Meet Western State Hospital social worker Esseme Essang-Ekpo
March is Social Work Month and this year’s theme is Social Workers are Essential. They are essential to patients at DSHS’ Western State Hospital, where social workers have a large role in ensuring that patients have opportunities to engage in activities that support their positive well-being and encourage successful transitions to community living.
Specifically at Western, social workers are primary therapists, clinicians providing one-to-one support to patients, they conduct groups, and write detailed psychosocial assessments, discharge planning evaluations and court updates. They also conduct daily complex problem solving on behalf of patients, serve as primary contacts for family and professional visitors, and serve as expert community transition planners.
Throughout Social Work Month, we will feature a specific social worker. Today let me introduce: Esseme Essang-Ekpo, a psychiatric social worker at Western State Hospital for the past 17 years, who has a very personal story to tell.
Esseme was only six years old in Port Harcourt Island, Nigeria, when the Nigerian-Biafra civil war began there.
Esseme, his family and neighbors would run to hide in the bunker when the shelling started near his home. They stayed there — sometimes for four to five days and sometimes without food, until the shelling stopped.
It was during one of these events that Esseme witnessed one of the men being shot and killed while running to the bunker with him. The image has stayed with him through his life. Upon re-emerging from the underground bunker, Esseme witnessed horrific scenes of death that now have given him an appreciation for simply being alive.
“There is now very little that can rattle me,” he said.
Esseme has been a psychiatric social worker at Western State Hospital (WSH) since August 4, 2003. In those 17 years, he has worked in every center on campus. He currently works on ward F1 in the Center for Forensic Services (CFS), which is one of the busiest forensic admission wards, often with extremely acute patients. Esseme has been in CFS for the past 10 years, where his supervisor hopes to keep him. He said he especially enjoys and appreciates the comradery he has found with some teams in the hospital. When asked about his work, he said, “I like what I do. I enjoy my job. I am happy to be here every day.”
In 1980, Esseme came to the United States to attend college at The University of Houston, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Science in criminal justice in 1986. During that time, the majority — up to 80 percent — of the Nigerian students in the United States were on scholarships from the Nigerian government.
However, for Esseme, his father’s pride would not allow him to go to government officials to ask for help. His father was able to pay for Esseme’s first year of college education and all expenses. For the remainder of his schooling, however, Esseme worked to put himself through school. His first job in Houston was at Frenchy’s Chicken where he would work from 6 p.m. to 3 a.m. and then his classes began at 8 in the morning.
Esseme’s introduction to the role of social workers was during his work at a group home. The social workers impressed him with their ability to help others, which is what he wanted to do. Esseme explored working with children at a psychiatric hospital specializing in treating children. However, after a short time Esseme realized he would not be able to work with children in his social work career. It was too hard to hear children speak about their abuse using adult language instead talking like the kids that they are. In his culture, men do not cry openly, and he found he could not hold back the tears when hearing the stories the children would narrate about what an adult did to them.
Still wanting to help and give back Esseme leaned toward working with adults with mental health issues. Esseme graduated with his master’s degree in social work in the spring of 2003 from the University of Washington. Later that summer, he was hired to work at Western State Hospital.
Thank you Esseme for all that you do for the patients at WSH.
Respectfully,
Dave Holt
WSH, Chief Executive Officer