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In her shoes

Ever have that moment where you are in someone elses shoes? And I don't mean mentally putting yourself in someone else's situation or literally putting someones shoes on. I mean you give someone so much grief (even write a blog post about it) then 6-7 months later are doing the exact thing they did and go "ah, I get it now."

Well, I had that today at work and I made my boss uncomfortable when I cried because of this realization. For the last 5 months I have been the Licensing and Training Coordinator at a local private foster care agency. Until a couple months ago, I was primarily doing training of prospective foster parents and recertifications of current foster parents. At the begining of February, I got my first assessment for a new foster parent! I was so excited to make a difference to someone's life and do "such a better job then my home assessor".  I thought we would be done by the middle of February. We weren't. I was for sure I would have everything ready to go by the end of February, but I didn't. I finally got myself to a completed draft for my supervisior to review and I was missing some information and needed to correct some spellings (surprise surprise). But as the last month and a half has gone on, I have become more and more frustrated with myself. Why am I not doing better than my home assessor? Why are these parents not done yet? Could I possibly do anything else wrong? The answer to all of those is "NO!" Jamie Fisher shut up and get a grip. You should have put it together 7 months ago when you went on a rant about your home assessor. The system and process for being a foster parent is HARD! It is long and frustrating for not only the incoming foster parent but the person assessing them too! Today, as I cried at my desk empathizing with this new foster family (because I have been in their shoes) I had the realization that I was a complete bitch to my assessor and I feel awful!

So after freaking my boss out a bit (it was kinda fun), I think it is time to write a note to my home assessor thanking her for all she did for me. I am so lucky to have baby girl in my home and I am so lucky to have a job that I love. In time, things always fall into place :)

On a side note-- it is social work appreciation month-- Have you thanked a social worker today??? :)

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