Serving Gogebic, Iron and Ontonagon Counties
Serving Gogebic, Iron and Ontonagon Counties
A large crowd of professionals listen to Dr. James Henry speak about secondary traumatic stress in the workplace.
By TOM STANKARD
Ironwood Township - Gogebic County was one of 12 counties chosen to participate in a secondary traumatic stress training session Monday and Tuesday at Big Powderhorn Mountain Lodge.
The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services teamed with Western Michigan University to create a trauma-informed system of care for children and their families in child welfare.
According to the MDHHS, trauma is the emotional response to an event, or series of events, that threatens or causes harm. Dr. James Henry Child Trauma Assessment Center Director at WMU said the effects of trauma can interfere with normal development and can have lasting adverse effects on children.
To educate and inform welfare professionals about traumatic stress, Henry spoke Monday about building trauma resilience case plans for children and families. Then, on Tuesday, Henry emphasized the importance of identifying and addressing secondary traumatic stress within child welfare professionals.
Approximately 40 professionals attended the training session Tuesday to watch and participate in a session.
Henry divided people into four groups according to how they deal with secondary traumatic stress. There was a physical, social, emotional and cognitive group. Henry said most people were in the physical group.
Henry said the point of the exercise was to show how secondary traumatic stress affects the workplace.
People returned to their seats and Henry gave a keynote presentation.
To begin, Henry said the first step to addressing the problem is to "name it and contain it."
From there, Henry went over problems concerning child welfare professionals, and discussed how it affects the workplace.
Henry said there's "tremendous turnover in child welfare."
"(Employees) come down eventually, and (they'll) come down hard," he said. "The energy and passion will go away."
The presenter said that child welfare professionals experience a role conflict.
"As we gain rapport, safety, they also make decisions that take children away temporally or forever."
In the workplace, Henry said child welfare professionals try to manage policy, paperwork and practice, but it's too much.
Henry said not being able to balance work elements causes stress in the workplace.
Henry said pain that's not addressed at the workplace creates a toxic environment.
"If we don't talk about, people get angry, and we blame," he said. "Venting is good, but constant venting is toxic."
Henry said this secondary traumatic stress can eventually shift a worker's mentality.
"It's really important that we recognize what this does," he said.
Henry said it's important to leave work-related stress where it as and not let it affect your personal life, but most aren't good at that.
"You leave it at work, but it's still in you," he said. "You leave it at work, but emotionally, it's still there. Your brain doesn't work that way because it's still in your body."
