Prosecuting The Victim, Gender Biases, and The Psychological Impact of Injustice

Chapter 14: Choosing Social Work as a vocation and Writing as an avocation...

I started talking to my parents about my discoveries. This began while I was a junior and over halfway through my education. I discussed a degree in English as my first choice and then I mentioned a degree in psychology. Both ideas were indeed good choices for me and much, much better choices than engineering.

I have always regretted that I didn't have an undergraduate degree in English because I love writing and this has been a reason for some insecurity that has followed me throughout life. I have always felt insecure about my writing skills and wished I had an undergraduate degree in English.

I could then go on and get a Master of Social Work (MSW) degree. I could get into an MSW program with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English or a Bachelor of Science in engineering or psychology. The latter would have been preferable and a better match for me.

Both of those would have extended my date of graduation from Georgia Tech and might have required additional funds or loans to be taken out by my parents. In retrospect, if I had a degree in English or Psychology, at least they would NEVER have expected me to work as an engineer!

I was thinking about how I could get into a graduate program with a four-year degree in a number of different fields. It didn't seem relevant to explain this to my parents. I wasn't seeking their approval. I was an adult by now.

My friend Suzanne recently commented on how English isn't practical. I would argue that learning things that interest you and doing things that interest you is very practical. Also, I was going to have to get a Master of Social Work degree and an undergraduate degree in the sciences or the arts is a prerequisite for graduate studies in social work.  

My father acknowledged that he had long known that engineering was not right for me. Yet, he never brought that up.

In all honestly, I should have made sure not to have a degree in engineering as that would be the root of all problems for my life with my parents in the next few years after graduation. 

As much as I wanted to learn more about literature and psychology before graduating, I mainly had a focus on the goal that mattered most to me.

The freedom to make my own plans and live my own life these past five years had been so transformative. I had discovered myself and my interests. For the most part, I wasn't discussing my plans with my parents because they seemed uninterested. I just knew that they weren't going to pay for additional undergraduate studies or graduate studies.

I shared these plans with my best friends and of course, my counselor and I were discussing these issues.

I decided that I was going to live with my parents for a little while which seemed like something that was okay with them. I knew they were not going to pay for graduate school but that was fine. I had discovered that there was a state psychiatric hospital near where my parents lived, and I thought I could volunteer there.

Great, that gave me now a very specific plan. I could volunteer with the social work team at that state psychiatric hospital in Augusta. Just thinking about it was exciting. I would prove myself there and get the necessary letters of recommendation from whoever was supervising me on the staff there - letters of recommendation that would open other doors.

Everything was carefully planned in every detail.

Having realized I had spent five years in the wrong field was a profound motivation for me to make sure I wasn't making any mistakes with my new plans.

My psychologist was totally and completely supportive of my plans to enter the field of psychiatric social work. I NEEDED to know that I had not just found what was interesting to me but that I had the right aptitude, personality, character, and other traits necessary for this new career direction. There are almost no words to describe the valuable nature of the relationship I developed with my counselor over these years I spent at Georgia Tech. Having someone to listen to me and to whom I could bounce ideas off was infinitely valuable.