Texas Counselors Creating Badass Businesses
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Since 2007, she's been co-supporting her family (along with her amazing husband) with her counseling practice achievebalance.org and counselor education company Kate Walker Training LLC. Dr. Kate openly shares wins, losses, and all the lessons in between with the Texas Counselors Creating Badass Businesses Community.
Author of My Next Steps: Create a Counseling Career You'll Love, researcher, speaker, and professor of counselor education, Kate helps you learn about positioning yourself as your community's expert resource, marketing, building HIPAA compliant scalable systems and outsourcing, content creation, podcasting, search engine optimization, niche development, social media strategies, how to get more clients, creating online courses, becoming a clinical supervisor, and productivity tips so that you create something amazing without burning yourself out.
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Texas Counselors Creating Badass Businesses
115 What Is Code-Switching In Therapy? An Interview With Dr. Patrice Dunn
Dr. Patrice Dunn joins us to unravel the intricate dynamics of code switching, sharing her journey from growing up in predominantly white environments to becoming a counselor and assistant professor. Through personal anecdotes and professional insights, Dr. Dunn sheds light on how code switching impacts mental health and why it’s crucial for counselors to recognize this in their sessions. Listeners will learn strategies for managing code switching, as Dr. Dunn reframes this often stressful necessity as a potential superpower, offering guidance on how to harness it effectively while maintaining one's cultural authenticity.
We explore the unconscious nature of code switching across race, class, and professional landscapes, drawing on Ruby Payne’s perspectives on class differences. The conversation delves into the observation skills of marginalized communities as they navigate social cues and societal expectations. Personal stories highlight the pressures and biases faced in various settings, emphasizing the emotional labor involved in staying true to one’s culture while adapting to dominant norms. This episode provides a thoughtful examination of identity development, stereotype threats, and the subtle ways individuals alter their behavior in response to external pressures.
Education and counseling take center stage as we discuss the importance of cultural sensitivity and creating environments where diverse voices are valued. Dr. Dunn shares insights into the challenges of code switching in educational settings, highlighting its impact on students’ participation and overall well-being. From classroom dynamics to food traditions and societal stereotypes, the episode underscores the necessity of ongoing learning and discourse in fostering multicultural understanding. By sharing experiences and reflections, we aim to inspire listeners to engage with these themes and consider the broader implications of cultural identity in their own lives.
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Welcome, Dr Dunn. Tell us a little bit about you and the program you're going to give us tonight.
Speaker 2:Okay, I am Dr Patrice Dunn. I'm in the Dallas area and I have a private practice that I've been doing almost 20 years I don't really count, but it's getting close to that. I am an assistant professor at Midwestern State University, enjoying that loving working with future counselors. I've been a counselor supervisor for almost as many years as I've been in private practice, and so this topic for me.
Speaker 2:Last year about this time I had attended a couple of conferences ACA, aces a couple conferences and this topic kept coming up of code switching and I left there with a feeling of, oh, some people are missing some things. They were talking about it. I agreed with everything they were saying, but I thought that there was another perspective to it. I was raised in predominantly white environments and so how I view code switching had a little different perspective on how some of the presenters I was watching had. So I thought, you know, there might be some people who know what it is and don't have any reason to know what it is, and some people are angry because they feel they're put in situations where they're forced to code switch for lots of different reasons, and we'll talk about some of that tonight.
Speaker 2:And so I just thought let's just get a little more clarity. It challenged me as an educator to kind of dig a little deeper, seeing what other people were saying about it. I've talked to several people just in preparation for this that work in different areas and just seeing how they're processing that, how they're handling it, eventually you know what is the cost to our mental health when you're doing that. I always tell people everything costs you something and so to be put in those situations whether they're voluntary or not, I believe, cost us something. So we'll look at that and then what we can do as counselors whether we feel like we code switch or not, how we can help improve in that area.
Speaker 1:Awesome, thank you. So before I, if you need to share screen, you can do that. I've made you co-host a little housekeeping. If you've attended these before, you know the drill. Please leave your camera on if you would like the CE. If you don't need the CE, don't worry about it. You can eat your dinner with your camera on, we don't care. But if you'll look over in the chat, you'll see that we have posted an attendance link. You must click that link and fill out the Google form. It's super quick and it's very, very helpful if the name you are using in this presentation matches that name. So take a moment and just click the link and that way you have it when the meeting ends and you won't need to worry about it. I think that's it All. Right, dr Dunn, over to you, okay.
Speaker 2:Let me just say real quick thank you for my fellow faculty members for joining in today. I appreciate love you guys. I'm glad you're here, I'm glad everybody is here, and I will leave plenty of time for questions and discussion. That's how I learn is by talking about what we're talking about, and I did get a couple of questions that I will address from Kate before if I don't cover it in what we're talking about. So just a couple of things that I want to go through very quickly. I'm going to talk about my why. Why am I talking about this? We'll find a definition of code switching. I'm going to give you lots of examples Again. That's kind of how I learned, like show me what that looks like. I'm going to talk about code switching as it relates to counselors and clients. Hold on, I lost my button.
Speaker 2:Talk about why do people code switch, the negative impacts of that on their mental health, strategies and solutions. How do we move forward with that? I'll talk a little bit about how I use it as my superpower. How do we move forward with that? I'll talk a little bit about how I use it as my superpower and then we'll talk about the implications of what counselors need to know about code switching. Hopefully I'll get through all of that, ok. So I'm always curious like what, what do people know? And just for the sake of time I won't go through that and use the chat and all of that, but I'm always curious like was this a brand new topic? Did you hear Kate talk about this? And you're like I don't even know what code switching is. What is that? And so I think you know in this group we could be at lots of different places in terms of what we already know about code switching, but I'll share a little bit about kind of my why and kind of my journey through this.
