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Sharing – 5 Crucial Mental Health Tips for Bloggers
Whenever anyone asks me about blogging, especially about child abuse and mental health, I tell them that they need to decide two things, and always stick to them.
1. Decide what you will share about your own story, and what is off the table. Don’t share so much of yourself that you wind up becoming overwhelmed and find yourself dealing with the fallout. Remember, once you share it, you no longer control how other people respond. If you’re not ready for that, there’s no shame in it. Just know before you start.
2. The second one, is to decide what you’re willing and able, to give to your readers. This is the hardest one, as the article below mentions:
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Sharing – What Is the Best Way to Deliver a Thank-You?
I’d rephrase their language a bit. Instead of waiting for the “best” time to say thank you in the best way, it’s far more important to just say it however you can. I would much rather get a quick text expressing gratitude than potentially not get anything because so much time has passed.
I don’t think I’m alone in that.
So worry less about “how”, and just make sure that you actually say thank you!Â
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Looking at Insurance Data to Identify What Works to Prevent Abuse in an Organization
This makes sense. Even something as common and necessary as background checks are only going to catch people who’ve already been caught before. It’s a good thing to do, but it leaves that gap. What doesn’t leave a gap is having policies and procedures in place that prevent anyone from being able to abuse kids when working with your organization. If being alone with a child is simply not acceptable for anyone, that closes those gaps.
As the article goes on, that means rules like not giving kids gifts, not driving them home, etc. That’s what works, and it has to just be the culture in the organization, no questions asked. Create that culture, and you’re making the best effort to protect kids that you can make.
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Sharing – How To Identify Grooming Predatory Behavior & Stop It
That’s our blind spot. We’re so busy looking for creepy, anti-social, stereotypes that we miss the charming abusers right in our midst, and we miss all the signs and hints that our kids might be dropping because we just didn’t stop to consider that adult to be dangerous. We just assumed they were safe, and our kids would somehow know better anyway.
Clearly, that strategy isn’t working.
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What Does it Mean to Hold Space For Someone?
For me, I’ve always viewed holding space in terms of that word, safe. When I hold space for someone I’m not solving their problem, or questioning them. I’m simply letting them be. Whatever that might look like at that moment, and I’m making sure that they are safe. It means making sure that being in my presence, either in person or virtually, is a place where they are free to cry, vent, question, or whatever form of expression is needed to help at that moment. It means being the person who is simply there, listening, offering support, but above all else, keeping them safe, physically, emotionally, mentally, etc.
I also recognize how difficult that really is to do. Many of us weren’t raised to “hold space”, but to fix things. We see someone crying and our instinct is to fix, to do something to get them to stop crying, instead of simply giving them space to cry. Or we want to run out and correct instead of simply allowing people the space to tell their story safe from the worry of the person hearing it will overreact. This is so hard for us, we want to correct injustice, to fight for the people we care about, but sometimes by doing so, we eliminate their safe space to simply tell their story and stop listening to what they want from us. That is the opposite of holding space.
How do you hold space for others, and for yourself?
