ELEVEN things I've learned in my first year of being an OT
I havenât done one of these in a while but my one year of working and being an adult anniversary is coming up this month⌠so I thought I would celebrate with a list of things Iâve legitimately learned over the last year.
1. Fashion counts. Ok, maybe not fashion exactly, but thereâs something to be said about feeling comfortable in your clothes and acknowledging that your clothes say something about you. I wore sweatpants to grad school (and I blame the physio students for lowering the standards on the normative grad school appearance in the building lol). I invested in a lot of stiff dress pants and shirts for placements but theyâre so uncomfortable I rarely wear them. So. The first half of my career was a lot of âare you a student?â, âsure, youâre this persons case worker. âŚâ, ânice shorts.â It took me this entire year to figure how to dress in a way that is comfortable, reflects my personal style, and subtly states professionalism in a âI know what Iâm doing, I swearâ way. Iâm still not sure about how to dress in the summer⌠But I started a work look Pinterest too lol: http://www.pinterest.com/amietwo/work-looks/.
2. Schedule time to document. It was easy to learn to schedule client visits and travel timeâŚbut documenting was always an after thought. I literally didnât chart on one of my clients for a MONTH one time. And I had to work one night (at home, thank goodness we have laptops) until 11 catching up. It was just like grad schoolâŚbut seriously: prioritize documenting time even when it feels like itâs not that important compared to actually working with clients
3. Old habits die hard. It takes approximately 21 days to build a new one. Also, you have to be organized to be an OT but itâs ok if youâre not- itâs a skill you can learn. I think Iâve mentioned it before that a lot of the bad habits I had in school (doing things last minute, double booking myself, not flossing regularly⌠Etc) would end when I got a job and joined the real world. Iâm not naturally an organized person. Iâm like really quite disorganized tbh (my coworker has called me the most functionally disorganized case manager she has ever met â a joke that also nods to my OT tendency to ignore problems if they donât technically get in the way of function). I have always been like this and for some reason assumed getting a paycheque would change that? I never successfully used an agenda at schoolâŚbut Iâm great at it now. And I havenât fallen a month behind on charts ever since that one time. I have a much better system; although it is something Iâm still working on.
4. Healthy self care is key. Other good habits Iâm trying to build are personal coping strategies. Over the last month Iâve allowed yoga to replace some other bad habits in my life (Iâm talking in the realm of smoking and drinking, but not exactly those things necessarily). Caring for others for a living is a privilege; it can also be draining if youâre not careful with your own health. In school we talked about making crisis plans which sounded dumb at the time -it was just us writing down things we enjoy but honestly, when youâre feeling shit, itâs nice to be able to look at a list to remind you of the things you like.
5. How to be âmyselfâ at work and acknowledging the importance of work culture I think it just took this whole year for me to settle in to myself at work. People at work are starting to find out I love to bake, and itâs been pointed out that baking is my new thing. But itâs not new. I baked all the time when I was in school. I just havenât baked for like 8 months because I was so stressed over work (see: number 4 for more about bad self care habits) and maybe I lost part of myself trying to be the professional OT I thought I had to be at work. It is a bit of a delicate balance- your personality isnât going to work with every work culture. Iâm lucky to be at a place that seems to be ok with me the way I am.
6. I have biases, prejudgements, and stigmatizing thoughts sometimes. But Iâm working on recognizing them, acknowledging them, and changing them. For example, sometimes I get frustrated with clients who experience anxiety around trying things that will probably help them. Which is the WORST thing as a mental health worker, I know that!! I canât help being frustrated - itâs my internal reaction - - but I need to acknowledge that I am, think about why, and think about how to make it productive in my work with the client so that my external response is not frustration. Iâm working on changing my internals too though because I know clients can tell when we are frustrated, even though we try not to show it.
7. say thank you. I spend a lot of time talking to other community workers at other community agencies, hospitals, welfare offices etc That saying about catching more flies with honey is true. Iâm buds with a few pharmacists in the communuty, some social workers and therapists at other organizations, and I always feel if we scratch each others backs, the system can be a better place. Weâre all here trying to help our clients and I see it truly as teamwork, with client as the team captain. I never understand workers that donât want to play on the same team but I try to be nice to them anyway
8. make work friends; theyâre important. Work friends are important for several reasons. One, we spend 40 hours at work - it would suck to not have someone to kill some of that time talking about your favorite bands (or sports, if thatâs your thing). Two, networking. You never know what opportunities will come out of that new work friend. Three, friends make you happier and is probably 75% of my current job satisfaction.
9. Make a stupid budget . If youâre anything like me, this will be your first steady pay cheque and even if its not a lot, knowing that same amount is rolling in every other week will do something to your psyche and you will just buy all sorts of things you donât need. Learn about budgets and investments and all that boring stuff. one day Iâm sure I will be glad I did.
10. Always have hope for your clients. if you donât see it, they might not either.
11. KEEP LEARNING. YOU WILL NEVER BE DONE WITH LEARNING. take advantage of trainings offered to you, seek out training and mentoring opportunities, and just acknowledge that you will never know everything you need to know to do your job. Plus this is the OT student blogâ- Iâm all about life long learning (just not at school anymore)