Speaker 2:Again, I grew up in predominantly white environments, went all through higher ed in white environments, and so I think code switching was a thing for me. However, I didn't know that's what that was. It just had always been what I had always done. My mother was very instrumental in making sure that she inserted us in places where we weren't the only person of color in the room. We went and we traveled on vacations. We always went to historically black colleges and universities, so we had a good mixture of that, but in terms of how we presented ourselves, I think it led more to the dominant group than not, and so I put these pictures up here because they're both me.
Speaker 2:Obviously, I have braids in one and I don't in the other. In the other, and one of the things this was recent, but I used to think when I was doing like photo shoots for my webpage the book cover that I had, you know, I didn't want to show up in braids. I mean, that was like a conscious thought that I had and it kind of irritated me. I'm like why am I even have to have this conversation with myself? Why am I battling with myself? I didn't want people to see my webpage and think that I only counsel black people, and so I would always take my braids out, straighten my hair, take the pictures and then, if I wanted to put the braids back in, I would. But it was a thing that I was constantly thinking about all the time what would I wear? How would I show up? I didn't want to be too Black, because that might scare some other people off, and I happened to be somebody who was much more comfortable with different groups of people, just because of how I grew up. I put that Black Votes Matter shirt there because I had a recent experience.
Speaker 2:Over the summer I went to New Orleans to the Essence Festival and they're giving out T-shirts like right and left. So everybody's like, oh yay, something free. And I always needed another shirt to clean the house in or whatever. But I put this shirt on one Saturday and ended up going to the Kroger and I had this shirt on. Didn't even dawn on me. I live in a predominantly white area of North Dallas and soon as I got out the car, this African-American lady runs up to me. She's like, oh my gosh, I love your shirt. And I was like, oh my gosh, I actually left the house in this shirt. What was I thinking? And I'm like, oh thanks, that's so nice Because I want to present myself one way to her. But to the other people, I'm going into the store and I'm like, should I turn the shirt inside out? I didn't know what to do Again, frustrated at myself that I even had to have that conversation. And so I definitely think it's a thing. I definitely think, if it's not managed well and identified that it can start to wear on your mental health and Lord knows, I don't need any help with that. So a couple of definitions. I took these from people smarter than me. So don't you worry.
Speaker 2:Code switching occurs when people from historically marginalized groups alter how they present or express themselves to gain acceptance from others in the dominant group. Y'all know who the dominant group is right. Okay, just make sure everybody will make sure we're using the same definitions of things. But you know, in this country that's the standard. The dominant group sets the standard for what beauty is, what acceptable is, what tone of voice makes sense in different environments. Code switching may involve adjusting one appearance, style of speech, behavior and expressions to optimize the comfort of others in exchange for fair treatment, advancement and employment opportunities. The code switching phenomena is visible in various settings, particularly in professional and educational environments, where people of color navigate spaces in which they are racially or ethnically or gender minority.
Speaker 2:You know, it just made me think, and kind of reading this again, I do think that there is some. You know. They talk about your employment opportunities. I think about genders. I mean generations, how some generations show up for a job interview Now. Our parents and grandparents would just be rolling over Like what are you doing? Why are you dressing like my grandma? But do you have pantyhose on? Are you wearing a slip? You know those. You know it was that standard black suit, white shirt. You know that's how you presented yourself. These kids show up and who knows, there's no standard now kind of how they do that. But again, you know that's the generations are kind of a different thing. But these are two definitions for me that are kind of the whole big picture of that.
Speaker 2:I'm curious to know I guess somebody could put it in the chat because I really just want to know and I figured I have a captive audience here so I could ask I'm curious if, based on, these'all got to watch this clip because it's a quick one. But I want you just to kind of tell me what you see in this. You guys should recognize him. He's been around. Do you see that? I'll play it again because it was quick but it's good. I played again because it was quick but it's good. You notice the difference in how he greets people.
Speaker 2:I don't know if you know any of the work of Ruby Payne, but she does a lot of work with classes, more so than race and ethnicity, but she talks about that middle class, the upper class, and then people in poverty One of the things that she says about people in poverty and there's a lot of people of color that might fall in that, but there's also people in the dominant group. But she talks about how observant we are. We watch how people interact with each other, right. And so if I'm a, if I'm a parent and I'm going to meet the teacher night, I'm going to look at how this white teacher greets all of the parents. You know. So she's given hugs and you know warm handshakes, and then she comes up to me and there's no physical contact, there's no anything. I'm developing a really quick opinion of that. And so me, being an African-American parent, going into that environment, am I changing how I interact with that white teacher versus when I go to the third period class? Am I responding differently to a teacher of color? Maybe my tone, maybe the way I greet them is different, but that handshake was definitely just telling to me. So, again, as I was kind of putting this presentation together, I began to think about the counselor versus the client.
Speaker 2:I've had people I office out of my home now and so I have people that call and want to make an appointment. They'll want to come in and I will open my front door and the shock that I see on people's face. Sometimes I'm not sure if they think I'm the help. I'm not sure you know they're like am I here to see her? Who is she? They don't really know what kind of name Patrice is, so they're not really sure. My mom told me she named me after a French white man, so I don't know what they're thinking when they hear my name. But so then there's just this oh my gosh, so then I'm you know. So then I. Then I'm thinking, unconsciously, thinking if you can do that, how am I going to win this person over? How am I going to quickly develop rapport? Because obviously the color of my skin has their mouth on the floor right, and so I have to very quickly get their confidence, get them to sit down. It doesn't take long. I've been doing it too long to not be good at doing it, but you can definitely see that.
