Firstly, I’d like to say I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, and an amazing start to the beginning of 2017!
I’ve been so busy with so many fantastic things recently- I really must start writing them down. I have achieved so much over the past couple of months, it’s almost unbelievable.
The CAT (Children and young people’s Action and Transformation) group met on the 30th November, with a few new members joining the group. During this meeting the young people discussed crisis.
The group were asked to define crisis from their perspective as a young person. This is what they said;
Crisis is………
“When it is highly likely that I will harm myself or others.”
“A situation that is out of control and getting worse.”
“Someone without appropriate support, isolated with no lifeline.”
“Losing a sense of self, feeling angry, and not knowing where to direct it. This causes erratic, unpredictable and risky behaviours.”
“Losing self-awareness, so you can’t remember what you have done.”
What would prevent crisis?
Having the right support- someone to talk to and give advice.
Someone impartial who won’t get affected by my thought patterns and behaviours- family can make it worse as they don’t always understand and they are too emotionally involved.
Often young people will appear to be having a good day and then they crash. This is hard for the people around them to understand. The young person will feign emotions throughout the day to keep everyone else happy, and put on a fake smile which is exhausting. It’s easier to smile than say how you really feel, but this just masks the problem and makes it worse eventually. So prevention is about being able to be honest about how you feel and talk about it at the time with people who understand & won’t react emotionally themselves.
It can be worse in schools due to peer pressure and teachers not always understanding. They just write a report card, and don’t ask the young person how they are. Teachers that understand and offer support can prevent things escalating into crisis. Peer support is important too. If your problems start from an early age, friends understand more because they’re used to it.
The School nurse can play an important part too. We had a really good one who asked everyone individually about their emotional health.
What is needed during crisis?
A 24/7 Crisis helpline is important- a faceless voice especially for men as there is still stigma (men are viewed as weak if they suffer emotionally). This stigma also must be acknowledged in the SPA.
Don’t rush my phone call if it’s late at night. Calls must be fully staffed 24/7 with no automated responses- it must be a person answering the phone.
Questions to be asked: Is it a state of emergency? Has the person harmed themselves?
There must be staff who can cope with the information they are receiving and can respond.
Some people may call the crisis line if they are drunk- this may be because alcohol is a trigger for them.
People who staff the crisis line should have some form of training such as safeguarding training and mental health awareness training, such as mental health first aid. They should have good assessment skills.
The staff should be sympathetic to a degree, but should be in control of this, and must understand mental health so that they can give coping tools or advice on how to deescalate the crisis.
Prompting questions can help the young person to figure out their own solutions to crisis. Core questions, grounding tool based on 5 senses*, distracting tools.
* Grounding tool based on 5 senses:
· Name 5 things you can see in the room with you.
· Name 4 things you can feel (“chair on my back” or “feet on floor”)
· Name 3 things you can hear right now (“fingers tapping on keyboard” or “TV”)
· Name 2 things you can smell right now (or, 2 things you like the smell of)
· Name 1 good thing about yourself
In the next CAT meeting, we will continue to discuss crisis by talking about: What would improve A&E experience? What would the perfect support look like? What follow up support is needed?
Do you agree with these statements? Let me know what you think.
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