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Q - Dear Annabelle,
I am a Certified Nursing Assistant and I do private care for an 19 year old lady with Cerebral palsy and mild retardation. The problem I'm having is the Mother of this young lady is a very negative influnence on her and I have trouble counteracting it.
The Mother is trying constantly to get me involved in family problems, (not related to her daughter), and school problems that she causes for her daughter. she also tries to talk bad about the company I work for and the employee's that work in her home. So far I have been able to keep her at a distance and tell her I'm there to take care of the child and not be involved in the other things.
But now the daughter is doing the same thing to me and it is very hard to make her understand that I can't get involved in this. The daughter thinks this behavior is Ok because the Mother encourages it. Do you have any suggestions for me to try that might help? I love to work with this young lady and leaving the home is not an option!
Thank you very much for allowing me to get this off my chest and I hope to hear from you soon.
A - Dear Patti,
Your letter is poignant. You want to do the professional, ethical thing. You don't want to aid and abet the mother's destructive behavior, but you can't afford to lose your job. First of all, remember that a Īnoble grand gestureā that got you fired would probably hurt your patient as well as you. So let's explore the limited realistic options.
The mother you describe has some form of personality disorder, possibly caused and almost certainly aggravated by her daughter's condition. You don't mention a father. Is he there? Is that another disaster? Forget about changing the mother's behavior. You can't. The best you might do is sit down with her and explain that you feel loyal to her and to her daughter...and to the company that employs you, and that when she bad-mouths them, you feel torn.
In the best case condition, that might open up the idea that you are a woman with your own sensitivity and opinions. Don't count on it, but if you put your case tactfully, no harm should result.
There may be just a bit more you can do with the daughter. If you explain, very, very sympathetically, that her mother is stressed, and that that's why she's so impatient with everyone, you may help her learn to separate her mother's angry, depressed version of the world from the real facts of life. As an adjunct to that, you might try to find occasions to praise people to the daughter, to give her a model of behavior different from her mother's. Both of those will be slow going. Don't expect to see anything like results for months. In the meantime, tactfully stick to your guns and maintain your professional boundaries.
- Annabelle
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