Speaker 2:So sometimes the code switching could be from the counselor based on the clientele that they're seeing. As a school counselor. Sometimes it depends on the demographics of the school that I might be in. I worked in a district where I was a district-wide counselor, so I got to see the whole gamut. But so sometimes it's on us the ownership of that code switching as the counselor, to see what do I need to modify or dial back or tone down as a counselor? Do I speak differently to my clients of color? Do I speak differently to Asian clients? And then, on the flip side of that, do I have clients that come to me? Again, my question would be would a white client come to me and feel the need to code switch or not? I'm thinking not, but that's just me and I'm not able to speak on that with any level of experience.
Speaker 2:But other clients that might come in and think a certain way, and there's lots of things that put people in that position to feel like that. There could be a client that comes in that looks like me, but they see these three diplomas on my wall and they might feel like, okay, now they have to sit differently or they have to present themselves a certain way. We know that people come into counseling all the time thinking that there's a right answer to things and that we're looking for that right answer as opposed to you know I work really hard in my office just to get people to come in and feel like you're just sitting in somebody's living room having a conversation. I don't want it to be that stoic, sterile kind of feel, but so I, just, from the lens through which you're looking at this, I want you to think about it yourself as the counselor and then how that affects your clients that are coming in there. One of the questions that I got was what are some physical, verbal and other social cues people look for before they code switch? I said, wow, that's a good question. I don't know. Here's what my thought was. I just read it a little bit ago. I haven't had much processing time.
Speaker 2:I don't think code switching is always conscious environments with different people. Thanksgiving at my house is not the same Patrice that you see at work every day. Right, I might be louder. I laugh really loud anyway. We're just loud people. My whole family is like that and so everything we do is I used to tell my students when I taught school I don't know how to whisper Like, everything I do is loud. If I'm correcting you, it's going to be loud, don't be offended. It's going to be loud, don't be offended, it's going to be loud. If I'm loving on you, it's going to be loud. Right, my class is not that class that walks down the hallway very quiet. You know we try to put bubbles in our mouth and all those things. It just doesn't work that way. But I do believe that code switching can be individualistic. Like everybody, it might show up differently for everybody. I don't think I could teach a class on how to identify code switching.
Speaker 2:I think it's one of those tools that, as a therapist, you put on your belt and if you're pushing up against some resistant with your clients, if you're noticing that they're uncomfortable, then I tell my students all the time take the risk, ask them. I'm getting the sense that you're really uncomfortable. What is that about? Are you uncomfortable? Are you used to being in these situations? I look around sometimes. I've been in some environments where I look up and all of a sudden a white person will be the only white person in the room. Well, they're probably feeling a little uncomfortable and I can just imagine that I've been in that situation. So we talk about transparency a lot, you know, and how to use that and be skillful in using that in a therapeutic situation. That would be one of those times. But I don't know that there's any signs or clues. I think the younger they are, they would be less informed about that they're code switching. I don't think they think that that's what they're doing. They're doing it. That is just how they survive. That's how they fit in.
Speaker 2:We talk about people with that sense of belonging and community. They're doing it to fit. This is how everybody else talks. I did that one time I told my dad. I came home I said but dad, lisa's mom said he was like, do you need a new address? I said no, sir, I'm fine, I'm good, I'm sorry, I don't know what I was thinking, but you know, to him it's like that's not how we do things and you don't have to do it the way everybody else does things. Okay, let me keep moving here. Okay, so this is Janelle Hazelwood.
Speaker 2:She said in my experience, if I spoke too loudly, I was labeled ghetto or uncouth. If I spoke too much with my hands, using slang, or didn't enunciate every syllable, I'd be considered unreliable, uneducated or not trustworthy. If I used analogies that were smart but rooted in urban or Black culture, I'd sometimes be laughed at like I was the company comedian. I thought that was powerful, very well said and I believe many people would be able to relate to that. We talk all the time as counselors about our biases and what do we do with that? How do we check our biases at the door? I think this is one of those things. I've gone into schools. There'll be a group of African-American girls. They're like miss, they're all calling us loud. And is that another? I'm like well, are you being loud? They're like well, yeah, I'm like well, that's why they're doing it. So you don't have to kind of buy into that stereotype.
Speaker 2:But shouldn't it just be okay that we communicate differently, that we might use our hands? In some cultures it might be disrespectful to use your hands. I don't know about you guys, but these new things, these bells and whistles on these computers, sometimes, because I talk with my hands, all of a sudden a thumbs up will go up on my screen. Yeah, I'm like wait, how'd that happen? Like I don't know how to make it happen. I think I know how to do, like the hearts and all the little hearts that start to go up. But when you're talking, I get balloons that'll go up, confetti that will go up because I talk with my hands. So it's always a reminder to me. When I videotape like a podcast or something like that, I'm kind of like sitting on my hands because, you know, I'll always have a hand across my face. So there's a book. You know books are always better than the movies.
Speaker 2:But it's also a movie called the Hate U Give and it's about a young girl. She's a high schooler that lives in the inner city but attends school in a predominantly white area. Her father thought that was best for her, so he sends her out there, but she's torn between these two very different cultures and not really handling it well. She has a friend that's shot by a police officer, so she's dealing with that. How to find her voice? Her white friends are like what's wrong with you? Why are you all upset? So it's just a really good example of that. I work in these affluent school districts where there's lots of kids of lots of colors and parents always tell them don't apologize for wanting your kids to be in a certain school district, but understand that the struggle is real. And at this age you know, in the middle of adolescence they're trying to identify who they are. So when we talk about their identity development, they're struggling because of that.
