2023.10.04 The Principle of never being poor

Case example: Long term patient/client with chronic history of being cash poor, e.g., no food, can't repair car, not enough money for gas, short on house payments, but the person is not destitute, they are not in immediate danger of being homeless.

Intervention: 20 dollars was given, in a non-requested scenario (prophylactically), with the educational addendum to keep the twenty dollar bill in the wallet and never to be spent.

Result: Two weeks later, the client noted the money was still in the wallet and immediate cash short-falls were being alleviated.

Takeaway (short term): prophylactic interventions like this are risky and should only be done with clients who are well known to the clinician as otherwise stable and capable of some internal progress in self-determination.

Clinical discussion: in another case of prophyactic intervention, the intervention only served to make the client more dependent on the monetary stream.