There were six of us going through this qualifying ordeal together. Three males and three females, all recent graduates of NYC colleges master's degree programs in School Psychology. These internships were offered by the NY Bureau of Child Guidance at a location in Queens NY. We shared a single, nondescript office furnished with school house worn wooden chairs and desks from another, long gone, era. For a full year we shared too, the ups and downs of being under an electron microscope in the person of Eileen Stephenson, our supervior, who had thirty years of experience with the Bureau as a Clinical Psychologist. Dr Stephenson smiled only rarely, in fact her face showed almost zero emotion. Physically too she seemed stiff and unbending. Her speech was exact but minimal. I felt she always said far less than she knew and wondered what she was holding back and why. If it was good news, why keep it from us. Well, after a while, I got used to her and concluded that was just the kind of person she was and put it out of my mind.
Perry, who lived way out away from the city on Long Island, was one of my fellow interns whom I became close friends with and who had been over my apartment in Astoria Queens several times with his wife. He was unable to put our supervisors unusual manner out of his mind. As a matter of fact, it apparently weighed heavily on him for he seemed to freeze up in her presence. We met with Dr. Stephenson both individually and as a group. It was in the group sessions that I saw him unravel whenever she posed a challenging question to him. His face would redden, He'd start to speak then stutter and finally stop, trying to regain his composure, eventually he'd say anything, just to get off the hook. That wasn't the Perry that I had come to know.
It was at one of my individual sessions with Dr. Stephenson. We had been reviewing the progress I was making in working with a young African American sixth grade boy from a local school with whom I had switched from verbal counseling over to play therapy to see if some of his family dynamics might begin to become clearer. My supervisor had provided some genuinely useful feedback on my report and I was about to leave her office when she caught me up short and asked about Perry. She wanted to know if I had any clues regarding what was contributing to his difficulties in the program.
I thought to myself that the only problem he was experiencing in the Internship was in the group sessions--------but how do I say that without getting myself in hot water.
I decided to back up and ease into my answer. I talked about how everyone felt pressure to do well and how for Perry that pressure was even more intense and told her a bit about his background that explained why. Then, after sharing my observation of Perry's effective performance in other settings I said, "And besides, as you well know, you are quite a formidable person". To my amazement, that seemed to floor her. She replied showing a rare expression of facial surprise, "WHO ME", she didn't believe anyone could ever see her in that light.
She apparently lacked insight about the impact she made on people. She just didn't have a clue. Who would have guessed? How many people out there, who sit in judgment over others are similarly blind to what they bring to those encounters? How many sensitive victims have consequently, been left behind as road kill?
2 comments on Supervisor lacking Insight
Add a comment
To add comments without entering your email and image verification, you must be logged in. Login or Join Blogster
I can relate to this story. With a few exceptions, I felt the "cold shoulder" quite often during my medical training, although I was one of the youngest in my class, so my relative immaturity might have made me more sensitive to those distant professors who were preoccupied most of the time, it seemed.