Speaker 2:I was going to show you a clip from that. It was just going to be the trailer of the movie. You can Google that Um, but for the sake of time I don't want to do that and I'm not sure all this technology, what's going on. So I thought it would be important that we kind of discuss um, you know, I was thinking about like who, who code switch? So if, if, white people don't code switch, I don't know, I haven't seen the feedback yet, but you know, I think there's times where women might feel like they need to code switch. I was watching something.
Speaker 2:Oh, I went and presented to a school that's all construction, plumbing, all that kind of stuff, and they have a lot of mental illness. Apparently, they have very high rates of suicide in construction, mental illness Apparently, they have very high rates of suicide in construction. And so they hired me on to come out there and talk to them. And there's one woman there and I'm like, ooh wonder what that experience is like for her. Does she show up on the job and she's very feminine or does she feel like she has to toughen up and talk like the guys and act like the guys? So I think, women I'm speaking from the perspective of an African-American person.
Speaker 2:When I taught in Dallas, my Hispanic students struggled with that. They were actually when I was in Dallas years ago. They would almost get in trouble for speaking Spanish at recess lunch. I'm like, let them talk. Well, you know, that's when they're comfortable, you know. But a lot of them, their parents would be embarrassed to come. They all try to get rid of accents if they could. They didn't want to have that accent.
Speaker 2:I had a couple of students from India that would bring their lunch but boy, when they would open their lunch the smells would be strong. I mean I don't cook that well, but I mean I would assume it's curry and some other things and those smells linger, right. So kids are always like, eh, what's that smell? I have a client of mine got kicked out of school recently. It's not funny, I'm sorry. I laughed, but he got kicked out of school because he was eating a burrito and somebody was making fun of like how that smelled. And they're like oh, that stinks so bad I can't believe you're eating that. So he punched the kid in the face multiple times, went to alternative school. He said I missed homecoming because of a burrito. I said, yeah, you did. So.
Speaker 2:You know, doesn't make much sense. But there you go and then clothes. You know, kids, adolescents, are trying to find their identity. Parents complain all the time like, oh my gosh, why are they dressing so goth? They're so dark, they're not doing you know, or you know it's. There's a lot of research that shows that African-American males do well in predominantly white schools, do better in terms of that sense of community, because people think they're cool, they're hip, they have swag, they you know, they have rhythm and beat and all of these kinds of things, and so they assimilate a little better than the girls, who they're thought of as loud and aggressive and those kinds of things. But a lot of it is. You start seeing the white kids wanting to dress like some of the African-American males do, and so everybody's trying to figure out who they are. I work with a lot of adults that are still trying to figure out who they are, and so let's go through this list the purposes Now this is very. This list the purposes Now this is very academic. I'll just say that word for how they describe this in the literature Social integration All the research talks about.
Speaker 2:Retention in college and higher ed is all about that sense of community and you're finding a place that you can belong. Identity expression We've talked about that, whether or not the identity is in how you wear your hair, your jewelry Some people do that through tattoos. The communication efficiency why would they say that? Like that, I'm just like that's a whole lot of words, but just in how you communicate. Somebody was saying, oh, one of my students was doing something on a presentation and was talking about. You know cultures that don't look in your eyes. You know like it's disrespectful to look somebody dead in their face. In this country we're like, oh my gosh, you're being so rude. You want to look at me when I talk to you kind of thing. And sometimes it's just our word choice that makes us less efficient. Social norms and expectations the cultural adaptations this country has always deemed themselves the melting pot, right? Well, what if some people don't want to really melt together? What if we don't like what we're blending with Right? But there is this, this unspoken goal of assimilation that we're all going to hold hands and sing Kumbaya.
Speaker 2:Year two in higher ed. You definitely see power, dynamics and where people fit in with all of that, the expression of solidarity or inclusion. I believe you know I'm not the brightest apple in the bunch, but I believe everybody wants to belong somewhere. I just do, and I'm not talking about middle schoolers and mean girl stuff. I'm not just talking about high schools and cliques. I'm talking about adults. I think adults desire to fit in somewhere. They want to have their people, their tribe, their group of people, whether or not it's at work, it's at home, it's at church, wherever they are, they want to fit in and feel like they're a part of something, and that just doesn't always happen.
Speaker 2:Personal preference Some people in my experience just feel more comfortable being around white people. I don't look like them, but I feel more comfortable because I've learned how to operate and move in circles with them. So sometimes it's just a preference and so I have to speak a certain way so I can stay a part of that group that I've made myself a member of. I'm going to say this about the purposes. I think it's very different for everybody. I think about multiracial people, children. All of my grandchildren are multiracial and they find themselves sometimes not white enough to be considered white, not Black enough to be Black, considered white, not Black enough to be Black. In the African-American culture there's lots of things that separate us, whether it's the tone of our skin, if it's the hair, the texture of our hair All of my grandbabies look like they're Hispanic Black or white, they just look Hispanic.
Speaker 2:But what is that struggle like for an adolescent that's trying to develop and figure that out? Um, you know, do I act like this or do I act like that? Um, my one granddaughter she's 17 now, but she? Um used to say she was going to visit her Brown family, um, and so we were the Brown family and then she had her white family and she said the Brown family definitely ate better, um, so she enjoyed coming over here to get some good food. So I didn't argue with her, I agreed. So negative impacts that's kind of what we're, you know, hoping to avoid. We want to bring some recognition to this issue. And then how can we avoid this? So that identity strain, trying to figure out who you are, just that feeling of self-worth, like I belong, I am worthy.
