LD’s grandmother had a strong presence in her family. The matriarch set the family structure and created her family system according to the Haitian traditional customs and beliefs. In the process of working with LD, I had to research Haitian culture and traditions to understand better her dilemma’s with grandma. In my research, I gained knowledge that enabled me to process what LD was communicating to me and used that knowledge to assist her.
Shulman (2016), states that as the middle phase session proceeds the worker uses several groups of skills called skill factors. Skill factors are defined as a set of closely related worker skills that may include empathic skills, sharing feelings, challenging the illusion of work, supporting the client in taboo areas, and sessional ending and transition skills. I believe that I have included and demonstrated these skills with LD in session. Empathic skills were utilized in reaching for her feelings, in the client/worker relationship, trust and caring were established and the client was able to perceive empathy. It is imperative for the worker to differentiate empathy from sympathy. According to Kirst-Ashman (2015), empathy is crucial for the helping process to be effective. It involves not only being in tuned with the clients’ feelings, but also conveying to the client that you understand how they