Coffee and Butcher birds.

My friend in Darwin points out the Butcher Bird swooping amongst the Cappuccinos and Piccolos and occupied tables of the Botanic gardens’ café. The backdrop of tropical flora  and the songbird pieces of the birds in the vegetation really is  pretty. The Butcher bird unlike the other Darwin patrons of the café wears a formal business suit of black and white despite the heat and humidity. It stares unsmilingly before launch.  It has business this morning  amongst the crumbs of baguettes and overnight porridge. The Butcher bird swoops . There might be a  protest of the coffee drinkers. Protests do not bother the Butcher Bird.

He, or is it she , ( certainly not ze/hir ) is  focused on the business at hand.

The musical song of the Butcher Bird is alluring.. I think the word is euphonic. It is honeyed and sweet.

My friend shows me a close up google image of the Butcher bird and gives me a description of our suited companions savage behaviour beyond its sweet song in the café. It has a hooked beak with a notch that severs the spinal cord or crushes the skull of other smaller creatures. After bayoneting them it hangs their victims remains on a branch near their penthouse lair.

I imagine they preen their feathered suit , take on that steely gaze and  then go back to business and begin afresh their alluring  pretty song.

On the way through..

Warning or attempting to dissuade people from a course of action that will harm them is one of life’s smaller duties. However , there is no dignity in repeated admonitions if people will not listen.

Wise heads will listen the first time and probably act on the second hearing. Protecting the foolish and personally wearing responsibility for them is onerous and a waste of your time , money and resources. Warnings are a bit like sitting down to drink a strong coffee. One is adequate , and two is the limit.

On the way through

Violence, in its various forms, never leaves those who in their youth found it to their advantage. It is not as muscular or as physically agile as it once was , but assuredly remains snarling and barking and bullying albeit with blunted teeth and matted fur. It is not as pretty or loud or assured as it once was , the dried thorns protrude and no alluring petals assert themselves.

What is coming up in conversations ?

People appear to be more distracted and struggling to focus. There can be a number of reasons for this , not necessarily all at the feet of social media. I want to suggest the following. There is general disorientation of life and living patterns that emerged during Covid.There was less face to face contact and a greater dependency on digital communication, both in our work spaces and in our domestic lives. Digital communication is short hand and it’s a form of abbreviated relationship sharing.

Also, there has been a flourishing of social apps in the cyber space and they have extended their kingdoms especially so during the epidemic. Such apps such as Instagram ,which gets mentioned much in conversations, is very much image based along with all the photo shopping and and electronic air brushing that goes with it. I have just returned from Europe and also then travelled to Asia. The degree of personal preening that I observed in historical sites or perfectly beautiful scenary, being seemingly ignored, for the sake of focussing on facial iPhone snaps was silly.

Digital communication is also a communication style that encourages image rather than the more demanding one of verbal communication and the reading of non verbal language. Its in the digital space that there can be a creep or graduated movement towards less attention to detail. ( Unless of course its the crafted coiffure of my lovely hair or stage managed presentation of my body) Less personality is conveyed and you certainly don’t need to try as hard if the alternative are those of interaction via emailing or using a platform. This of course raises terrible internal questions for the Insta users. Namely am I good enough ? Do I come up to passable and admirable levels? The answer that people give themselves is that they don’t. The answer boils over into other spheres of work and relationship.

I also have had conversations with individuals who made a stand to reduce their own social media consumption or simply to stop. I am told that like smoking it was hard at first . Life, apparently got progressivelybetter.

Another observation about families...

Families, as they grow, need to develop a culture of purpose and intentionality. Some families have no energy. Children and adults just seem to turn up and go through the tasks of the day in fatigued survival mode Living and partly living.

When partners come together or get married, they potentially move from being post adolescence individuals to a couple hopefully maturing and growing up together. It’s a great and socially defined moment of growing up. They have children. They take on incremental grades of responsibility and sacrifice and a movement away from individual needs. A growing unit, a partners needs and children’s needs becomes a priority. Choice and responsibility and sacrifice brings about an order and predictability. Families cannot live with a continuing neglected pattern of failure or chaos or mayhem. To do so is to be locked into adolescence. People need to grow up, take responsibility and lift a load in their lives. People generally don’t feel good about themselves if they just turn up to any event or work or social situation without any thought. Its not healthy focussing on accomplishing nothing except your own, undisturbed, languor.

Life will happen of course and tragedy and calamity will occur. But where there is a surrender and capitulation to life challenges, a sour legacy of failure and avoidance , can emerge. It damages esteem for adults and damages their resilience and their dignity. It’s not a good legacy for children to observe and emulate.

Just don't go there .......