Speaker 2:I think you know a lot of my research is with women, but I definitely believe everybody wants to be seen and wants to be heard. Right now I don't know if that has something to do with how they end up dressing or talking or wearing their hair. Sometimes I do think people are attention seekers, but in groups of people, not only do we want to find our group, we want to be seen and we want to be heard. You want to be valued, you want people to hear what you're saying and then hang something on that Like wow, that was good. And there's places I've been in them where I might say something and you just hear crickets and the research says then somebody else comes along from the dominant group, might say something very similar to that, and then we build on that and then that's a great idea, let's go ahead. Let's run with that idea. Good job, bob. And that's a great idea. Let's go ahead. Let's run with that idea. Good job, bob, you know. And so how do we, how do we have a voice without code switching? Can we find? Are we able to be seen and heard without having to code switch?
Speaker 2:Emotional labor this is one that I learned about during my dissertation. Labor that just reminds me of having babies. Like that's hard work, right, could be worth it in the long run. The end result could be good, but it's some work and it's emotional. When we talk about wellbeing, we talk about your physical health, we talk about your mental health, your emotional health. This is emotional labor. This is work to the point of burnout your stress. What are they? Commercials talk about Cortisol all the time.
Speaker 2:That increased stress and then all the negative, gosh awful things that can happen to you if you don't moderate that Authenticity concerns, like just showing up, being authentically. You just I want to be who I am. I don't want to have to dumb that down, tone that down, because I'm going to be around a certain group of people so I can't talk about certain topics or I can't speak a certain language. I think we're in that period now because of politics certain language. I think we're in that period now because of politics, right? So if I go in a room of people, people might assume that, oh, she's going to vote for, you know, harrison Walls, or you know, or they're going to assume I'm going to walk into a room, assume somebody else is going to vote for Trump, and then so it brings all this unnecessary stress where, if the world would go according to Patrice, we'd all be able to enter that discourse and just agree to disagree, have important conversations. I don't think we grow unless we do. If we sit in a room full of people that all think the same thing, nobody's growing. That sounds really boring to me Okay.
Speaker 2:And then finally, the stereotype threat. There's lots of them. I talked about biases briefly already, but all of those stereotypes that we have about different sex and groups of people that you know I got told those girls you don't have to live up to those stereotypes, you don't have to be a fighter because that's what they say. You know people probably think I can fight. I've never been in a fight. We'd be scared to fight. So that's just not part of the culture that I grew up in. Now I can talk, I can fight you with my words. I can probably out talk most people. I used to tell my husband all the time if we get into a fight you're going to lose because I can out talk you. He probably would still agree with that. So just some things to consider If you were to have a client, maybe as an adult that's working in the world.
Speaker 2:I had a client yesterday. An African-American man been on Wall Street his whole life. He's in a whole big high-rise building right now and is the only African-American person in the building Right, and so he's talked about that stress and that strain and how he's had to adapt and dial things back. You know he definitely agrees. He dresses differently at work than he does at home. You know, some of these young kids want to show up in Nike dunks and he's like I would never wear that to work with a suit.
Speaker 2:I don't care what's going to happen, you know, and so it does affect how people interact with you, but you could have somebody easily coming to your office that needs help and that is just beat down and worn out, and so you might not have experienced it, but you need to keep this on your tool belt, as this might be a place we need to examine. Are they just worn down and stressed out because of the emotional labor of showing up? That very first picture I put up there was that young lady that had that mask on. So much like people do with depression, they feel like they got to go to school every day, put that mask on and smile and be. You know all things to all these people, and then they're exhausted when they come home. You know, young people typically have meltdowns when they come home and it doesn't go very well.
Speaker 2:So I've decided you know I'm always the optimist how can I take this thing that I didn't ask for but is obviously a part of how I move in this professional life of mine, so how can I use it as a superpower? So I think it is an enhanced adaptability. I feel like I'm very fluid. If I was in a big room with lots of different groups of people, I could probably find myself in each group having some conversation, maybe not totally connecting, but I could definitely show up and be a part of. I wouldn't feel, you know, left out or like I would have to leave. I've just learned.
Speaker 2:So you know I joke sometimes. It's probably not funny. You'll tell me if it's funny, but I always say I speak white people. I can hear white people. You know I've done it long enough and I do. I know people that look like me. They're like what are they talking about? Like, what are they saying? I'm like oh, I get it. Hold on, let me interpret it for you. It's like this six, you know, sense that I have, or this. Maybe I'm bilingual, maybe that's what it is. And I can hear white people Social integration, being able to fit in, finding places.
Speaker 2:You're seeing more of that. You know, historically, black colleges used to be all black. Now there's lots of white people there for lots of different reasons, money being one of them because you know, higher ed is a business and so you know. But my sister went to Stanford. There were no Black fraternities and sororities, right. So if she was going to join one she would have to join a white one. I don't even think at that time, because she's even older than me, that she could have had an opportunity to join a Hispanic sorority or something like that. I don't even know if that was a thing then. And then the cultural identity affirmation. I've learned, um, I'm 60 years old so I've learned a lot. Um, but it wasn't until I was late forties before I really started being okay with who I was. Um, I was in these white environments. I always knew I was different. I was uncomfortable. About that We'll talk another time.
