The Story I'm Telling Myself

Happy Fall. How are things in your corner of our world today?

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What We Do With Our Love

Happy September; I hope August finished as strong for you

as it did for me. I had the opportunity to lead a dozen

growth sessions last month; this one in Texas City

culminated in such an epic wall display.

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Psychological First Aid

Today I'm excited because my friend Amanda Symmes agreed to run with the baton and start writing for Free Spirit's Counselor Corner column when I stepped down; her incredible must-read first post is going viral! 

Click the image to learn more about 

The Search For The Power Between.

{I am so super proud of her!}

I'm also happy because yesterday I went to a workshop

to learn more about Psychological First Aid. 

Here are some highlights from my notes:

Psychological First Aid is about understanding

normal reactions to abnormal events. 

It's about looking at the here and now,

the current symptoms as a reaction to what happened

rather than the emotional history of the victim. 

No psych meds are called for after a trauma

unless the person was on them prior to the incident.

Schools are the HUB of the community;

people will gravitate there.

Meet basic needs first; shelter is a primary concern,

followed by food and water.

Dehydration can be a huge problem in trauma respond.

Once a child's physical needs are met,

emotional needs can be addressed. 

Expect 4-6 weeks for normalcy to start to be restored.

Normalcy feels amazing; traumatized people benefit from 

feeling comfortable and familiar.

Allow 24-48 hours before

helping them resume their normal routines.

Every disaster is different ...  and the same;

what we can control is stability and routine.

Today's kids are overexposed and 

images can trigger delayed responses.

During monitoring and surveillance,

be approachable.

Be present with the victims.

Come from a place of love and concern.

Help get them relief from what they are experiencing now.

Trauma victims need a compassionate presence.

Emotions are raw; in loss, the primary emotion is grief, which might present as anger, sadness, agitation, fear. In trauma, thinking is not clear.

Information decreases anxiety;

honestly answer any questions they might have.

Draw a social map; encourage them to 

honor their feelings, their bodies, their experience.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is the #1 treatment for trauma,

but nothing is as effective as social supports.

Put social supports in place so that

trauma victims know they are not alone.

Survivors need empathy from someone who can sit with them,

to understand and accept how they feel.

There is no such thing as closure.

People remember and want to talk about their trauma.

Research is contrary to the "turn them away" mindset.

We must be willing to listen when they're ready to talk.

Use a directive approach:

"We are here to help; is that okay with you?

Where can we start?"

Let them know that they are not alone.

Ask, "Whom can I call for you? Can I stay with you?"

We are NOT diagnosing our 

traumatized kids, just supporting them.

Normalize their feelings: "YOU are not crazy."

The jobs of children are to play and learn;

get them focused on what they need to do.

Help the survivors adapt; break the cultural divide.

Ask: "What's the culture of this system. What are the norms?"

Self-care for the caregiver is essential;.

some shared trauma experiences to beware of include

secondary trauma (picking up your client's trauma),

projective identification (absorbing what's going on with your client),

and compassion fatigue (indifference to the suffering).

The typical responder reply, "I'm fine." 

can be a cover for "I'm not doing this."

So be in touch with what's going on with you

and employ your therapeutic resources as needed.

To make her point stick, our Traumatic Stress Specialist, April Naturale, told us this incredible story of the rescue dogs at Ground Zero. She reported that the dogs were getting depressed because they weren't finding any live bodies, so their handlers laid down so that the dogs could find them, whereby giving them success, purpose. 

April did an amazing job and I feel blessed that she traveled to Houston to share her expertise with us. I'm so grateful to her and to the National Child Traumatic Stress Network for normalizing the work we did after hurricane Harvey. I was actually working in a school where the administration was reticent to openly talk through things, cautious because of fear, I suppose, of the myth that talking about it might make it worse. It felt validating to know that talking about it is, in fact, important to healing and hope in trauma recovery. 

I also feel more competent to render Psychological First Aid 

the next time I'm called to be a first responder.

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Savoring The Path To Serendipity

Friday morning, I was in a sort of end-of-the-year funk,

just going through the motions,

watching the minutes click off of the clock.

Before the first hour had passed, I had a text from a friend,

asking if I'd seen that there was an active shooter in Santa Fe.

Wait, what? Our Santa Fe, just down the road Santa Fe?

My AP and our maintenance man both live in Santa Fe.

Before long, news that an officer was down.

