Managing the Endings of Relationships

Endings are often a difficult time in our relationships with service users and can be the trigger for those ruptures we discussed in an earlier blog. They bring up feelings for us as workers, which can range depending on how the relationship has been. We might feel worried about whether we’ve done enough, whether that person will be ok without our service, or we might worry that they will be angry with us, and all our good work will be forgotten. We might even feel relieved, which can be a tricky feeling in itself, often coming with lots of guilt for feeling that way. For our service users, endings can bring up feelings associated with past losses or rejections, fears about the future and worries about being alone again. 

Even when all the stars align, and both we and our service user are feeling happy with the work we’ve done and confident for the future, endings still require a lot of thought.

People experiencing homelessness and multiple exclusion often have previous negative experiences of endings. This might be in their personal lives, where they may have been rejected or abandoned by caregivers, or in their relationships with services, where often people have been described as “too complex” or have been unceremoniously discharged after missing an appointment or a letter. All of this can and probably will play out in our ending, no matter how well the work together has gone. 

We hope this blog will help you to create “good enough” endings with your service users – there is no such thing as a perfect ending! 

Thinking about dependency

In healthcare and beyond, the concept of dependency is often talked about as we approach endings. We worry that service users are relying on us too much, have very little in their lives beyond services, and that this might make it difficult for them to move on past services. When we dig a little deeper, we can see the roots of this concept in our very individualised society. Unlike societies in the global south, where community and caring for one another are more embedded in the culture, the UK and other Western societies have an approach which is all about being independent. We idolise the idea of not relying on anyone but ourselves. The idea of “personal responsibility” is woven into the fabric of our laws and policies and being “independent” is seen as an aspiration. We admire those who are “self-made”, often without acknowledging the various helping hands they had along the way. 

When we pair this with underfunded and overstretched services, we often come up against the narrative of dependency as a problem. Dr Emma Williamson argues that “being able to ‘depend’ on others and trust in reliable sources of support is the path to growth, psychological health and true independence” (taken from her chapter “The Dependency Paradox”). People experiencing homelessness have often lacked stable and reliable people in their lives. Without this, they may struggle to internalise the concept of caring for themselves, having never experienced true care from others. 

Holding on the importance of being that stable and reliable person in our service users’ lives can help us to think more compassionately about the ending. We can reflect on what they might have learnt from our relationship which they could take forward, rather than blaming them for becoming “too dependent” on services. It might also help us to constructively challenge when the idea of “dependency” is brought up in discussing discharge. By acknowledging the way in which our systems are designed, we can take a step back and reflect on what else is going on which is making us feel worried, distressed, or why we might be leaning on this idea of dependency. Maybe we’re frustrated with the progress, or we’re really worried that this person might struggle outside of services. These are all really normal ways to feel and they deserve to be reflected on and talked about in our teams. 

Managing our own feelings

Often our own experiences of what it is like to work in the service, or previous endings in our personal and professional lives, can come up for us when thinking about endings with service users. For example, you might be the kind of person who just likes to “slip out” when leaving a job. People making a fuss over you leaving might make you uncomfortable, so you’d just rather avoid it. Whilst that is absolutely your choice when you leave a role, it is very likely that this uncomfortable feeling might also be coming into your work around endings with your service users. 

We all, consciously or unconsciously, bring our own “stuff” to our work – our likes and dislikes, preferences, ways of working which have suited us in the past, knowledge, skills, emotional responses and how much sleep we had last night. This includes the way we would prefer endings to happen.

It can be really helpful to bring this into the conversation with our service users. Being open, human, and willing to have a difference of opinion is important in helping to set the tone for jointly creating a good enough ending. We can acknowledge our own preferences, talk about the last time we left a job for example, and ask the service user what their experience of endings has been like. It’s important to listen to the good and the bad, and often the bad will be far easier to recall than the good. Maybe we could ask some questions to find out if there have been any good enough endings? Or what they might think that would look like? 

Supervision and reflective practice sessions can also be really useful spaces to have conversations about our own feelings around endings. These spaces should be non-judgemental and open spaces, where you can talk about all of the feelings which are coming up for you. 

What does a “good enough” ending look like? 

There is no such thing as a perfect ending, and through this blog we’ve talked a lot about “good enough” endings. For many of the people we work with, endings will have been bad. Good enough is a great benchmark and helps us to acknowledge that it’s normal to feel sad or angry, as well as proud or content, when a relationship ends. 

A good enough ending acknowledges the emotions which are coming up and reflects on what has been learnt from the relationship. It’s important to think about this from both sides, as often we learn just as much from our service users as they do from us – so let’s tell them that! This is also a helpful prompt to support people to think about what qualities make a good or a helpful relationship, and how you will both apply what you’ve learnt together in the future. 

Sometimes the people we work with might opt out of these conversations, they might be too painful or too difficult to have in person. Sometimes the ending doesn’t go as we planned, which can be difficult for us as workers too. If appropriate, you could try writing to your service user to express some of what you might have discussed in person. You could talk about the changes you might have noticed in them, or examples of times when they engaged well or achieved something. You could tell them what you’ve learnt from them, and what your hopes are for their future. Letters can be a good way of helping people to transition, from being part of your service to being part of a broader social network. 

If this blog has been helpful and you’d like to reflect further on endings, please contact us to talk about how we could support your team.