Speaker 2:I have a little sister who is very, very light skin, very light skin. She went to the same high school I did. Her experience was very different from mine. She was able to get on the cheerleading squad. We didn't have Black cheerleaders. She was on the cheerleading squad. She ended up being homecoming queen. So the way she was able to assimilate and fit into that we talk all the time now about. You know just our different experiences with the same group of people. We're four years apart, but it wasn't generations apart.
Speaker 2:So I've just decided that I'm going to take these things and I'm going to use it and I'm going to hopefully be able to help both sets. What I run into is people that look like me, that are kind of angry, like they're mad. You know, and I'm like you know, I'm not code switching for anybody. I'm going to do what I want come in, have, okay. Well, like this gentleman from Wall Street told me last night, he said I'm always trying to educate these young African-American men, but they don't listen and what I tell them is you're not going to have a job for very long. And that's exactly what happened, you know. So, whether it's right or wrong, it is just how we are and where we are sometimes. And so I decided if it's going to be a thing that I have to encounter and deal with, then I'm going to use it to my advantage, and I think I do that relatively well.
Speaker 2:Maybe my co-workers might say something different, I don't know. So a couple of strategies and solutions. And because these are big umbrellas and you have to I love you too, wendy I have to. You know, it's individual, where you are, what your environment is, how much power your voice has to implement the change. I work at my home and so I can change that environment however I want to. But cultivating supportive networks Facebook is a champion in that kind of stuff because they have more groups for everything. Just counselors I mean there is the clinicians of color, there's the DFW counselors, there's the counselors and supervisors. I mean you can go all the way across the board and ask anything that you want, and that whole entire group is so supportive, because everybody has been not always about code switching, but everybody needs to ask a question at some point. Kate can tell you that, because she'll always chime in and give you some good advice.
Speaker 2:Promoting inclusive practices Again, that's, if your voice has some power somewhere that you can kind of do that. I'm always talking to schools about creating welcoming environments. If kids don't see themselves around the building we're not really good at that yet. We're getting better but it kind of feels like a checkbox we used to talk about. Well, kids never see posters or bulletin boards with people that look like them. So then all of a sudden, you'll be in a school full of white people and boom, there's one Black person right there. Oh, there goes one Hispanic, okay. Well, so now they check the box. Well, look, we got people that look different. So it needs to be more genuine, more just, kind of organic. And we're not there yet. We got work to do Self-care and well-being so we can prevent some of that emotional labor.
Speaker 2:Think about people like sometimes just on your staff. If you work with a group of people and you just get mean, grumpy people all the time, sometimes they're just emotionally spent, like I am so sick and tired of coming to school every day and having to put on this face and letting you you know that's a whole nother presentation talking about microaggressions and those insults and all those kinds of things, but it's like slaps in the face to us, punches in the gut. You know you might as well hit us on the head with a bat and you're like what, what did I say? You know, and so we're like I don't want to have to keep teaching you that what you say was offensive. You know, like when are you going to go read a book or do a podcast or something to educate yourself? It gets to be exhausting for the people that operate in that level of offense and then advocating for change. Look, if you can't advocate for change, stop complaining. You know nothing worse than sitting around a group of people. All they do is want to complain about you know. Woe is me. Life's not fair and sometimes they might be part of the problem. Don't tell them. I said that, but none of y'all on here. I'm just talking about those other people.
Speaker 2:So what do counselors need to know? I'm finishing up y'all coming home. They should be mindful of how code switching may impact students, classroom participation, academic performance, peer interactions and just their overall well-being. One of my associates we talk about this all the time she's in a very affluent private school, but I'm working with a couple of students from that campus very smart, so their academics doesn't really have anything to do with that part. But what they tell me is like but I can't trust my friends. I have some good friends that don't look like me, but they don't really trust them. They're not really sure they see the news, they hear these things, so they're not quite sure how to figure that out and as adolescents they haven't quite developed all those skills yet to be able to do that. Counselors should create a supportive environment where students feel comfortable expressing their cultural identities and authenticity Authentically. I'm sorry, oh, I was having a thought. So what I tell my students all the time is, when you don't know, when in doubt, ask, ask, what can I do to make you feel more comfortable?
Speaker 2:I had a student who, well, he was sixth grade maybe and was gay, and he was acting out on it like in the most like lip gloss, glittery lip gloss, double bedazzle. He wanted to bedazzle everybody's jeans on the football team. So we were trying to dial him back just because the school wasn't ready for it. We weren't ready then, but I actually went to one of our band directors who was gay and asked him, when you were in sixth grade, what there goes that. See, I did it. What could, what could your school counselor have done for you in sixth grade to to help you, because I don't want to stop you from being who you need to be, but I also don't want you to get beat up in the locker room because you've offended one of these football players. You just want to bedazzle their jeans, right, and so I don't have any.
Speaker 2:I never present myself as if I know everything, so I'm very comfortable asking questions, but I don't know. Tell me more about this. You guys, if you don't know this, if you ever go to an adolescent and act like you don't know something and you need them to teach you something, you're going to get so many points with them. Oh, let me tell you how to do this. That's what I need to do with all these things that pop up on my computer. I said, when I get an adolescent in my office, I'm going to have them show me how do I make these thumbs up and hearts and all this stuff going. They'll show me and they're going to think they're super smart.
