Past
My mom gave birth to me at twenty years young. Looking back on it, it feels like my mom and I grew up together. My mom and dad had another child, my younger brother, Curtis. At the age of four, my mom and dad got divorced and my mom would later re-marry and have another child, my little sister, Olivia.
From the age of four and on, my Father wasn’t very involved in my life, stating that he, “didn’t know what to do with a little girl”. My mom and my siblings and I grew very close because we only had each other after my mom and stepfather divorced. As I got older, when my mom was in school or at work, she relied on me to take care of my brother and sister. At a young age I gained the value and the experience of being in a care-giving role. I believe that this is where the first building blocks for my path to social work began.
I grew up in poverty. My mom worked a lot to make ends meet, but she was also in school for quite some time so that she could get a better job in order to provide a better life for us. Living in poverty for much of my adolescent life forced my tiny family unit to be very close, and to make ends meet I had to help provide and raise my siblings. Growing up in such a way taught me the value of hard work and instilled a strong work ethic in me. Aside from good work ethic, my life experiences shaped me to want to help others and provide support to those that need it.
At age seventeen I was raped by someone I know. This experience would both shatter and reshape my entire life and the way that I perceive everything. I still feel like I can remember looking at my soul outside of my body; it felt like there was a part of me that I had lost forever. I wound up excessively using alcohol, seeking out risky situations, and trying to get myself in trouble, so that I could regain a sense of control over the risks and dangers in my life. I would later go on to get professional help, so that I could process the events that happened, and I learned how to no longer let my assault control every area of my life. A therapist helped me save my own life.
After this, my path to social work would continue to grow through my career experiences, although, it had happened in an inadvertent way. I had taken a job at a substance abuse rehabilitation center because I needed a job. The things that I experienced in this job would forever shape my path and the way I see the world. The first night on the job, I cried, thinking about how I could have been one of the patients there. Because of the assault that I experienced and the ways in which I responded to that trauma, I could have become one of the patients. Yet, I wasn’t. As I worked there, I experienced a wide variety of events and feelings that would continue to shape my growth and guide me along the path to where I am today.
After working there for quite some time, I experienced a few patients who contributed to the growth I gained from that job. The one thing that stands out the most to me about these patients is just the amount of sadness that they had and the fact that they strongly desired to get better but could never seem to. They would be in and out of treatment and it inspired me to want to be there for them, so that they could have someone who gives a shit about them, without wanting drugs or money in return. These people would come in so broken, with no one there for them, and it made me sad for them. It inspired me to do better and to be better so that I could be in their corner for them. I wanted to be there so that they knew that they had support and that there was someone out there that cared about them.
Present
After working at the rehabilitation center for nearly six years, I decided to switch jobs, as the work environment at my old job had grown to be incredibly toxic. I took another job working in the substance abuse field, where I would report on the progress and participation of court participants.
While I don’t love this job, it gave me a different insight into the ways in which the criminal justice system operates. Not only did it give me a different insight into this system, but it also stirred a stronger sense of social justice within myself. This sense of social justice and wanting to fight for people further shaped my desire to become a social worker. The desire that I felt to become a social worker had grown enough that I made the decision to enroll in University of Alaska in order to begin their Bachelor of Social Work program.
Future
In the Social Work program, I hope to gain a better understanding of how to support vulnerable individuals and to learn how I can be an asset to help individuals as they work to improve their quality of life. I hope to learn how to better intervene in key moments in an individuals recovery and I hope to learn how to better connect with people as I work to help them.
Outside of my professional goals, there are personal goals that I hope to work on as well as I pursue this path. While I already possess a strong sense of empathy, sympathy, and a desire for social justice, I want to further develop my ability to utilize these tools in order to better help individuals that I serve in a social work capacity.
Mindy Haley
Thanks for sharing such a deep story about your past. I believe it truly has brought you to where you stand today, and I am proud of you for surviving those experiences.
It is such an interesting thing how our own traumas can help us connect with vulnerable populations and the individuals who need social workers the most. I am very interested to learn about protecting ourselves as we practice in our professions – from reliving our old traumas, and from secondary trauma due to exposure to others. Fear of opening re-opening wounds was one of my greater hesitations to head down this career path, but I know there is a way it can be done. Is this something that you had support or training with in your career so far?
Ariel Oviatt
Thank you for the kind words. It’s a vulnerable thing to share, but necessary because I feel like that takes its power away.
I don’t recall having formal training of any kind, it was a lot of learning by watching and listening. I try not to disclose a lot of personal information if it isn’t helpful, or in an attempt to relate to another person to help them feel more comfortable sharing. The most important thing I have gained from working in this field so far is to utilize my peers and supervisors so that I can process anything that I feel I might be carrying around. I also found it helpful for me to decide who I am before I get to work so I know where I stand and I already know my limitations (mentally and sometimes physically) for the day. Working in the social work field helps in and of itself, because while we try not to trauma-dump on one another, we are also built in listeners (which is both good and bad I suppose). I also have a really dark sense of humor, which helps me get through some of it. The rest I try to process with my supervisors when I can, if I feel like I am struggling to do it on my own. The other thing I have found that I utilize to protect or support myself have been firm boundaries with our clients, which has been the most helpful to me (and this was something I had to learn quickly). I’m not sure how helpful that is, but I hope that at some point in this journey they might cover some alternatives, because that’s a great point.
Danelle Shellikoff
Hi Ariel, I commend you for sharing that horrible experience with us. I’m glad you had the tools to help you process what happened. I also want to thank you for being there for those struggling with addiction. I just had three years sober from my alcohol addiction on June 12th of this year. There were workers in my residential treatment center who clearly did not care; there were others I will remember forever. I’m sure you are that person who made an impact on someone struggling, and you are a part of their recovery story now. I find that beautiful.