Praying

Five years ago, my case manager quit. That happens a lot. A LOT. She was my 12th case manager in four years...and she, like so many others, quit. So I was reassigned to a guy named Tarik. A guy. Right now it would be somewhat difficult to work with a male case manager. Sharing all that personal information about myself...it's hard enough just to work with a male psychiatrist. But back then it was entirely unacceptable for me to be assigned to a male case manager. I just wasn't in a place to have a male case manager. Luckily the supervisor knew that and reassigned me as soon as I brought that to her attention.

Lindsey was this hip young woman, only a year older than me. At 22 years old I wasn't used to working with someone so young. We clicked right away. I didn't really get too attached to her at first. I was so used to all the cool people leaving. And I was in so much other turmoil, it didn't really occur to me that she would last five years.

Five years. F-I-V-E. That's unheard of in this field. In that five years I've grown to trust her with so much of myself. It's only been in the past year that I've been able to open up to her more than I ever thought I would. Over these five years she's become my biggest support, my best source of stability and my favorite cheerleader.

But now there's budget cuts to the system and along with the thousands of people who are losing their services, 30 case managers at my site alone are getting laid off. Will Lindsey be one of them? I pray she won't. I hope that you'll pray with me because I don't know what I'd do without her in this time of major transition in my life.