Speaker 2:Counselors should engage in ongoing professional development to enhance their knowledge and skills related to code switching, multicultural counseling and working with diverse student populations. I know my students are tired of hearing me talk about multicultural counseling, but K-Crips, they were supposed to talk about it in every class and I absolutely. It's kind of like ethics and supervision, like every situation. We can talk about something ethical and we can talk about multicultural counseling. I had to tell one of my students today multicultural is not just race and ethnicity. You know, that's all that he was focused on. I'm like it's bigger than that. You have to incorporate all of those things. You know what if they're hearing impaired or vision impaired or whatever those things are, and so we don't, as a profession, have any excuse to not go to professional development. I don't have any tolerance for people who are counselors and complain about that. I'm like you chose this field, so you're supposed to want to be around other people that are experiencing like things to you. I love going to the national conferences because you get to see how they're handling stuff across the country, not just in Texas. I mean, texas is big and we see some diversity with that, but you're supposed to enjoy wanting to go out and do that and get better, because that puts you in a better position to serve the clientele.
Speaker 2:Counselors need to approach code switching with cultural sensitivity and respect for students' linguistic and cultural backgrounds. Just words matter. Pick your words carefully, think about it. You know, if you don't know to call somebody a Latinx or Hispanic or Mexican, they'll tell you. Just ask, they'll tell you which one they're most comfortable with. Or they'll tell you, just ask, they'll tell you which one they're most comfortable with. So I'll finish with this quote. It says women suppress a lot of their sides. It's a form of code switching, a term to describe how one speaks and behaves differently in order to match an intended audience. Code switching is, at art, a survival mechanism, a way of showing at any particular moment, that you fit in, you're not a threat and you belong.
Speaker 2:I should paint that on a wall somewhere. I mean absolutely. I mean, if you want to talk about code switching, if I said all this for the last 40 minutes and you didn't get any of it, get this one right here, get this one right here and you've done well for the night. And then I just have this. I'm coming up with a podcast, y'all it's going to be Doc and Crocs. People in my office know that I wear Crocs of all different colors, purple, every shade of purple I can wear. But I got to sit down long enough to figure out what I'm going to talk about and then I'm going to put that out, so be looking forward to that. So I want to answer some questions that you guys have.
Speaker 1:Let me stop sharing and then I guess I could get back to the Awesome and folks. If you're going to ask a question, I would ask that you put it in the chat, because if you unmute you'll show up in the video, and then I got to edit you out for the YouTube and all the things, and then you have to a release or something, I don't know. But if you'll put it in the chat, then if I ask you to unmute or a doctor doesn't ask you to unmute, then yeah, go for it. Or if you just don't mind being in the video, that's fine too. Um, so we had some earlier on.
Speaker 2:Okay, wait, maybe I'm not looking at the chat right. Hold on, if you see some just holler out, I'm trying to read them real quick no, no, that's, that's.
Speaker 1:I see a lot of comments, yeah but you're mistaken for the help you.
Speaker 2:You know, and it's funny because when I'm in my home office and I go open that front door, I'm not. I don't always dress like I would in an office outside of there, right? So I'm a lot more casual. I have my Crocs on because I have these hardwood floors and they're bad for your feet, but I'm not going to sit around in whole shoes at home.
Speaker 2:Medical code switching to describe how a patient might switch to more clinical language and speaking with doctors to more effectively advocate for themselves or their loved one, that's interesting. I'm sure there's lots of versions of code switching. You know when I think about that. You know I have a sister. My little sister is on here. I was talking about her a minute ago, so, but she said she was going to be quiet and not say anything. So, but I still love her. But my older sister I always say she speaks in SAT, like, are you talking to? Like why? Again, she grew up in the same environment. I did, but that language really stuck for her and I'm always feeling like I need to carry a dictionary just to figure out what she's talking about. Um, I see lots of things. I don't necessarily see a question. Um, I don't either.
Speaker 2:The audiobook was really powerful. Oh the hate you give. Oh yeah, and I enjoyed the movie after I had read the book. Um, I had a high school english teacher explain that the idea of the melting pot was outdated and realistic. Instead, she said instead she said talked about the idea of a mixed salad where we all can mix together. I've heard that before. You know, I think the melting pot gets a little offensive to people sometimes, because it's almost like you're being forced to be like everybody else, as if that everybody else is the standard right, and I think there's value in each of us coming to the table and being who we are. And let's start there and have some conversation. Oh, dr Ivory.
Speaker 2:Dr Ivory said I don't wear Crocs because I'm a Black woman and don't want to be seen as ghetto. Amen, I would say the same thing about a bonnet. So to me, the thing about Crocs and I'm very particular about this, even in my house pick up your feet when you're walking. So I always feel like that ghetto picture that I get in my head is because you're shuffling your feet when you're walking. So I always feel like that ghetto picture that I get in my head is because you're shuffling your feet. I pick my feet up. We walk with purpose. That's what I teach my grandkids. My children were taught that way. Pick up your feet, don't go dragging your. If I can hear you coming down the hallway you're doing something wrong, but it's fun.
Speaker 2:My clients like my Crocs, especially when I get a new pair. Um and so my? My kids tell me I dress like the girl animals cause I always want to match. So I want to get a pair of Crocs and match whatever shirt I'm wearing. For today I'm not today I do have a pair of purple Crocs on right now as we speak. The topic came up in my very first counseling five, one class I taught a few years back.
Speaker 1:You got one question ahead of that Could code switching mean as a betrayal in a personal relationship? Has this happened to you?
Speaker 2:John, let me make sure I understand that If I was to code switch, would somebody I'm in relationship feel like I'm betraying my Blackness because I'm code switching? Can he unmute? Or he's oh, he's saying yes, he's like I'm not getting in that video. I don't want to be in that video. I mean it could be. I mean I think it's.
Speaker 2:Everybody views their ethnicity differently. Their experiences have been different, um, but I mean anybody that I'm in a personal relationship with. They would understand where I'm coming from. They might not agree, that might not be how they operate, but I would. I have that expectation of people that I'm in relationship with. However, I do think Black people in general.
