My first idea for this article showed me some of my own sexist limitations. I wanted to encapsulate the hospice social worker mindsets I described in previous articles with three characters I could relate to. And then I asked myself: Will my readers find these three characters as relatable as I do?
The three characters that occurred to me as representations of good hospice social worker attitudes are men. I’m a man. And very likely a majority of hospice social workers are women. So I challenged myself to come up with female characters who represent the same attitudes for me. And I couldn’t do it.
It’s society’s fault and mine. Most movies have male leads and female supporting roles. And as a father of three daughters, I have a responsibility to show them limitless examples of women as heroes of their stories.
Apparently, I’m not watching the right detective shows!
The characters that initially occurred to me were Jack Reacher, Sherlock Holmes, and Irvin Yalom. The latter is not a fictional character but presents a persona which is distinctly descriptive of an attitude that is crucial to hospice social work. I did a little Googling to find some female characters to draw on instead, and this resulted in me becoming more interested in watching Law and Order: SVU, for the Olivia Benson character, and Prime Suspect and Vera, for their portrayals of unstoppable women detectives. My future TV watching will now be more female.
But for now, I will still attempt to describe the hospice social worker mindset with–ironically–three male characters.
Jack Reacher
My fellow social worker at a previous gig described me as a Jack Reacher of hospice social work. I’m not a fan of the sexism in the two Reacher movies, but I am a fan of his resourcefulness and willingness to jump right into trouble. We gotta do that. Some hospice social workers use a number of methods to avoid involvement in intense challenges on the job. God bless their hearts. But the job is to help in sticky situations. And we have to go to the trouble, often unprotected a la Jack Reacher walking into a gunfight without a gun.
Sherlock Holmes
He treated every detail as important, and obsessively meditated on solving cases. I don’t think he ever treated a case as unsolvable, though some took more obsession than others. To differentiate his technique with a healthier adaptation I’d like to recommend, I want to coin the concept of “gentle obsession.” While the word itself implies tension and refusal to let go, the root words of obsession mean to “sit against” or “sit opposite.” Sit with it. And we can let it go. Gently allowing problems to slide in the back recesses of our minds where we trust we’re going to find a solution. We don’t need to be antisocial or hooked on cocaine and heroin like Sherlock. The key is really to keep going, knowing the case can be cracked… until you crack it.
Irvin Yalom
I’m aware he’s a real person. Dr. Yalom, if one day a Google self-search has you reading this, my apologies for putting you in the same category with two fictional characters. But I know him as a voice in his books and videos, as I do Jack Reacher and Sherlock Holmes.
I appreciate Yalom’s embodiment of secure vulnerability. His heart is where patients can find it and hurt it. And he acknowledges that. Because doing so is good for the therapeutic relationship, which is good for the patient.
Choose your heroes
You don’t have to embrace my heroes. I believe it is good to give thought to which characters we would want to emulate because characters we identify with do influence us. Whose strength and compassion do you most admire, and how would they overcome the challenges we strive to overcome with more ease and grace?