help Mary feel safe and create a strong rapport. During the early sessions, most of what Mary
said began as half sentences that she asked her sister to complete. Mary referred to her sisters as
her “caretakers and minders” who “know me better than I know myself so you should talk to
them.” Mary said that if she talked for herself she would get “it wrong.” The “it” and the “wrong”
remained elusive in meaning when I asked her what that meant.
Mary agreed, after two sessions, to meet with me alone. We used our first individual session to
establish Mary’s goals for therapy. Among her goals was developing ways she could feel safer
about going outside alone. Over the next eight sessions, I used cognitive behavioral therapy
interventions to help Mary build coping strategies for recognizing triggers to frightening thoughts
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and to help her manage her anxiety symptoms. I also used psychoeducational interventions to help
Mary develop routines for proper sleep hygiene, healthy eating, and regular exercise.
After several sessions, Mary shared insight into her feelings about dating an African American
man. Mary said that being attracted to an African American man frightened her and that there was
no future for her relationship with this man because he was married. Mary believed that she had
jeopardized her secure position in the family because being with an African American man
challenged the family’s ideas about race and their view of themselves as separate and unique from
non-family members. Once the family discovered Mary’s relationship with this man, she believed
her only way back into their lives was to accept the role of a “crazy sister” in need of protection
and whose judgment about people was faulty. By forming a relationship with an African American
man, Mary had shown her judgment to be outside of the norm in the conventions of her family.
In our final two sessions, Mary said that she no longer felt like she was the “crazy woman in
the family” and she felt safe going to the grocery store alone. It was my impression that Mary may
have been the identified patient in her family but exploring this idea would require family therapy.
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