Speaker 2:We could call you a sellout. For years we called people Uncle Toms if they acted too white. What is that? I'm sorry. I even said that y'all. I apologize, but that's what that was. It's still what it is. You'll still see people call people Uncle Tom. Yeah, let me say okay.
Speaker 2:So a class. It all started over comment regarding thanksgiving and what families eat. This was the best class I've had to date. The students were very authentic and shared their diverse stories. It was very informative and powerful and brought the class together as a whole. I could not have taught this. This was an amazing life lesson to all of us.
Speaker 2:Um, you know, ruby pain does some things with food, and what the meaning of food does with these different classes. It's very interesting to me. I was just telling somebody, you know, so I have clients that have unhealthy relationships with food, right, and so we do have to talk about that sometime. You know, tiktok is horrible, is horrible, um, but it is how I decompress at the end of the day, cause it's just makes me giggle. Um, but you know, who are you going to invite to the cookout? Everybody can't come to the cookout. Everybody can't make potato salad. Um, uh, and it's, and it's funny to me because that to me is so, I don't know, because I think there's a certain set of us that will get upset when they talk about Black.
Speaker 2:People always eat fried chicken, you know, and people get offended by that. We probably do eat a lot of fried chicken, but it goes back to slave times. That was what was afforded to us, that was what was running around in the backyard. I met my husband. He was real country and he was accustomed to going out in the backyard. I met my husband. He was real country and he, he was accustomed to go out in the backyard and swinging the chicken around and bringing it. That would gross me out. There's no way I'm eating that chicken. I am not eating that chicken. Um, so, but I do think. Um, oh, somebody said do you endorse Ruby Payne's book a framework for understanding poverty, ruby Payne's book, a Framework for Understanding Poverty?
Speaker 2:I do, I do. I think there's things to learn through her book. I think there's good points in it. I have rarely found a book that I'm going to amen everything from cover to cover. I mean, I might take issues with some of those things, but I do think there's a lot to that.
Speaker 2:But I tell people there's not like a blanket that you can throw over all black people and assume that we're going to all act the same, because we don't, but neither does anybody else. All Asian people don't act the same. All Indian people don't act the same. All white people don't act the same. Hello, and they're the dominant culture, but they don't all act the same. They are very different people. Right, she said it started over dressings or stuffing with apples or raisins.
Speaker 2:But somebody said I can attest to that. I grew up and I'm comfortable with all races. When I was a young man, I found myself code switching to speak with black dialect when I was younger. Interesting, brandon, that's very interesting.
Speaker 2:You know, I always said like there would be times where I would hear how other Black people would talk and I would try to do that and I would sound like a white person trying to sound Black, if that's a thing, you know what I'm saying. Like I just it's just like a Hispanic person that can roll their R's, like there's just some like I've met some people, y'all don't. There's just some like I've met some people, y'all don't tell nobody this. But like I've met some people and I'm like, ooh, they cuss so good. Like why am I, you know, admiring cussing? But you know, you ever heard people cuss and they can like string them together really well and it's very labored for me, you know. I'm like trying to. You know I wouldn't be scary or intimidating to anybody in that way, but interesting, and now we don't. I hope now, brandon, that you don't feel like you have to do that right, that you don't feel like you have to. He said in context I am Black. I see you, brandon, I see you yeah there you go.
Speaker 1:Dr Dunn, I want to thank you for this. I am learning so much and I continue to learn, and it was just my own personal experience. Sitting here You're talking, I'm like, okay, I get it, I get it, I get it. You know, I've been a woman in, you know, predominantly male situations, or I've been the master student with the doc students. I've been the young person with people who are old. And then you got me with the stress part. When you were talking about the cortisol, when you were talking about how it's constant, I thought, oh, I don't, I don't know, I don't know Yep, and we carry it everywhere we go, right.
Speaker 2:So whether or not we're in, you know ATB, whether or not we're, you know anywhere, everywhere we go, it follows us.
Speaker 1:Thank you for that yeah.
Speaker 2:So I appreciate you guys. You know, in the multicultural class that I teach, I'm always like you're not going to learn everything, you're not going to learn about every culture and don't ever think you have, because you're going to run into that person that just operates differently or thinks differently. You know we run into white people who were born, you know, adopted by black people, and so they were raised in different environments. Their voice is different. They, you know, how they think about things is very different. You know I was raised not to be a fighter. We used our words, use your words. You know other people that I knew, that I grew up with, didn't, weren't raised like that.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, but I appreciate you guys so much for joining in and having the conversation. I think it's an important conversation to have, um, and, and you know, one of the best things that you can do is go back and talk to other people about the same thing. Go find out what your friends think about this, see if they've run into any of this, see if it helps them. See other people that they interact with on a day-to-day basis through a different lens, because it's a real thing, but it can be a superpower.
Speaker 1:Thank you for this. Thank you so much and I am so happy you agreed to come talk to us. Please let us know when your podcast goes live, because I will be up everywhere, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Y'all hold me accountable for that, so I can make sure we will be demanding it.
Speaker 1:Can we tag you on social media? Because then we can ask questions and say we're awesome.
Speaker 2:I'm everywhere, I guess.
Speaker 1:So for housekeeping, just remember, take a second, click the link. Everybody do. Take five seconds, four, three, two, one. Click the link and then go have an amazing evening because you just did a great thing. You just made yourself a little bit smarter and uh, thank you all for coming. Dr dunn, thank you again. Thank you. You guys are welcome. You're awesome. See everybody at tca maybe. So all right, guys, we'll be there. Bye bye.