Signs or warnings are there for a reason. People don’t serendiptously put up signs to annoy people. They are usually there for a reason. Some one or some group have put up a sign as a warning to others because someone has been hurt badly or died or there has been a near miss. Alternatively, given the calculations and the frailness or ignorance or bravado of humans, something awful is likely to occur.

In life generally, it is important to know who and what is dangerous. In life it’s essential to know where danger lies. There is no virtue in being life innocent or being naive. The obligation and duty to yourself and others is to keep away and steer clear of strife.

In the mental health realm don’t revisit old toxic or dangerous habits or believe you're capable of dealing with dangerous people by yourself. To use an analogy, Ive spent a lot of time on mine sites. Machinery and some geographic locations appear safe from a distance , however close up they are very dangerous. . Don’t revisit those places or people where experience says it’s painful or brutally upsetting or a waste of time. Certainly keep away from people that your life experience suggests are dangerous or angry or create havoc, .

Domestic violence and those who speak truthfully…

Domestic violence comes in various forms. I thought that I had shrugged that part of my career off many years ago working in Government. There are things you never want to go back to or deal with and you really make up your mind that’s it. It has resurfaced and as a team we occasionally have need to work with domestic violence victims across NSW and Victoria and South Australia.

For the most part it is women who find themselves at the cruel receiving end of it. Though there are men. (And children and animals are affected directly as well, of course). You realise that evil and ugliness is not confined to any one gender. You're really seeing human nature at its most malevolent and narcissistic and cruel. Years ago a lecturer of mine told me he destroyed volumes of stories about war and about being a prisoner of war. It was not just the cruelty he saw of Japanese captors in Changi concentration camp, but also of Australian soldiers in captivity. It was too much to bear. It was too much to inflict on others who might read it. That’s my principle in counselling and relating stories. I’ve seen too much and heard too much. It serves no purpose in relaying stories about cruelty, even if they are anonymous.

I do want to make the following observations.

There are a lot of motherless and fatherless grown up children around. They were emotionally abandoned or untutored in life or ignored or just unloved, while their parents got on with living the good life or pursuing the third or fourth relationship.

I observe that Leadership in workplaces really matters. People of goodwill and influence such as leaders and managers in workplaces can really make a difference. Employment and work places, for victims of domestic violence are usually the one safe place. The messages of predictability and friendliness and safety mean a great deal. Its the safe place where conversations about having a plan and getting out and getting safe often start.

My other point is this. For young women especially, friends can mean the difference between staying or getting out of a violent situation. By friends I’m not talking about the mates collecting gossip or those living a life and circling the office.

We have noted in counselling that genuine and brave friends really matter to people in life crisis. They are those who fit that wonderful category of truth tellers and who want the good for their friends. Those friends can speak into lives. They can and must be truthful about relational choices or their strong misgivings. They may even forgo their friendship for a season with their friend, as they take a side. None the less they have spoken the truth.

what shall it profit a man ...

Poverty can dehumanise people. It restricts access to healthy food and to shelter. It ravages families and makes them vulnerable to all type of abuse from the violent and the spitefu and the shrewdl. Poverty bruises self esteem.It has a vicious way of murdering the ability to be aspirational.

Working with long term unemployed people and in very ordinary suburbs, there was nothing romantic or poetic or noble about the poverty. Life is brutal and unhealthy and short and full of violent things.

Riches can create an entitlement and arrogance especially where it can buy absolutely anything or anybody it desires. The schooled rich keep their contempt hidden and keep their rules of engagement with the world and people around them secreted away. The newly acquired rich flaunt it like a designer tattoo or gold throat chain..

Working with individuals with unimaginable wealth is to work with very unhappy and joyless people who have no peace -despite their riches. Their children invariably become their clones or escape them or ignore them.

Things that aren’t easily buried

In counselling you observe some interesting things. Worry or anxiety or obsession can seem to come out of no where. It plants itself. But it sets up its swag and makes a home. For how long or for what duration is the scary part in the questions that follow. Sometimes it’s easy enough to connect the dots. You can work out from recent events where dynamics are clearly at play. And yet sometimes life circumstances and the evidence of the recent past and present don’t give any clues as to where it necessarily came from.

For those to whom it comes out of the blue I can only say that our thoughts and memories are not random or come from a blank nothingness. Anxiety is made up of images and replaying of conversations , words and sepia memories and repetitive scenes that change characters and disguise themselves and monologues and dialogues and a fantasy of intertwined narratives. We all have histories. We all have memories. And we all have stories. We all have distracting thoughts or behaviours to hide the dark stuff or the anxious thoughts. Inwit have visited a lot of mine sites over the years. Rubbish has to be buried as mine sites are miles from nowhere. Rubbish, like tyres needs to be buried. Strangely, over time they will eventually come to the surface. The pressures exerted underground always make sure of that.

A looking back that does no good.

