Reflective Report: Social Worker's Approach to Client with Addiction

This report presents a social worker's reflective account of interacting with a client named Alisha, who is facing homelessness and drug addiction following a mental breakdown due to a relationship breakup. The social worker details the initial assessment of Alisha's condition, acknowledging the complications arising from her drug abuse and family estrangement. The reflection focuses on the social worker's approach, emphasizing the importance of understanding Alisha's past relationships, family dynamics, and the events leading to her current state. The report further discusses the potential physical and psychological effects of Alisha's drug abuse, including changes in her appearance, depression, and possible heart disease and neurological damage. The social worker highlights the need for patience, empathy, and building trust to effectively counsel Alisha. Key strategies included active listening, providing a safe space for her to share her feelings, and facilitating connections with other individuals recovering from addiction. The report also touches upon the importance of involving Alisha's family in her recovery process. The reflection concludes with insights gained by the social worker, emphasizing the progressive nature of addiction and the significance of early intervention, the importance of building rapport and the potential for individuals to change with the right support and guidance.

Running head: SOCIAL PRACTICE
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Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

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1. My name is Alex, and this is a summary of the scenario that my client is facing. My
client Alisha is having facing some issues in last few days. My client Alisha is suffering from a
mental breakdown due to her relationship with her boyfriend. She became a drug addict after
breakdown her relationship with her boyfriend. Due to this drug addiction Alisha’s family is
ignoring her and she became homeless. The scenario is pretty much complicated and it needs to
be dealt carefully so that Alisha can come out of this trauma. Alisha needs to be observed
carefully her actions need to be observed carefully to understand what can be done to make her
come out of this drug addiction.
2. Alisha has become drug addicted due to the mental breakdown for her relationship with
her boyfriend (Wise & Koob, 2014). The problem arises due to her depression. In this case I
need to carefully analyse how much the incident affected her and how she can be treated so that
she feel better. As the social worker my primary approach will understand her past relations, her
relation with her family and what the reasons behind the recent breakdowns. She needs to be
treated with care and then we need to help her by providing her carrier building sessions by
which she will be able to manage her issues effectively (Kolodny et al. 2015).
3. Drug abuse can affect her in a number of ways. Getting homeless is one of the many
problems that she will be facing (Ersche et al. 2012). Her physical appearance has changes
recently due to the effects of the drugs that she is using. The harmful drug addiction has affected
her appearance; she became thin and has dark circles. She has reduced weight in this few days
and has been suffering from depression. She also has developed heart disease due to the
substance abuse. She has been highly affected by the addiction. She started this drug addiction in
2016 and has been taking all the drugs that is available in the market. The substance abuse has
affected her brain and the nerve system. This information was collected after we examined her in

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a local hospital. Her condition has detoriated so badly that if I don’t take any steps immediately
she will be highly affected and which can ultimately lead towards her death. Being a counsellor I
and people around me who is trying to help her will need to understand that th8is whole
procedure will take time and this we need to keep calm and behave nicely to her so that she feels
comfortable with us to share her feelings. Understanding what is going in her mind is the first
thing that we need to understand. Understanding her feelings for example when she is sad and
when she is angry or happy is crucial to interact with her effectively. Addiction is a progressive
and chronic disease; it gets worse over time if it is not treated properly. Addiction is tough to get
over, but with care and time it can be cured. Having a positive conversation with the client will
be the first step as it will help in building relationship and it will also make the client feel
comfortable and trust the counsellor (Everitt & Robbins, 2013). It is important to drop all the
expectation and focus on what the client have to say regarding her current situation. As she
explained that she has been highly affected by the breakup that she had recently which led her
towards depression and then she started doing all kinds of drugs. She started with marijuana and
now she is in such position that she has nothing left to try. She also expressed her worries and
disappointment about how she tried to stop all these addiction and how tough was for her to
control those. She expressed how much she misses her family.
She needs to be given proper guidance about how she can improve her situation and how
she can come out of this mess. I need to give her proper opportunity to share everything that she
wants to share. One of the most important reasons for depression is unable to share problems
with others. Understanding her problems and listening to her problems will make her feel
comfortable and she will feel that she is not alone. After she discusses all her problems I need to
give her time and will take an open session with other drug addicts who also wants to cope up

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from this addiction this will help her understand their problems and this will also make her feel;
the consequences of drug addiction. This open session will also help her to make friends, this
will make her understand how to build relationship and will also give opportunity to share her
problems with them. The next step will be informing her parents about her recovery and how she
is changing herself to fit into the society. This will give a huge boost to her recovery as she will
be seeing her parents after a long time and this will make her feel comfortable and her parents
will also be able to take better care of her.
This helped me to learn many things about how people can be affected by such emotional
breakdowns. This helped me to understand that people can change if they are willing to change.
Addiction is progressive and it will only get worse with time so it needs to be treated as soon as
possible. This will help my carrier as I learned many things like how to understand someone’s
feelings and how I can help someone to manage her problems. This will help me in many
profession as it made me understand that key is essential in the counselling process and with time
everyone can heal.

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References:
Ersche, K. D., Jones, P. S., Williams, G. B., Turton, A. J., Robbins, T. W., & Bullmore,
E. T. (2012). Abnormal brain structure implicated in stimulant drug
addiction. Science, 335(6068), 601-604.
Everitt, B. J., & Robbins, T. W. (2013). From the ventral to the dorsal striatum:
devolving views of their roles in drug addiction. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 37(9),
1946-1954.
Kolodny, A., Courtwright, D. T., Hwang, C. S., Kreiner, P., Eadie, J. L., Clark, T. W., &
Alexander, G. C. (2015). The prescription opioid and heroin crisis: a public health approach to
an epidemic of addiction. Annual review of public health, 36, 559-574.
Wise, R. A., & Koob, G. F. (2014). The development and maintenance of drug
addiction. Neuropsychopharmacology, 39(2), 254.