COUNSELOR HELPS PATIENTS SEE LIGHT.

Byline: Victoria Giraud

If Margaret Longenecker hadn't been discouraged by the English department at Cal State Los Angeles, she might not have ended up as a marriage, family and child counselor.

And if she hadn't, what would have happened to all those she's helped?

Over the years, Longenecker has trained peer counselors to help with homebound disabled seniors at the Santa Clarita Valley Senior Center, represented the Los Angeles County Elder Care Network by giving informative talks to care-givers of the elderly, trained the local AIDS response team, participated as a facilitator for support groups for AIDS and muscular dystrophy, done parent training and helped ``throw-away'' people turn their lives around.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg for a lady who says with humor, ``I'm just an old lady who works every day and has no idea what she wants to do when she grows up.''

Longenecker, who is a widow with three grown children and has lived in Santa Clarita the past 11 years, leads a busy life combining counseling - about 25 patients a week - with lecturing, facilitating and training.

``If I lost one of the pieces, it would be like losing a limb. I like being with different people doing different things and handling different problems. I don't become jaded. I can see what people can change.''

Change is what Longenecker is all about. Her business license is under the title ``Committed to Change.'' Over the years she has had some dramatic experience helping young men who've been members of religious cults change their lives around. She said emphatically, however, that ``People can't change unless they have a goal, structure and some kind of schedule.''

One of the young men Longenecker helped is now 30. He graduated with awards and honors last year from Cal State L.A. and is already working toward his master's degree in psychology. When she agreed to help him as part of her pro bono work, he was in a hospital with a psychotic breakdown, the result of eight years in a religious cult, she said.

It took over five years to pull him out of his problems. He had been a ``full-blown'' addict.

``It was like inheriting a 14-year-old boy. I set a simple goal first, but it took him five weeks to clean out his dresser drawer,'' Longenecker recalled.

Longenecker became a ``good parent'' for him, which meant taking him to buy his first pair of trousers and a shirt and his first set of bedsheets. She talked to him on the telephone three times a day or more. ``A good parent says, `What are your choices, your alternatives?' That's empowering. They then start getting interested in other people.''

The young man, as a result of Longenecker's help and his willingness to change, is now working in a hospital, studying for his master's and has a girlfriend.

Longenecker came to education rather late in life. She was happily married and busy rearing children. ``I was most traditional. I would comb my husband's hair every morning. I starched and ironed his shirts.'' She also devoted a great deal of time as a volunteer for the Girl Scouts for 35 years and for the American Red Cross for 21 years. Currently, she's coordinator for Santa Clarita Mental Health Disaster Team for the Red Cross.

In the early 1980s Longenecker received a bachelor's degree in business administration because she and her family were planning to open a skilled nursing facility. When her husband died suddenly of cancer, the nursing idea no longer made sense.

She needed to be independent, and thought of returning to school for a degree in English as she enjoyed writing. When Longenecker went to see the head of the English department, the woman noted her age and commented that ``it was a shame that I would take a chair away from a young person.''

Longenecker was so upset when she left that office she started crying. She went to a drinking fountain, her tears mixing with the water she was trying to drink. As she stepped back from the fountain, she stepped on the foot of a man behind her. Noting her extreme distress, he offered to listen. He turned out to be a member of the counseling department, and by the end of a four-hour conversation, he had helped Longenecker plan a new course of study so that she would eventually become a marriage, family and child counselor.

``I've been able to utilize all my education,'' Longenecker said. ``As a person I'm very ordinary, but the opportunities I've had are very extraordinary.''

She is continually amazed at the changes that people can make, especially addicts who are able to turn their lives around. ``I have great respect for those who change. I'm just a conduit.''

Her busy schedule usually includes about 20 speaking engagements a year. Longenecker will be speaking to the Southern California Psychological Society in June. She calls her talk ``Orchids and Oak Trees,'' or ``a worms-eye view of what happens if we stay stuck in what we believe we did not receive.''

As she explains, orchids are parasites looking for a host and oak trees drop acorns that grow.

``I'm having a lot of fun,'' Longenecker said. ``I wake up and I say, `another day, thank you.' I'm ready for anything; it's exciting.''