Play Therapy

After yesterdays pity- party, I thought I'd talk a little bit about something different
Have  I mentioned yet that I'm a Play Therapist?    I've had jobs where I have a title, but it's not who I am.  But, being a therapist is something that sort of integral to your soul.  Play therapy is the form of therapy that is used with children.  A play therapist uses toys and playing as the therapy.  A lot of people say they do play therapy when what they mean is that they have toys in their office and use those toys to engage the child clients in a conversation with words.  Play therapist realize that children are concrete creatures.  Words are abstract but toys are concrete.  When children play, they are communicating much more with their choice of toys, how they play, and how they engage the therapist then they ever do with their words.  I can never remember the exact statistic, but something like 85% of what we say and communication has nothing to do with words.  Take the sentence, "I didn't say you were stupid. "  Now say that sentence emphasizing a different word every time.  I didn't say you were stupid.  I didn't say you were stupid.  I didn't say you were stupid.  I didn't say you were stupid.  I didn't say you were stupid.  And finally , I didn't say you were  stupid.   Same words, different meaning every time.
My MS has had an impact my ability as a therapist.  Sometimes this is a negative impact, like when I fall asleep in sessions!  But many times it has been useful and helpful.
Sometimes, how clients respond to the obvious signs of my MS, is almost diagnostic!  If a child just blurts out, "You walk funny!", I tend to think attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.  Some kids are more subtle.  Once a kid said to me, "My sister says you walk with a limp".  This was a kid who clearly didn't want to take responsibility for hurting my feelings.  I had another kid who made fun of my walking.   Here was a kid with oppositional defiant disorder!  It's a client completely ignores my condition or is oblivious to it, this tells me that they are so wrapped up in their own world and problems that they are slightly incapable of connecting with me. 
I have also used my MS to establish empathy.  Knowing that I have my own challenges, makes people feel that I have a greater understanding of what they aren't going through.  I worked with a kid who was on medication for depression.  He was very angry about having to deal with his depression and said something like, "You don't understand what it's like!  You don't have to take a pill every morning!"
I looked at him and said, "You don't have to give yourself a shot in the butt every other day!".  I wasn't trying to be unsympathetic.  But this was a kid who  was a chronic victim and he needed to have a reality check about the difficulty of this situation. When working with children whose parents have died, I recognize the need to reassure the clients that I don't have any intentions of dying anytime soon.  A lot of kids think that since I walk with a cane I must be  very very old!
Sometimes the MS can make it difficult for me to do some of the things that the kids want to do.  Recently I had a child say, "You might want to get down on the floor for this.".  I just say, "I am for staying in my chair.".  Most kids are okay with that as long as I can lean way down to be on their level.  Sometimes I have kids who really need to trash the play room.  I know this   needs to happen, but I just dread the cleanup process. (Trashing the room in play therapy talk, is sort of like an adult client having an emotional breakdown or being very angry.)  It is also a way for children's test the limits and see if I really do accept them unconditionally.  This is why I do not have glitter and my playroom!  The sand tray is bad enough!
So part of me wants to go on disability in order to alleviate the stress of worrying about insurance coverage and paying the mortgage but I really can't see myself giving up doing play therapy with children or not being a therapist anymore.  First of all, you really don't get all that much money on disability!  Secondly, and most importantly, being "disabled" and an invalid is not really a role I would like to ascribe to!
No one grows up and says, "I'd love to be on disability when I'm an adult"!
Being a play therapist is an integral part of my makeup.  Being on disability is not.