With people there is a morbid thinking and a looking back in time, that creates a brutal stuckness in the past. I’ve met men and women who refuse to let a block of their history, no matter how painful or bitter , dominate their lives. They refuse to entertain the monologues in their heads or encourage the lengthy conversations with others about wrongs done or past histories. They know that words and images can be powerful triggers, when they are toyed with. Words and images and then narratives will take them to restless places where lengthy rumination and wasted hours and lost sleep dwell.

panic and anxiety attacks

A panic attack can be a very scary experience where you have an episode of feeling overwhelmed by fear or anxiety.You may sense that anxiety is spiralling out of control. And nothing you do is able to stop it. The more you attempt to remedy the anxiety the more intense it becomes. It is a very uncomfortable place to be in and what is experienced is a combination of mental and physical symptoms.

The actual experience of a anxiety or panic attack.

People will experience an intense apprehension or fear despite their circumstances being quite ordinary. People feel and become aware of their heart rate rising. They might experience sweating, trembling or shaking. Having difficulty breathing is another scary symptom. Chest pain and shoulder and arm pain can happen. This seems to duplicate signs of a heart attack. Feeling like vomiting or the need to go to the toilet is common. Or mentally just a sense of being in an unreal out of body state like de’juvu. These are all physical and mental signs of a panic attack.

These symptoms can last up to 10 minutes. They can last for as little as seconds or a couple of minutes or 30 or 60 minutes.  Sometimes they move like waves through a day coming and going. The waves of panic also move with varying degrees of intensity and different physical symptoms.

One of the problems with panic attacks is that it makes people believe that they are really odd or strange or going insane. This is certainly not the case. And statistically 1 in 5 people will have an experience of a panic attack in their lives. If anything, it means a lot of people are keeping very quiet about it. !!!

Another problem with Panic attacks is that people can also get into avoiding ordinary every day events out of a fear of having a public panic attack. They avoid going out or even being in the company of people or circumstances that they believe will induce an attack.

What happens when we get anxious ?

Just a few reflections. Next time you get anxious try and be aware of what happens to your breathing. More than likely breathing becomes faster and shallower. Likewise when people are sighing or panting they are only taking breaths from the upper part of their lungs.Anxiety provokes this upper lung breathing. At the same time our thought processes are probably telling ourselves how hopeless or terrible our situation is . This cycles into more dark thoughts and more shallow breathing. Before you know it the physiology of the lung and heart joins with the catastrophic thinking and a anxiety or panic attack is occurring. 

Thoughts are not friendly during panic attack and there is a cascading of thought after thought that appears uncontrollable. There is growing and fearful sense of not being able to escape the here and now as well as the life issues that have brought it into being.

Panic attacks can often fatigue people or make people sleepless.

People don’t often recognise that anxiety keeps people awake. While a household or partner may be sound asleep, a person who is in a anxious place or fears some frightening panic attacks, will not sleep well or simply spend a night horizontal and thinking or monologuing in their head or perhaps wandering about their house attempting some solace from the thoughts. Sleeplessness can manifest itself in fatigue and the minds disorientation, which expresses itself in odd behaviours and speech.

Using our radar

In talking with some people about their experience of panic attacks they will sometimes mention spending time thinking on their inadequacies and comparing themselves to particular people or groups of people. Other people will talk about the high or idealistic or romantic notions that they have invested in some person or social event or place or ceremony. The theme of avoidance and escape into fantasy can also be part of those conversations when discussing precursors to panic attacks in counselling. Fear is the engine room of panic attacks. Panic attacks appear to come quickly and without apparent signs or warning. However we do have radars. Detecting my body signs ,such as shallow breathing or just clearly being aware that my my mind is at this time making mountains out of molehills, means that our radar is working. Taking note of the thoughts from a distance and naming the dimensions of it also goes along way in dealing effectively with panic attack and anxiety.

What are some useful strategies in dealing with Panic attacks?

When the panic or anxiety begins to rise breathing is essential. You may even have been holding your breath while you have been thinking or worrying without knowing.Breathing in deep controlled and gentle manner without frantic deep breaths will start to work. 

Very useful to talk with someone who understands and does not view your panic attack as strange or that you need to snap out of it. Counselling with someone who takes time to understand the genesis of your panic attack and can provide some useful directions in counselling at your own pace can be immensely helpful. 

Remind yourself at the time that the attack is only temporary. Some people have found distraction and doing something that is reassuring really helpful. Watching some mindless television, listening to the radio, internet surfing (just avoid Googling up Panic attacks or heart attacks) In fact anything that is distracting. Distraction works because the subject material producing the anxiety is focused away from the thoughts and physical sensations.

Some people find it useful to restructure their thinking by writing or just thinking through the evidence as to why they should be so panicked. This process invites people to ask the question, “what am I really in danger from?” “What catastrophe am I really facing?” “What is the worst possible thing that is going to happen to me?”

