care of care givers

Some words are almost magical. "Care" seems to us to be one of these.

"Care" is an ancient term, with a profound meaning. It derives from the Latin word Cura(m), whose original meanings are thought, solicitude, but also anxiety and shortness of breath. The whole speech of the care is already condensed into its etymology.

Care is a profession, with its rules, its limits, its difficulties and satisfactions.

Just as many other work, "care" can also became a work of art: methods and techniques that encounter creativity to flow into the creation of works of art.

The treatment of care (or care-giving) can be carried out by people with very different roles and ranks, in a continuum that goes from professionals (psychologists, psychotherapists, educators ...) to teachers and parents.

Regardless of the diversity of roles and the different ranks that culture embodies around it, care always implies its own discourse. Each discourse of care implies its own meaningful structure, made of subject, verb, object, complement.

Anyone who has lived an experience of care in its various forms, aspects and positions, knows that the only subject of care is those who request it, those who use it. The subject of care is as well a single object of care.

We situate our discourse of "care" within this grammar, and we like to think about lending our professional skills to people, that we always consider individuals who can choose to experience themselves as subjects of care, long before they live as patients, clients, colleagues or users.

Always having the subject of care in one's mind, in our work, means a free, non-judgmental, profound and respectful attention to the person's profound dignity, which is, and remains, the only one able to act a structural change in his individual history.

For this reason we have decided to open a new generative phase of our care-work by uniting, sharing and making available our skills to offer our care and to pass the care to those who will participate, working in various ways in the care.

We are willing to experiment together with new discourses of care, contaminating and contaminating, exchanging and sharing group paths, which can be conducted or co-led by a group of colleagues and friends to generate a new dimension of collective care.

We are:

• Paolo Brusa, psychologist, trainer, supervisor: active in the socio-educational field since 1994, degree in Clinical Psychology and Community in 1997, since 2003 he works as a freelancer collaborating with various organizations in Italy and abroad. In addition to the psychological support for individuals, couples and victims of violence, he works as a trainer, methodological consultant and clinical supervisor expert in the psychological and relational sector in Piedmont, Veneto, Trentino, AltoAdige and Friuli in services and with at adult in condition of homelessness, victims of violence, refugees, asylum seekers, minors, individuals with physical and mental disability, ethnic minorities. Since 2000, he works as a consultant, project management and coordination of projects funded by the European Commission, of which he is an external consultant for the Horizon 2020 program and for the Executive Agency for Consumers, Health and Food Safety (CHAFEA)
• Cristina Testa, psychologist, psychotherapist, psychodramatist: since 2000 she works with groups, in different services. For many years she worked with women experiencing homelessness and in the psychiatric area, first as an educator and then as a psychologist. Between 1998 and 2006, aside her clinical activity, she was involved as researcher in psychiatry. From 2007 to 2013 she participated in the design of the Master in Psychodrama at IUSTO, and as a lecturer. Currently, she work as a clinical psychotherapist with adults and young adults, individual and couples; she work as a team supervision and as a trainer in the Degree Master Course in Nursing. She is the Director of the National Workshop of the School of Psychotherapy of COIRAG.
• Daniela Parafioriti, psychologist, psychoanalytic psychotherapist: since 1998 she works in and with groups, in different services in Piedmont and in Lombardy. For many years she worked in the field of psychiatry and services for people experiencing social exclusion, first as an educator and then as coordinator, responsible for services; now she is also acting as a psychologist and trainer. Since 2009 she dedicated herself to clinical activity as a psychotherapist. From 2014 she works in the job insertions and orientation projects for different fragile targets. As a free lance, she works a psychotherapist with adults, young adults and couples; she is a team-supervisor in Piedmont and in Lombardy.
• Claudia Guidi, psychologist, psychotherapist, psychodramatist: degree in Clinical Psychology and Community in 1998, she obtained the specialization in group psychotherapy in 2003. She works as individual and group psychotherapist with a psychodramatic methodology. She conducts group-sessions for children with relational and learning disorders and conducts parent support interviews. From 2001 to 2005 she entrusted with children with very serious disabilities. She leads groups of educational, clinical and training supervision aiming at a constant updating and analysis of issues related to discomfort, equal dignity and the development of differences in an inclusive key. Since 2011 she works in the conception, development and management of clinical-educational groups, and as a team-supervisor in projects dedicated to integration and support for children and adults in situations of marginality and migrants.
• Silvia Cerrone, psychologist, psychotherapist: she works as a freelance psychotherapist with adults and elders, both individually and in groups. She is a consultant at the “Center of Social Theater and Community Work” of the University of Turin, for which she is responsible for the area of health promotion, as well as psychological supervisor for emergency projects and development cooperation and conductor of laboratories that use the methodology of social and community theater. She worked in the therapeutic community Il Porto with patients with personality disorders and addiction problems.

The group work dimension shares few but defined rules: no interest in value judgments and what may be right or wrong to do; a guarantee of participation and periodicity in the meetings; the commitment to report during the meetings the possible dynamics among the components experienced outside the group itself.

We are not only colleagues and friends, we also share a common approach which is linked to the our specific-but-diverse skills and experiences, and is part of the work methodology in free group and peer sharing, which recognizes the participants full responsibility and freedom in the contents and forms sharing, with the foresight to dedicate a space to everyone.

We are available to inhabit a space for sharing a plurality of points of view, ideas and suggestions on a theoretical, methodological and significant starting from the constitutive structure of the individual to groups