A BALLOON LIVING IN THE YELLOW HOUSE: REPORTS EXPERIENCED BY PSYCHOLOGY TRAINEES IN A PSYCHIATRIC SUPPORT HOUSE

Abstract

The internship was carried out in a psychiatric support house, with the aim of observing the residents’ daily lives and behaviors. The house welcomes people with different needs, where some need greater care and use of medication, and there are those whose demands are lower, and for these the environment can become more exhausting and stressful, since patients with severe mental disorders, can be more aggressive and noisier. It was possible to observe the difference in the interaction between the patients and the trainees, those who had less psychological and motor difficulties interacted more. Students from another period applied art therapy to the residents, from these artistic practices it was observed that the activities aroused a lot of interest in the inmates and a better coexistence with everyone who was there. This shows how important the work of the psychology professional is in these environments, unfortunately in this house there is no psychologist, they only rely on the help of psychology students, and from other areas of health who are willing to carry out projects together with the House. These moments of observations and interactions between the interns and the residents were of paramount importance for psychology students to begin to understand the human psyche in practice and become more humane professionals.