Don’t live life like is an emergency. Relaxing or learning to relax is a lost art in our busy world and sometimes needs to be relearnt or even taught for the first time. Relaxation has three methods that seem to produce some relief from the demanding thoughts and dynamic effect of panic attacks. They include progressive muscle relaxation, controlled breathing and imagery.

I have already mentioned the potency of avoidance which can generate panic attacks. Mental avoidance of tasks or conversations or matters that cannot be put off are a universal culprit in panic attacks and I think a lot of mental health issues.

Dare I mention exercise. It clears the head and releases endorphins. 

Alcohol and work and life

Alcohol consumption is so much part of Australian work life and social activities and home life that it is difficult to be objective about its harmful impact. It does affect individual lives and families and work life. It is a social ritual and the consumption and serving of alcohol is the expected norm of life. This is further supported by media that will underscore that in small measures alcohol consumption is normal and will even have health benefits. Media reporting is at polar opposites. On the one hand they will report death and mayhem that was caused by it. Or alternatively its social excesses that give rise to some comic tragedy or mishap.  The bottom line is that alcohol will always make an impact on clear thinking and action in some way.

Alcohol and its effects:

Alcohol is a significant chemical when introduced to the bloodstream. Someone has commented that If it were to be introduced as a substance in the 21st century as a totally new invention, it is likely that it would be restricted and would certainly be seen as undesirable substance, because of its addictive nature. Alcohols main effect is to depress the central nervous system. It does produce a temporary relaxed state followed by any number of physiological and psychological responses. Drinking will affect individual judgement. It will slow response times.  Machinery or vehicle use can be made dangerous after alcohol use and it reduces concentration.  Care and judgment might need to be exercised after consumption for the of sake children or vulnerable people. Accident, risk or harm to yourself or others is increased with the consumption of alcohol. Choices and decisions are impaired. People can do or say stupid things that can end careers or relationships or terminate in legal action against them. Risks happen when people are drinking. Risks also occur when they are coming down from alcohol with a hangover.

What are the recommendations and quantities around consuming alcohol?

2 standard drinks a day. One drink is considered to contain 10 grams of alcohol. That’s for men and women. It doesn’t sound much but the long term addictive qualities of alcohol along with its medical impact can be devastating. Alcohol and its effect will be calibrated by a persons metabolism and age and mental state and other prescribed or non prescription drugs that are being taken as well.

What are the clues that suggest someone has a drinking problem? 

If your entire social and family life revolves around drinking and you cannot imagine a lengthy period without drinking, that is a problem. If you drink to relieve stress or depression or make yourself comfortable in social circumstances that should ring alarm bells. Or if you have major personality changes when you start drinking or you get angry and frighten people. When you can’t stop at 4 standard drinks a day, or 4 drinks a day is just not enough - it’s likely you have drinking problem. If you start drinking and you can’t easily stop, its likely you have a drinking problem. If it depresses you or makes you angry or has ever compromised your safety or others around you, it might be worth making some personal rules about how much and under what circumstances, you drink. If you drink until you black out or go unconscious or have no recall of the night before you have a drinking problem. If in your own family there has been problems with alcohol addiction, you should also be cautious.

Some practical tips around drinking 

Make up your mind before hand as to how much you plan to drink. Drink light beer and plan to have soft drink or mineral water in between. Try to avoid and don’t get into “shouting “a round.  Avoid salty food and crisps. Hotels put them there so you will drink more. Try not to drink on an empty stomach. And don’t allow others to top up your drinks.

If its all too difficult and alcohol is too hard to navigate and even reduce, there is always the severe and wise choice of giving up entirely. If that is not possible by yourself, it’s time to seek help to stop or reduce your drinking.

After a traumatic or critical event:

What on earth happened - what is going on? 

 We expect life to be predictable and safe.  We all have some sense of what a normal and predictable and safe day is in Australia. We go to work or go home or are about social activities with family and then the totally unpredictable or chaotic or violent happens.

Being involved in a critical episode or traumatic event will disrupt our lives and shake us and those around us. After a traumatic event we can expect to experience any number of feelings or thoughts or physiological responses. If you or workmates or family members have been involved or have witnessed or been in the vicinity of a traumatic event, it will bring about dislocation and disruption to your life in some shape or way.

What is a trauma or critical episode?

It can be any number of incidents that involve the loss of life or a near miss or verbal threats that could have involved death or serious injury. More specifically a critical incident might be a death or suicide or assault in a workplace. Or it might be a serious accident in a workplace which results in serious injuries for one or numerous people. An accident offsite or in its proximity affecting family members or workers. It might include violent or very threatening behaviour on a site such as a robbery. It could be a catastrophic industrial implosion or explosion. All might be considered to have an effect on people psychologically.

