their story...my story...your story

So when I was in school one of the tests we would sometimes get would be a 'fill-in-the-blanks' test.  We were sometimes given the words to fill into blank spaces left in a passage or sometimes no words were given and it was up to you to determine what the missing words and where they went.  One of the things that I'm learning every day as a social worker is to not fill in the blanks.  Sometimes a client shares with us part of their story and we're kind of left trying to figure out the missing pieces.  And we look at their current situation and circumstance and use that to determine what the gaps are.  But the reality is that their present is not what has determined their current situation. And what we see is only the now but we don't know the road travelled before they got here.  What's yoEvery time we look at someone we are only seeing part of their story.  Even when we talk to persons there is a part of themselves that they don't always share and still left with only part of their story.  You see someone's story is made up of so many pieces and parts that usually the only person who knows the whole story is the person themself.  Not even a parent knows the entire story about their child.  And so when we interact with others, we have to be ready for whatever may come our way because "the full has not yet been told."  So the next time we see the harried looking mother at the grocery store with 3 or 4 kids trying to swipe her EBT card...remember you don't know her story. Or the next time, you see the young lady sitting on the train station acting what you perceive to be inappropriate behaviour on the train...remember you don't know her story.  The young man at the traffic light with a mug begging for change...you don't know his story...even me sitting here at my desk, typing this blog, seemingly well put together, and everything going well for me...you don't know my story.