Re: pain clinic

January 7, 2004

I can understand the clinic since it is a multidisciplinary organization

wanting to do some psychological testing. I would not worry too much about

the MMPI, though.

Here is a true story about the MMPI :

The company for whom my husband worked at the time was hiring a new

employee.

All their upper level execs were required to do psychological testing before

being hired. A friend of my husband was recommended for the job and took

the test.

After it was over he told us that he had a problem with some of the

questions. One fill in the blank started with

\ " Mother__________________________\ "

If he said he loved his mother or hated his mother, he was afraid of how

that would be interpreted, so instead he wrote the sentence: Mother Goose is

a good source of children\'s literature.

Whe he got the results, his evaluation said,\ " Avoids issues\ "

Seriously, tho, it might be very helpful to you to take it. I would talk

with the evaluator before hand and tell her/him about your ptsd and ask if

that will skew test results and how she/he would deal with that in the

interpretation. No psychological testing is any better than the person

scoring it.

I used to do a lot of educational evaluations on preschool children with

special needs. I tested a child who had been declared retarded and rejected

from a private school. His preschool teacher felt he had normal

intelligence but was very shy and tended to freeze up in stressful

situations.

I worked with him at my house, in the kitchen. He had milk and cookies and

I let him play with some toys while we worked. With preschool evals, we can

only look at motor skills. eye-hand coordination and language development.

Because he felt comfortable, I was able to prove that he was in the average

range of development-lanaguage but had some gross motor deficits. We found

the perfect therapist to work with him, got him into another private school

and he is doing well. The point of this story is that because I knew about

his problems in advance, I was able to make him comfortable.

If you talk with the evaluator in advance, you might be more comfortable

with the testing and not find it so stressful.

Judy

The Ehlers Danlos National Foundation

January 7, 2004

On 1/7/04 11:08 AM, " ceda " <ceda > wrote:

> From: looselinks@...

> Subject: Re: pain clinic

> I can understand the clinic since it is a multidisciplinary organization

> wanting to do some psychological testing. I would not worry too much about

> the MMPI, though.

> Here is a true story about the MMPI :

> The company for whom my husband worked at the time was hiring a new

> employee.

> All their upper level execs were required to do psychological testing before

> being hired. A friend of my husband was recommended for the job and took

> the test.

> After it was over he told us that he had a problem with some of the

> questions. One fill in the blank started with

> \ " Mother__________________________\ "

> If he said he loved his mother or hated his mother, he was afraid of how

> that would be interpreted, so instead he wrote the sentence: Mother Goose is

> a good source of children\'s literature.

>

> Whe he got the results, his evaluation said,\ " Avoids issues\ "

That is funny. I think that is a great answer; and of the alternatives for

what that *could* have come out saying: " avoiding issues " is the lesser of

several evils. You can see how the above example applied to severe ptsd is

inviting disaster and does not allow for the actual event of very real

trauma at the hands of an abusive mother.

> Seriously, tho, it might be very helpful to you to take it. I would talk

> with the evaluator before hand and tell her/him about your ptsd and ask if

> that will skew test results and how she/he would deal with that in the

> interpretation. No psychological testing is any better than the person

> scoring it.

It isnt like I am opposed to the test. The test has been taken. Results

are in. there is no need to retake a test like that - ecspecially when one

already knows the outcome. The outcome is predictable; what they chose to

call it is totally up in the air. When it was obvious that the last one was

incorrect I had the right test done which showed the real dx. I don¹t need

that retaken either.

> I used to do a lot of educational evaluations on preschool children with

> special needs. I tested a child who had been declared retarded and rejected

> from a private school. His preschool teacher felt he had normal

> intelligence but was very shy and tended to freeze up in stressful

> situations.

> I worked with him at my house, in the kitchen. He had milk and cookies and

> I let him play with some toys while we worked. With preschool evals, we can

> only look at motor skills. eye-hand coordination and language development.

> Because he felt comfortable, I was able to prove that he was in the average

> range of development-lanaguage but had some gross motor deficits. We found

> the perfect therapist to work with him, got him into another private school

> and he is doing well. The point of this story is that because I knew about

> his problems in advance, I was able to make him comfortable.

How nice for the boy. Seriously. Though sometimes it doesn¹t turn out that

way. Sometimes the kid is seen to be average or above - even gifted; and

the problem is trauma; and since the trauma is not addressed -- the child is

thrown back to the wolves with the kid chalking it up under 'don¹t trust the

nice people'; and the teachers calling it 'underachieves'. I don't mean to

be rude or to put down your example. Just to say there should be more

people like you doing the testing.

> If you talk with the evaluator in advance, you might be more comfortable

> with the testing and not find it so stressful.

>

> Judy

Thanks judy. I will think about that.

January 7, 2004