Grad School: Week 1

I just completed my first week of graduate school classes today.  It was a summer block, so the classes are already over and I am filled with conflicting emotions.

a.  I came into this fearful that I wouldn't be able to do a simester's worth of work in one week.  I came to learn that the two classes were pass/fail and required little more than attendance for 8 hours a day. So, positive.  I did learn how to read and use the DSM-IV.  I can tell the difference between scizophrenaform disorder and a paranoid delusional disorder, and can also tell you what a dissociative fugue is.  I also was the subject observed in a dream therapy demonstration and was reduced to tears in front of a grad student class of 60 people.  (I learned from this that I can bite off and chew public speaking and improvisation, but it is hard to stomach for the continuing 3 days of full time class).  I learned about the anthropological development of marriage, and how intimacy is expressed and can be taught through couple's sessions.  Those were the highlights.  That and a lot of Countertransferrance and Judgement discussions, teaching me how to use my instincts to ask questions.  Basically a lot of grad students practicing therapy on eachother as we present actual conflicts and issues from our lives.  Kinda like nursing students jabbing eachother in flobotamy class.

b.  I paid over $2000 in tuition plus books for these classes.  That's roughly $50 per hour just for sitting in class.  Fortunately I had paid vacation time stored up at work, but it is going to be a HARD transition as I quit my job for the fall semester beginning in 5 weeks. In my senior year of undergrad I had an internship as a Medical Social Worker Intern.  I was not paid and my father was aghast at the school blackmailing me for free labor as a professional.  I thought he was so silly, and just had to learn that school was something that took advantage of you.  I have now been working as a professional for the last year, and have gotten used to an income.  Not only am I quitting work to do this, but I am paying them to sit in a class room.  I DO have an internship that fortunately pays a stipend equal to minimum wage--which I am grateful for--but this seems like a lot bigger of a sacrifice this time around.  There have been several times this week when I have asked myself "Why am I doing this?" and had to just trust myself and stick to the plan I made when I applied.

For better or for worse, in 13 months time I WILL have a master's degree in Social Work.  What might scare you more is that I WILL be a therapist operating under a lisence in less than 2 months...  Feels kinda ethereal, and I'm planning to have fun in the coming years figuring out what it all means :)