How We Learn to do Our Best Work

Who are your role models for how you operate in the world and do the work you do? I'll tell you about mine.

When I was twelve in 1970, I was a troubled kid. I had abusive and neglectful parents. I struggled with mental illness. (At that time, no one knew my struggles were based on trauma.) I started junior high school and was having difficulties with a teacher that was picking on me. I met with the school counselor, Mrs. Keenan. After talking with me, she took me out of the class with the problem teacher and put me in the library to assist with the librarian for that period.

Although I was a straight A student, over the next year, my mental health issues worsened. Mrs. Keenan found ways to support me. She started meeting with me weekly. I didn't exactly know why, but I was so grateful to have someone to talk to that wasn't my mother that I didn't try to puzzle it out.

After trying to talk to my mother and finding a brick wall repeatedly, Mrs. Keenan opted for ways to care for me outside of collaborating with my mother. On the days when I came to school with major dissociative issues, she knew that sending me home was not going to help me. So, she put me in a quiet room with a cot in the school clinic. She let me stay as long as I needed to. She checked in on me once every 45 minutes or so until I felt like I could go back to class.

When my issues around self harm started, she asked to meet with me every morning when school started. I said, "But, aren't you too busy to find time to meet with me every day?"

Her response was, "We'll meet first thing. I'm not that busy first thing in the morning." Again, I gratefully accepted her offer. I was just trying to figure out how to get by.

That picture in my work cubicle by Andrew Wyeth entitled "Day of the Fair" is part of her legacy to me. On a day when she took me to see my psychologist, Dr. Williams, during school, I admired that picture in my psychologist's office. Dr. Williams graciously gave me the picture. I was so honored but didn't feel like I could take it home. Mrs. Keenan took it to her office and placed it on her wall so I could come look at it whenever I wanted.

Mrs. Keenan told me I could have the painting whenever I wanted it. I wasn't ready, and she kept that picture in her office for me for 17 years until I finally got an office of my own and told her I was ready to take it. She had it framed for me before she gave it to me. (It was a good thing I was ready, because by then she was nearing retirement.)

After I ran away from home in the spring of 1972, Mrs. Keenan worked with the school psychologist to get me the mental health care I needed. With my parent's approval, Mrs. Keenan drove me to Lakewood to help me get admitted to Child Study and Treatment Center of Western State Hospital. I believed I was in a safe place, because she had taken me there, and I trusted her.

When I got out of Western State Hospital and went to live with my grandparents in the fall of 1972, Mrs. Keenan was there at school, supporting me, meeting with me weekly, and communicating with my grandmother.

I continued to have a free period every day in the library each year. I didn't know why exactly, but it worked for me. In fact, when I moved on to high school, I met the school counselor and again was given a free period during the day. In reflecting back on it, I understand it was a method to accommodate my need for some processing time during the day. I only recently realized that all the counselors were working in tandem to help me continue to have good grades and be successful.

This is feeling like a long story, but the point here is this: When I contemplate how I work with employees and the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act). I realize that Mrs. Keenan's treatment of me is the model for the caring I express to those I work with. In reaching out to someone who is struggling, I make Mrs Keenan like decisions in how to help them stay afloat so they can continue to be successful. I must have looked much like a struggling employee to my school counselors. That is reasonable accommodation.

Mrs. Keenan taught me how to care for people I am not responsible for. She taught me to know when to cross the line from strictly professional to compassionate specialist. She modeled for me how to be my best self when dealing with others whose struggles I can merely nudge in the right direction but not fix.

It's hard to find the words to express my incredible appreciation, but I might have given it a good go here. So, the question for all of us is: Who are we modeling? What behavior are we modeling? It is worth considering. After those questions, the final one is: How is this working out for me and the world around me? If I can answer that in the affirmative, then I have grasped the essence of what Mrs. Keenan taught me.

Joceile 12.28.15