The time after a critical episode.

At the time and the time after the trauma, people can experience a spectrum of thoughts and emotions. There can be a sense of survivor relief, guilt, numbness, regret, agitation or fear. The range of thoughts and feelings can be jumbled together or experienced like a rollercoaster ride. Trauma is real in our lives and initially people can experience a sense of being emotionally and psychologically “all over the place” This is not uncommon and does not mean you are losing your mind.

Some of the responses to trauma.

Some strong emotions come to the surface in the hours and days after a critical incident or after witnessing something traumatic. 

People react to grief and loss in different ways depending on their personalities and characteristics. People will react to the trauma depending where they were geographically and in relation to the actual trauma event and what they saw or heard. 

Again, trauma is similar to grief and loss.  It is very similar in that it is the invasion of the unexpected into a predictable world. This sets the thinking and feeling world of individuals on its head. It should be noted there are no set rules of timeframes or rules about what or when people should be feeling or recovering or not crying or feeling OK again. 

People who have gone through trauma are on a journey. The brain is making sense and responding to the thoughts and feelings or images of totally out of the normal and life-threatening events. 

The severity and the proximity of a trauma and its effect on immediate loved ones or friends or workmates are all factors in dealing with trauma.  

Some specific responses to trauma.

·    Individuals react to stress and anxiety differently. Some people have friends to talk with others have limited contacts or networks or families to reach out to.

·    Confusion and disbelief that the trauma has happened at all. Some people report feeling physically numb or initially being in a dream like state.

·    An inability to sleep and not being able to concentrate or focus. 

·    Disbelief and denial and an ongoing thought, that this awful thing, could not have occurred.

·    People will feel overcome with emotion and cry or they can display great resentment or anger and want to blame someone for the episode. Some people are very stoic.

·    Guilt at surviving a critical episode or avoiding an accident where others were harmed.

·    Self-examination and blaming and questioning one’s own culpability in the episode.

·    “I could have, I should have, why didn’t I,”.

·    Sadness and feeling isolated or hopeless in the circumstances.

·    Feeling the trauma physically by having intrusive thoughts or failing to sleep or being hypersensitive or overly vigilant.

What is important is that like many episodes in life, things will over time return to the safe normal. The critical episode however is still part of memory and bruising for an individual or group. However, the severity and the proximity and psychological and emotional impact of any traumatic event and the make-up of the person experiencing it will be a major factor in people’s response.  

Also the dynamics of the trauma and who was involved and its effect on immediate loved ones or friends or workmates are all factors in dealing with trauma and moving into a recovery from the critical incident. Talking about what happened matters. 

Individuals react to stress and anxiety differently. Some people have friends to talk with others have limited contacts or networks or families to reach out to. Other times horrific things happen and there is never an easy exit in the short term.  Talking with a counsellor confidentially can be useful. 

Some practical ways ahead.      

·    Being around a scene or site where trauma has occurred will be confronting for a while. But not forever. Just brace yourself and steel yourself and look after others who are in the vicinity.

·    If you were close to the episode you will have intrusive thoughts and images. These will go with time. Again, there is nothing strange about them but talking about the images with someone you can trust matters.

·    You could be emotional about what’s happened. You may even think you're the only person. You're not. It’s important to reach out to other people or workmates.

·    Eat regularly and go easy on the alcohol.

·    Keep up with your normal routines and if your alone be deliberate and time limited about thinking or exploring the episode in your head. Every reasonable person always beats themselves up with” I should have. I could have. why didn’t I. 

·    Try not to work or bury yourself in work with no rest or recreation time planned 

·    If you can’t sleep at least rest. Don’t ruminate or relive the event when you rest. 

·    With time and space and reassurance things will return to normal.

Navigating Loss and grief and life sadness

Sadness and losing something or losing someone is a human experience. It’s part of life. All of us will experience loss in our life of some type. It can be others loss. Or it can be our own.

Life is not always easy. Bad things happen to good people. Grief is the response to losing someone or something we hold as important. We have invested affection or a level of significance in that person or a part of life or possession. Grief is the process we must go through. That journey usually can’t be avoided. We have to travel the grief journey and accept it and the pain and misery that new circumstances have been brought about.

On the journey through grief and loss we as humans will be captured by thoughts as well as emotions and also our behaviours and even physiological responses. We may have had experiences of grief in small ways previously in life, but some grief comes with a force and power that you might not have experienced before. You must not be surprised if grief impacts the whole quadrant of life. 

·      Your thoughts might be of disbelief, confusion, disarray, anger, nothingness.

·      Your feelings might be those of sadness, anger, shame, guilt, anxiety fear.

·      Behaviourally you may cry, become withdrawn, not be focussed, want to sleep or not want to eat.

