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June is Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) Awareness Month.
Get familiar with the causes, symptoms, and treatment of PTSD in children, and check out the resources below for information on PTSD in adults.
Symptoms
Any life threatening event or event that threatens physical harm can cause PTSD. These events may include:
- sexual abuse or violence (does not require threat of harm)
- physical abuse
- natural or man made disasters, such as fires, hurricanes, or floods
- violent crimes such as kidnapping or school shootings
- motor vehicle accidents such as automobile and plane crashes
PTSD can also occur after witnessing violence. These events may include exposure to:
- community violence
- domestic violence
- war
Finally, in some cases learning about these events happening to someone close to you can cause PTSD.
- 15% to 43% of girls and 14% to 43% of boys go through at least one trauma.
- Of those children and teens who have had a trauma, 3% to 15% of girls and 1% to 6% of boys develop PTSD.
Treatment:
- Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT)-Most effective, often accompanied by psycho-education and parental involvement.
- Play therapy-Play therapy can be used to treat young children with PTSD who are not able to deal with the trauma more directly. The therapist uses games, drawings, and other techniques to help the children process their traumatic memories.
- Psychological First Aid--Can be used in schools and traditional settings. Psychological First Aid involves providing comfort and support, normalizing the children's reactions, helping caregivers deal with changes in the child's emotions and behavior, teaching calming and problem-solving skills, and referring the most symptomatic children for additional treatment.
For more information...
Click here:
Source for professionals
Click here:
Source for family/public
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June Kid of the Month: Salimah Rahman
Salimah Rahman is eleven years old and in the fifth grade at Woodburn Elementary School. Salimah's parents, who are now naturalized US citizens, emigrated from Pakistan when her father, a computer engineer, was offered a position with an American company. Their mother, a financial consultant, was able to take the opportunity to study at an American university. Several years after arriving in the US, the family welcomed their elder daughter Salimah. Her birth was celebrated for many reasons, including the fact that she would represent the first generation of their family to be born US citizens.
About a year ago, there was another day of celebration when Salimah's parents took the oath of citizenship. Salimah was proud of her parents, who had worked very hard to learn all of the historical and civic information required to pass the citizenship exam. At their celebration party, Salimah said, "Now I know how Mom and Dad must feel when I get a good grade on a test or when they see me participate in school assemblies."
Salimah, like her father, enjoys all things computer-related. One of her favorite pastimes is corresponding via the Internet with Salimah's extended family still living in Pakistan. When there is an opportunity for an overseas call or the occasional visit, she and her cousins enjoy the opportunity to practice their language skills. Her cousins wish to improve their English, and even though she sometimes uses Punjabi (Poon-jah-bee) with her parents, Salimah enjoys the opportunity to speak Punjabi with kids her own age. Punjabi is a dialect of Urdu (Er-doo), the official language of Pakistan.
While the family is proud of their national
ity as US citizens, they also honor their ethnicity as Pakistanis.
Salimah reminds people that she is happy to talk about what being a Muslim means for her, but she can't speak for all Muslims. She also asks people to remember that she is many things--a Muslim, an American of Pakistani heritage, a computer programmer (someday!), and a big fan of the Woodburn Wildcats.
Salimah is featured in The Kids on the Block program about coping with crisis, war and family deployment.
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DID YOU KNOW?
Mild traumatic brain injury (mild TBI) or concussion has been identified as a hallmark injury of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. New research has explored the impact of mild TBI on the development, course, and clinical management of PTSD. Findings have shown the impact of mild TBI on response to PTSD treatment, which can inform potential treatment augmentation strategies. Possible mechanisms of the relationship between PTSD and TBI include:
- Altered memory formation for the event and associated emotions, leading to poorly controlled recall of the event (i.e., re-experiencing symptoms)
- Changes in cognitive control may lead to emotional dysregulation.
Check out
this Defense Health Agency webinar on deployment-related co-occuring PTSD and mild TBI to see more current research and treatment practices related to post-deployment PTSD symptoms, including those attributed to mild TBI.
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Lately we have been lucky enough to bring our Kids on the Block program to older children in communities across Georgia. How can older children benefit from KOTB? Do preteens and even teens watch puppet shows? The answer is that our program presents itself both as an example of creative expression and an educational tool.
Our KOTB troupe benefits from collaboration with agencies and programs that serve older children. Performing puppetry for older audiences is about tone and context. For these audiences the puppets speak and act in a more serious tone, rather than bounding about the stage with energy. Older audiences are at times a more cynical bunch, and they will resent any hint of condescension in our performance. So I preface every performance with a request that the audience offer us feedback about the topic we are presenting. I explain that we typically perform for younger audiences, and that we need suggestions on how we can make our performances more accessible for younger kids, especially during the discussion session. We also discuss how puppetry is an important outlet for creativity, and how creative expression can be an instrumental part of personal recovery.
Older audiences also demonstrate more sophistication about mental illnesses and coping skills. Recent audiences have discussed subjects such as anxiety, bipolar disorder, OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder), ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder), and PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder). Conversations about these topics enable the program to expand its role to address more serious mental illnesses. Both groups benefit from the performance; the teens have an opportunity to safely ask questions about mental illness, and our troupe benefits from suggestions from the teens.
What people are saying about Kids on the Block:
"Thank you so much for bringing the program to our Club! Please come back soon with more puppets."
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Teacher, Boys & Girls Club, Columbus GA
"That part when the puppet danced was really funny."
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Second Grader, Dekalb County
"I liked when Mark Riley showed us how he plays basketball."
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Third Grader, Polk County, GA
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To schedule a Kids on the Block performance, please contact Lorie at [email protected]
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| WE NEED YOUR SUPPORT! Kids on the Block is only one of many programs offered by MHA of Georgia to further our mission of enhancing the mental health of Georgians through education, outreach and advocacy. Click here to learn more about our programs. Your support will help us continue our work educating Georgians about mental illness, working to eliminate stigma and advocating on behalf of people with mental illness in our state. Click here to support MHA of Georgia. |
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