Memphis VA

[BGIE]

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I don’t know where to begin with this hellhole of a site. I barely made it out of there with my sanity intact. The supervisors completely lack any capacity for self-reflection. They still use the old psychoanalytic model that was big at the site in the past, where they view trainees as “inherently ill and need to be fixed.” The Palliative supervisor diagnosed every trainee on her rotation with BPD (Having worked with them all year, that was inaccurate.) Suffice to say, I steered clear of her rotation. Whenever you ask a question, they ask you “well, how would you do that?” If you can’t locate a resource, they tell you to just look it up. Several of the trainees expected passive SI due to the abusive nature of the supervisors. My white male supervisor had the audacity to ask me *why* I would bring up the BLM movement this summer to my African American patient. I can’t tell you how disappointed I was to hear the inherent sexism among female psychologists in power. They consistently said that the female trainees had to “hide” their personalities in order to be respected. Which is accurate. They view remediation as a good thing. They see themselves as being able to hold emotions and will elicit them from you but if it’s not positive, they will become defensive against you. I could go on and on. The other departments are trying to eliminate the Psychology department there so the supervisors don’t have a strong sense of safety so they are incapable of providing safety for their trainees. And they’re completely unaware they’re essentially “rolling the trauma downhill.” Run far and run fast from the Memphis VA. They will damage you. It is not worth the drama. Also, any postdocs? They do NOT prep you for job placement. At all.

 

[WisNeuro]

Do not spam post the same thing in multiple threads. It is a violation of the TOS, and simply annoying.

 

[BGIE]

Do not spam post the same thing in multiple threads. It is a violation of the TOS, and simply annoying.

I understand. I don’t want to spam post. I was replying to two other people who were applying to the Memphis VA. Then I decided to just do a general post. But my general post is not a duplicate of my other messages.
can you please explain to me how it was spam? I want to make sure I don’t do it again.

 

[WisNeuro]

It was a duplicate of the other messages, as you replied to say the same thing you said here. Generally speaking, before reviving age-old posts, reply to people in PM, and then make a general post if you see fit.

 

[Mercury in Taurus]

I don’t know where to begin with this hellhole of a site. I barely made it out of there with my sanity intact. The supervisors completely lack any capacity for self-reflection. They still use the old psychoanalytic model that was big at the site in the past, where they view trainees as “inherently ill and need to be fixed.” The Palliative supervisor diagnosed every trainee on her rotation with BPD (Having worked with them all year, that was inaccurate.) Suffice to say, I steered clear of her rotation. Whenever you ask a question, they ask you “well, how would you do that?” If you can’t locate a resource, they tell you to just look it up. Several of the trainees expected passive SI due to the abusive nature of the supervisors. My white male supervisor had the audacity to ask me *why* I would bring up the BLM movement this summer to my African American patient. I can’t tell you how disappointed I was to hear the inherent sexism among female psychologists in power. They consistently said that the female trainees had to “hide” their personalities in order to be respected. Which is accurate. They view remediation as a good thing. They see themselves as being able to hold emotions and will elicit them from you but if it’s not positive, they will become defensive against you. I could go on and on. The other departments are trying to eliminate the Psychology department there so the supervisors don’t have a strong sense of safety so they are incapable of providing safety for their trainees. And they’re completely unaware they’re essentially “rolling the trauma downhill.” Run far and run fast from the Memphis VA. They will damage you. It is not worth the drama. Also, any postdocs? They do NOT prep you for job placement. At all.

Thank you for sharing your experience. Many will appreciate your bravery. Too bad that the internship matching process is so competitive, some will end up there even if it is not ranked their 1st choice. Glad that you made it out with your sanity intact and speaking up.

 

[Doctor Koala]

Eh, ignore old @WisNeuro on the petty forum administrative rules. On the topic of Memphis VA, it’s historically one of the worst VA’s in the country so I’m not surprised to hear about the dysfunctional internship program there.

 

[Psychai]

Eh, ignore old @WisNeuro on the petty forum administrative rules. On the topic of Memphis VA, it’s historically one of the worst VA’s in the country so I’m not surprised to hear about the dysfunctional internship program there.

Do you have any insight on what other VAs historically have bad reputations?

 

[WisNeuro]

Ah, I love it when sock accounts take any opportunity to revive old threads to punch out in jealousy, means I must be doing something right.

Anyway, make sure you're getting multiple forms of info folks, especially when one form of information is an account that has solely been created to rant incoherently about a bad experience they had, and another source is a disgruntled user with an unhealthy obsession with another user.

 

[neuronoxious]

Do you have any insight on what other VAs historically have bad reputations?

The VA has posted their rankings of VA hospitals for the past several years and you can look them up. Although they've recently decided to stop doing that.