Case Study 1:
Jon is a 25-year-old gay, White British man, originally from a small town in the north of England. Jon felt unable to be open about his sexuality growing up in his home town. Jon’s father’s worked in construction, but is now retired due to health problems and his mother works part time in a care home and cares for Jon’s father and two younger siblings. Jon moved to London two years ago to find a better life. In London, Jon found work, first as a waiter, then as a barman and he also found private rented shared accommodation through acquaintances that he met at work.
Around a year after moving to London, the bar where Jon worked closed due to Covid restrictions. Jon was placed the work furlong scheme for the first two months, then the bar owner decided to close the business completely and let Jon and the other staff go. Jon now found it difficult to pay his share of the rent on the shared flat. As it was summer, he decided to pitch a tent in a local park, in order to save money, while he continued to look for work.
After a couple of weeks of rough sleeping, Jon got into an argument with some of the other homeless men, who camped in the park. He was homophobically abused and beaten with sticks. He suffered a fractured skull and a number of broken ribs. Jon spent two weeks in hospital, where he was medically assessed and treated for his injuries. On discharge Jon was referred to a voluntary sector organisation that works with homeless people. Jon was offered a room in large residential hostel, which he accepted.
In the hostel Jon keeps very much to himself. He confides in staff that he is afraid to be open about his sexuality with other residents. Since discharge from hospital Jon has suffered from nightmares, and disturbed sleep patterns. Jon finds that he now becomes very anxious when dealing with unfamiliar social situations and increasing spends long periods alone in his room. Jon drinks 4 or 5 cans of larger a day. Jon says he does this to “take the edge off of things”. Jon reports that he is feeling depressed, is unhappy with his current level of drinking and that he is finding it hard to motivate himself. This is impacting on Jon’s tenancy at the hostel as Jon has now missed a number of appointments to apply for Universal Credit, which may impact on his access to housing benefit
You are a social work student on placement at the hostel. How could you use social theories to understand and intervene to support Jon?
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