And then, the update that eight young lives were taken.

Just like that.

A kid killing kids.

I absolutely couldn't catch my breath

at the thought of us losing our most precious resource.

Children.

Again.

Two teachers died, too; 

heroes who couldn't stand the thought of their students being shot.

After school, when our own students had left for the weekend

and I could relax and reflect,

I sat in our comfort chair and I cried,

for the devastated families whose loved ones aren't coming home,

for how horrifically frightening and long that day must have been,

for how painful the days, months and years ahead will likely be.

I cried for innocence lost. 

Again.

And I felt overwhelming helplessness.

If ever I needed The Path to Serendipity

and get a booster shot of healing and hope, 

it was this weekend.

And look what was waiting on my doorstep when I got home. 

There are so many nuggets of inspiration in this one little treasure to help us unwrap the present and discover life's gifts.

As I devoured through the text savoring every sentence, I found myself making so many connections with principal and author Allyson Apsey, from our upbringing in the midwest to battling bullying in high school to working with intention to live a life that matters.

This authentic, bold leader is the real deal.

And her spot-on reflections are positively uplifting.

Even in her journey's stops which require tissues,

Allyson is able to find sparkly diamonds 

where it seems there's nothing but dust.

She reminds us that it's all about

what we choose to mine.

Even when life gets painful.

She credits her years of experience as well as 

her training in William Glasser's Choice Theory

for many of her myriad wise insights and connections.

I especially love the reminder about Glasser's belief

that everyone has five basic needs,

belonging, fun, freedom, power, and survival,

something to keep in mind the next time

we happen upon an argument, 

a conflict 

or a challenging behavior.

I know it'll help us not only professionally

but with personal relationships as well.

Oh, I could go on and on, but instead

I'll invite you to check out The Path to Serendipity;

I'm quite certain you'll be thankful that you did.

Thank you, Allyson, for sharing your heartbeat;

I could feel your passion and your joy on every page.

{Oh, and you were right; I loved the forward by Brad Montague!}

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Be The One

Today I'm excited because we have a winner for the three-month FarFaria App subscription. Congrats, Sarah Crist. I will be in touch with you to connect you with my friends at FarFaria so you can download your app directly. 

Sarah's favorite B2S book is The Kissing Hand by Audrey Penn. Such a sweet, sensitive story with a built-in strategy to help young ones stay connected with their loved ones even when distance separates them.

Did you know that there's another book in this series,

one that targets the problem of bullying behaviors?

Click the book cover graphic for a reading on You Tube.

Watching this video from Conscious Discipline might very well be the most important ten minutes that you'll spend today. OK, that might be a stretch, but I promise you that you will not want to miss this look at how bullying happens.

It goes all the way back to birth. The part about children with "difficult temperaments" stopped me in my tracks. I especially connected with the explanation about what a parent says our of frustration and angers and what that parent actually means. How many times was that me? 

A problem in the making ...

Now that we have this powerful information,

how do we meet the needs of those children she refers to as

"desperate for connection" effectively? Or at least a little? Because to them, a bad connection is better than no connection at all. And the part about "I don't care" meaning their brain is shut off, we've got our work cut out for us to reverse their "I don't feel cared for by anyone" feelings, because kids can't learn from someone with whom they don't have a relationship.

The virtue of "empathy is offline." WoW. 

Ok, so the video kind of ends quickly, leaving us hanging. That's because it's produced by a company that'd like you to attend their training and use their program. But you can also elevate empathy and counteract that "problem in the making" by creating a climate of caring attachments in your classroom, with your class family. Put your focus on relationships and linking our students to one another and to you. Let them talk and teach them to listen. Help them express their feelings in a healthy way. Empower them to take responsibility for their own learning so that they don't feel unworthy or disconnected. You could be the one who helps that child connect. One of the slides in my presentation has some challenging Buddy-Buzz questions:

Read Teaching kids to be nice without being bullied {here}.

One by Kathryn Otoshi is a powerful tool 
with an anti-bullying, be-the-one theme. 

Using simple color blots to serve as its characters, Otoshi makes it easy for us to connect feelings to her tale about Blue. Yellow is bright and sunny, for example, and Purple is regal. Like fire, however, Red is hot and its anger translates into bullying behavior. Red pushes Blue around and no one intervenes to make it stop. Because the other colors won't stand up to Red, they are all eventually berated and belittled. Until One comes along. One helps the other colors understand that what Red is doing is wrong. One encourages the colors to be upstanders rather than bystanders. And, in the end, when Red gets so mad that he's about to roll away, it's his true Blue friend who suggests that they co-exist ... and maybe even get along? ... with this reflective inquiry: Can Red be hot and Blue be cool?