·      Physiologically, a lack of energy, feel out of your body, oversensitive, stressed

Grief does not happen in a predictable orderly manner. There are no set rules.  Nor a start and finish line. We are all different.  It’s useful to know what some of the behaviours and words have been to express as people have tried moving from responding to a grief and emergence at the other end.

A Possible map of the journey 

Numbness: there is an experience of shock and even horror and disbelief. 

Denial: a deep sharp question that this should not be happening.

Strong emotion: this can be unique. For some weeping. For others total withdrawal.

Depression: Turning in on yourself and not allowing anybody else into your grief. 

Physiological impacts: Not sleeping. Not eating. Susceptibility to flu and cold. 

Anger: There can be a resentment at the person who has left you or who has deceased

Shame and guilt: there can be a self-prosecution that begins “if only I or why didn’t I “

Sentimentalism:  there can be an idealisation of the person or things that are lost.

Normalisation: The body and mind feel better about regular tasks and interactions.

Sad acceptance: Resistance to feeling good or joy in life is not as strong. A new life emerges.

New but bruised realities: The bruises may be deep but life will go on. 

Griefs intensity might be affected by some things:

·The circumstances of the loss and why or how and when that grief occurred.

·The particular make-up of the relationship or of the thing you have grieved over. 

·How your own group of friends and family experience grief or react to sad events.

·Your own degree of personal resilience and you tackle stress normally.

·The family and friends and belief systems that you hold to regarding loss or grief.

Helping others with their grief:

It’s always important to take time to listen to people in grief. Listen and be in that space and don’t feel that you need to use clichés or say something profound. Ask if they want to talk and don’t be concerned if they don’t want to at that time. People grieve differently. 

There is a wise proverb that says no one can know the bitterness of another mans heart. We should never presume on knowing what another woman or man is going through exactly. 

People will express some deep emotions and even say surprising things. You’re not there to judge or condemn, let them say what they need to say without too much interruption. People in grief can also say angry things or even humorous things. 

Your allowed to speak when you can and to be honest that you have no answers or that the loss makes you very angry or whatever it provokes.

Don’t take over the grief experience or the life of a person. They still need to have dignity and take direction in their own life. 

Dealing with your own response to grief and loss:

Accepting that a range of emotions will be present for a season of time into the future. You will experience a spectrum of emotions potentially and some will be upfront, and others may lay dormant for a while. If you or someone else is in significant grief, avoid  making significant life decisions or committing to new relationships is wise. 

·You should not expect to recover or move on overnight. 

·Grief means it’s alright to ask friends for help. 

·Getting back into a predictable routine around sleeping and eating will be important.

·Don’t drink heavily or try to anesthetise yourself with medication.

·Counselling isn’t mandatory but it can be very helpful getting over significant grief. 

·Crying or getting emotional will be a normal part of loss.

·You may seek out others who have experienced similar loss. 

·Remember that there will be others in your circle who might also be grieving.

People ask questions around grief and loss 

·Question :  How long should I grieve for?    When will I ever stop? 

Grief and personal response to grief will depend on an individual’s history and life experience. It will also depend on the gravity of the loss.  The loss of a promotion or job is a grief in its own way. The loss of a child has a far greater gravity.  People may not experience the tragedy of a death, but a job loss may be yet another episode in a long constellation of accumulating griefs. The length of time is not the issue. It’s the degree of pain of the grief that needs to be assessed and considered. 

·      Question: Does grief impact on relationships or marriage? 

Sometimes but not always. Individuals in families are different. People process loss or sadness in different ways and with different internal thoughts and behaviours. Perhaps the problem emerges when one individual feels the loss intensely and doesn’t sense their partner gets the depth or pain or have a vocabulary to understand what they are feeling or trying to articulate.

·      Question:  Have I got to experience stages of grief?  Should I have a orderly experience of shock, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, negotiating and acceptance ?  

Not at all. Grief or loss is experienced by individuals in individual ways. We may experience grief in any number of ways or in any order or with only a few of the issue’s  above being in our grief experience.

·      Question: When should I seek professional counselling in grief or after a loss? How would I know if I should seek counselling?

                 As a rule of thumb, if after 8-12  weeks your thinking and emoting and waking  behaviour is occupied with  nothing else except the subject of  the grief  it is reasonable and responsible seek some professional assistance. 

just a bit depressing .......

Major depressive disorders are something that caring conversations  by friends or family or even  experienced counselling by itself , cannot fix.  Sometimes medication is required and essential in unison with counselling.

There can be seasons or times in life where a sadness or grief impacts all of us personally. We live in a broken world.  And we need to accept that fact.  Sad and chaotic things will happen. 

Sometimes life is just about the sadness of situational depression and the normal grief or sad stuff of life. Life is not always ugly. But it can be for a season and we need to accept that and be as reasonable and responsible as we can in the circumstances and lift the load that life gives us.   

