ABSTRACT
This chapter illustrates a process inherent in the social work task: the encompassing and the bringing together of a polarity. It gives evidence of an unconscious dimension of the point of view of the client. The social worker had carried the issue of the lost man/father figure in the forefront of her own mind, and so was quickly sensitive to those points in both interviews when it was palpably relevant. The social work task, in cases where there are emotional problems to be worked on, can be conceptualised as having three stages: the initial, ongoing and termination phases. A major feature of the ongoing phase of work is that the social worker repeatedly finds, after hard won achievements, that she is 'back to square one'. Even very experienced social workers need a supervisor, a seminar group or a workplace case discussion group to restore their belief that their own capacity to survive is what will strengthen their clients.