Want a glimpse into your students' world? 
Make a Be A Buddy, Not a Bully T-chart before reading One aloud:

Check out this great review with activities for One {here}.
Watch a Vimeo using kid-made stick puppets to act out One {here}.
Don't miss this Pinterest page dedicated to One {here}.

This year, as you work to build relationships with your superheroes, 
why not challenge them with this question:
How will you be the one?

Oh, and be on the lookout in Sept. 2014 for Two!

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Now That's Significant

Today I'm researching who Dr. James Comer is 

and pondering what he means by significant.

Here's what I found when I looked the definition up online at 

The Free Dictionary.

And I'm going to muse that trust, kindness, caring and love are likely incredibly important ingredients

in that recipe of meaningfulness that makes

those connections significant.

How do you make that happen in your school family?

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Lorenzo's Gift

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And now for the rest of the story. On Wednesday I promised that there was a story coming, because sometimes I wonder if the students in the earlier part of my career got ripped off. I think I can safely say that that happened to Lorenzo. This story has been one that I've needed a week to reflect on before sharing it. It's so weird; I hadn't thought about him in 22 years and this week I can't stop thinking about him. I'm not sure that I've totally digested it myself, but here goes; my son Jacob suggested the pithy title: 

Catharsis Over Queso

After much debate about where to take Jacob for Mexican food the night before he went to Germany for a few weeks, Luna's won out because it's close by and we had a church bulletin which means a ten-percent discount. Anyway, we were enjoying queso and chips while perusing the menu when this man comes to the table and asks what my name is. He explains that he's pretty sure I used to teach at FHS and goes on to say, "I think I was your worst student." Well, "that couldn't be right," I was thinking as my mind flashed instantly back to Hector (click here to remember his story). He told us that he was a 1990 graduate and that he'd caused a lot of trouble in high school, so much, in fact, that I'd kicked him out of my class and made him take Spanish from the teacher down the hall. He said his name was Lorenzo.  

As I tried to remember a Lorenzo and figure out WHY I would have possibly kicked this kid out of my class, I quickly apologize for not doing more to connect with him. He shrugs off my apology and he adds that I'd be glad to know he'd turned his life around and graduated from Texas A & M. He says he's in town visiting his mom and I introduce him to Kaitlyn and tell him that she's a student at UT.  They greet one another, and that's when he says he wants to buy our dinner to make up for how horrible he'd been. He asks John how much he thinks it'll cost and John replies that we're pretty much a $50.00 family of five. So Lorenzo puts $50 cash on the table and says again that he can still see the frustration on my face and he was sorry for all of the trouble he caused. Then, Lorenzo walked off.

I wanted to know more, to remember his story more clearly, to understand what made me do what I did. I see his mom, who was waiting for him at the cash register behind us and, when we make eye contact, she comes over to me. I tell her that I'm sorry I kicked him out of my class and that I hope I wasn't mean to him, and she smiled softly and said something like this: No, he doesn't want you to feel bad, that's not what this is about. When you walked in, he recognized you right away and he told me that you'd kicked him out of your class.  I asked him if he deserved it and he said yes. You disciplined him like we would have and I want you to know that he's a successful businessman because of teachers like you.

She was kind to imply that it was tough love, the reason I didn't let him stay in my class, and maybe it was. Or maybe I was just a young, inexperienced teacher, in over my head and out of tools to help a trouble-making teen. I feel sad that someone has believed for 22 years that he was my "worst student" and I totally wish I could change having given up on him . . .  I just cannot imagine that I thought sending a student to another class was any kind of viable or reasonable solution to his behavior challenges. 

So I've had to force myself to not get too caught up on what went wrong and focus on what went right, on the courage that it took Lorenzo to come to our table and make amends after all those years. I'm happy that he was able to go on to make better choices and do good things in his world. I feel fortunate that Lorenzo was able to forgive me for not finding a way to reach him and I am grateful to him for his generous gift of grace (especially powerful because my own children got to witness it) and some great grub. 

For the record, I find it comically coincidental that all of this happened at a Mexican restaurant. 
And today I know, without a doubt, that you just. never. know. 

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