However sometimes it can be a deep vegetative depression. I will suggest a rule of thumb.  If the length of time of sadness  extends longer than two or three weeks and the sadness has  been the satelliting  subject in the mind, every waking hour , you can be sure that something chemical has probably seeped deep. Consequently counter chemical measures are required. 

The following significant behaviours are associated with depression and give clear clues that something significant and harmful is taking root psychologically in a persons life.

Individuals are different but many will exhibit a sorrow and sadness and have weeping episodes. Its perhaps the most obvious sign of something hurtful going on.  

I will often start at a simple level and ask people about their sleeping habits  and about their appetite.   With depression individuals may exhibit appetite extremes. They may be  eating too much food, especially comfort foods and unhealthy calorie rich or sugary food. Or have no appetite whatsoever.

 Sleep patterns can be very disturbed as well. Individuals may find they cant sleep at all and find themselves over stimulated and ruminating.  Alternatively many want to sleep all the time.  People who would normally go to bed at 10pm will prepare for bed at say 6pm or 7 pm . That sleep is broken and they wake numerous times in the night and very early in the morning. 

Depressed people cannot concentrate or focus even on simple short term tasks. They seem to be preoccupied  with remote problems rather than matters at hand.  You begin to be concerned that they seem to satellite around the same issues habitually.  I will also ask if people sit and ruminate and for how long they just sit and think. Rumination can go for hours.

Particularly worrying is when individuals start talking of life as not being worth living or its hopelessness or lack of purpose.  Others may just be irritable or quick to anger or be impatient. 

Parallel with this can be anesthetizing behaviours such as drinking or misusing substances too much or watching social media and its useless content in unhealthy and obsessive ways. 

Changes in personality are another significant indicator that something deep is happening inside a person. These changes can be different for men and women. It also shows itself differently in each person. Family observes it first. Friends notice it soon afterwards, and work colleagues not too soon after that. 

These tell tale signs are dramatic.  They are the jagged  surface of the ice berg that we see.  There is the deeper and larger iceberg under the surface which points to some biological changes or dynamics that will need chemical assistance in relationship with therapeutic input. So a referral to a GP matters along with some regular counselling from an experienced counsellor.

.

on friendship

There is peace and sometimes a proper challenging to be had in talking and taking time to speak with friends. Friendship is not all about the pursuit of happiness, but any interaction with friends seems to be a reflecting on life and the opportunity for some wisdom to be gathered.

There is something that is strangely civilised and human about being with friends who care and who take the time to understand and question what it is we are saying and what is really behind the words of concern or anger or anxiety about some issue or matter in life. In a virtual world of electronic acquaintances , flesh and blood friends matter. Friends can be about untangling the jumbled emotions or thoughts that have tied themselves into some Gordian knot of the heart or mind. It can be the process of a complicated matter made simple. Or conversely a simple matter that needs expansion or a belief that needs its ideas or its vocablury extended or its prejudice tested or confirmed. Time and patience and initiative and a space where one can really focus on understanding matters in friendship.

Friendships can exist in families.I hear stories of cousins who are the best of friends and even of siblings who look forward to one another company and are content as adults to go on holidays with one another. Families however can be a place of friendliness and safety. However friendships can be the place where the the pains or outrages of being part of a family can be undone and some healing can take place and listening and reflection without criticism can take place.

Words are powerful. Affirmation matters. Disagreement matters. Correction matters. Confirmation matters. Truth matters. Aristotle talks of different types of friends but he makes special mention of those friends who not only seek our good but see it as their duty to tell us the truth. 500 years before Aristotle, King Solomon the wise said that wounds from a friend can be trusted. Its not just a feel good experience or being on the receiving end of friendship that matters. It’s being a friend who values truth and has a pair of ears that are open and a mouth to keep quiet and when the time comes, to speak.

nature or nurture ?

Anxiety and panic attacks and experiences of being overwhelmed by life or circumstances appears as a common theme in counselling.  For some people being overwhelmed by apparently small circumstances  can be a frightening thing. Especially when these events seem to come from out of no where. They are not only debilitating for individuals suffering from them but family and partners are also  affected by the episodes.

There are any number of starting points in relation to discussion of anxiety or panic attacks but I want to make some comments about temperament or personal makeup in relation to this small portion of the large topic. 

What has interested me in this topic, started some years ago It follows my interest in post war trauma.  Particularly after the Vietnam war and the veterans who found themselves with what is broadly known as post traumatic disorder.  One area got my attention. And that was what was clinically referred to as pre existing morbidity. The translation of that terminology is this.  Why was it that some individuals exposed to  conditions of combat or the slavery of military life seemed to return to Australia relatively unscathed and got on with life ?

