Blue Water Woman -- Summer 2019

MAKING
a difference
APRIL GARDNER
8 SPRING 2019 BLUEWATERWOMAN.COM
BY PATTI SAMAR
When April Gardner was 22 years old, she graduated from college
with a degree in English literature and promptly began a promising
career as a copywriter.
But after hustling her way through several very good corporate jobs
in Chicago and Boston, Gardner, a Michigan native, felt there was
something missing in her life.
“I was in a corporate, go-sit-in-a-cubicle job and I felt like I wasn’t
doing anything to help people,” she said.
So, at 30 years of age, she packed up her life in Boston, headed back to
Chicago, and went to graduate school, where she obtained a master of
social work degree.
Gardner used her social work degree in the Chicago area for a period
of time, helping people of all ages, when she realized it was time to shift
gears again: she joined the Peace Corps.
“I served in Kosovo, and I was working with kids in a primary school,”
she said. “My primary role was as an educator, but I was leading writing
workshops, I volunteered at an orphanage, I organized a national poetry
competition, and we wrote a grant that helped obtain sports equipment
for the students.”
The Republic of Kosovo, located in southeastern Europe, was
politically unstable throughout much of the 20th century, culminating
in particularly violent outbreaks of war in the late 1990s. In 2008, the
nation declared its independence and the country has spent the past
decade rebuilding.
For Gardner, joining the Peace Corps was an opportunity to
experience both personal and professional growth.
“I didn’t see it as a break from my career so much as building on my
career,” she said. “I joined the Peace Corps because I felt like I could be
doing more to be helping people.”
Upon her return to the United States last year, she returned to
Michigan, where her family still resides, and she joined the staff at Blue
Water Counseling of Fort Gratiot as a licensed clinical social worker.
“I think in some ways, I’m still adjusting to American life again, so my
primary focus has been on my job,” she said.
Gardner noted that one of the joys of her work at BWC is in building
long-term relationships with her clients.
“I’m able to develop relationships with people over the long term,”
she said. “That is gratifying because you see more change. It’s exciting
watching somebody go through a positive change. There’s a spiritual
component to watching people connecting with themselves and others
through more healthy channels.”
Gardner said the majority of the clients she sees at BWC are dealing
with some kind of anxiety or depression.
“A lot of anxiety and depression comes from people not taking care
of themselves,” she said. “They are doing more for other people in their
lives than they are taking care of themselves. I am able to help them
understand that it is okay to take care of themselves.
“I enjoy working with people of all ages, but with teens, they
sometimes feel pressure to be a certain way, and trying to manage things
from what they want versus what their parents want.
“Adults tend to put their spouse’s needs or their partner’s needs ahead
of their own.
“With all of this, it’s all about coming back to yourself,” she said.
“Watching clients come out of that and coming to a better place in life,
well, that is the most gratifying part of social work.
“Therapy is a coping tool to help you get unstuck,” she said. “I see
myself as a support to helping someone solve their own problems.”