PERSONAL MODEL OF HELPING

Karen Carr

January 10, 2010

BSHS312 – Effective Models of Helping

Dr. Princess Clarke

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How and why you formed this viewpoint

In growing up I always wanted to help other people. I was the child who other children confided in or came to when they wanted to talk or needed help with a problem. When growing up it was not common for black people to go to counseling. Families kept secrets among themselves and sometimes those secrets came back to haunt people many years later. When faced with problems people relied on their spiritual beliefs, the support of the family, and sometimes close friends. If a girl had gotten pregnant and not married that would have been kept top secret. Usually a family member would raise the baby and no one would ever speak openly about it. My family had to deal with the death of two of my brothers at young ages. It hurt my mother deeply having to deal with the loss of two children because of violence. These tragedies were never discussed even as we became adults. As I became older I realized that my mother and our entire family should have gotten counseling. It was not until after my mother passed that my uncle shared with me the pain and agony that she had suffered but his emotional pain as well.
Your view of helping

As an adult I see the damage that family secrets and not having the capability to openly discuss problems, or seek professional help when needed can cause. I believe that helping people to identify and resolve their problems is a profession that requires hard work, responsibility, honesty, ethics, and skills. Counseling is the opportunity for a person to make a positive difference in the lives the clients being served. Through research, use, and experiments counselors have a variety of models and theories that can be used. Having the variety of theories and models provide