In contrast why did some who were exposed to the same scenarios and  rigors find themselves suffering from post traumatic conditions ?  The same question can be applied to critical episodes in Mining or Shipping or commerce after some life threatening serious events occurs. The matter of  pre existing personality temperament seems to matter. 

The research on temperament is interesting. It is where the nature and nurture argument emerges. Firstly there is weight given to nature and genetic factors.  Studies of young children and their development into adolescence  discloses something about  the variety of individual responses to stress and anxiety . Longitudinal studies of  very young toddlers into their teens suggest there is a lot of behavioural continuity in terms of temperament. Some children when exposed to frightening events such as street noises , strange faces,  loud booming relatives and the bursting party balloon will have a marked startle effect and cry and be distressed.  Other babies exposed to similar stimuli will lay there happily and just ignore or find the stimuli all very amusing. Longitudinal studies suggest that the response over time remains consistent with the initial observed behaviours in the proverbial nursery.  About 10 % , who are nominated as a high anxiety group will continue the same anxious response into observed adolescent years.  And the 10%  who reside in the low anxiety group will continue in their own amused, nonchalent, relaxed manner. 

And the rest of the population appears somewhere in between. 

Now imagine if one of those naturally highly anxious children finds themselves in an environment at home where there is discord or abuse or constant arguments or dysfunction and where there is a lot of expressed worry or concerns. A  lot of  life experiences and events are going to accumulate and compound and translate into fear and anxiety in that young persons mind. Life will become a fearful and dangerous journey. Strife and fear and avoidance that a child observes will translate into a script of how to deal with life as an adult. Conversely if one of these same highly anxious children is in a home where there is affection and warmth and lots of coaching and strategic independence it follows there will be a reduced impact on their sense of anxiety. It will markedly reduce the anxiety.  It may not take it away entirely.  But it will be ameliorated. Both nature an nurture will have their impact . 

So the matter is not simply nature or genetics. Nurture is also important. If a child hears nothing but statements that they ought to be fearful of every adventure away from their mother. Or that life is dangerous or that all strangers in the outside world are dangerous or that simple tasks in a household are potentially harmful. Or again and again that life makes no sense and all questions are pointless and there is no sense or purpose to life. And simple life tasks always take on great drama – those words and scripts and anxieties will follow them into adolescence and adulthood. 

These are the dynamic words and dormant thoughts that mysteriously come out of no where. They paralyse or provoke panic attacks. Like the booby traps still discovered in World War 1 trenches 100 years later. The metaphorical traps inside the brain, exploding unpredictably with the shrapnel of defeat and angst deep in the recesses of memory. 

As I continue to say . Words and stories and how we use them are very important. The tone of voice and non verbals that are in concert with dynamic words really matter and can reorientate individuals lives. There are words conveyed that heal and that give back life.

a steaming land ......

I have returned from New Guinea. There are 800 language groups. There are diverse beliefs and an ancient history. The country is so rugged and forested that a language group can exist in one valley their language is not understood by the villagers in the next valley. From a plane the valleys and mountains appear to steam. The white cloud steams up through the sharp spearheads of the mountains. A constant mist emanates from rivers and valleys. Regions are known for their tribal violence. Generations of war. Peace is brokered through gifts or exchanges. For a little while at least. Suspicion remains and human nature will always find some angle to be offended over. Some intrigue. Some alleged theft. Some poaching of pigs. The stealing of a wife. Some sorcery. There are mortal consequences.

Pigs are a universal currency. In the west we say money speaks all languages. In New Guinea presumably pigs speak all languages. Bride prices and many commodities are bartered on the worth of pigs. Brides are quite proud of how many porkers were bartered on their pretty selves.  You see the pigs being cradled with affection. A short life, but a merry one, presumably.  So called Big men or Bigfella's own many pigs. Or they are capable of getting their hands on many pigs. They supply to those who ask them. Its like MasterCard. The pigs are supplied on credit.  Big men are like Godfathers. They are generous. But you owe them allegiance. Big men get in to politics. Whole villages will vote for them based on promises. Whole villages will desert a Bigfella in politics if things don't go their way. Life is less about nation. Its about tribe, clan and family.

 Broadly speaking, the coastal region can be matriarchal. The highlands more patriarchal in governance. Violence is a theme. Its a very strong theme. Raskals are the national thugs. Violent,ugly and unwanted and banished from where ever they have come from. Social orphans  or literal orphans.  A bit like Australia's early convicts after settlement, one imagines. Banished and no way home.

I spent a half a day in one of the  prisons talking to about 20 of the Raskals. My first job in the public service working 45 years ago. A very minor dogsbody in Corrections was I . Collecting research and doing lots of photo copying for the parole board inside a prison and doing rounds of the court system and police stations. I met lots of thugs and conmen and other unmentionables. These were the most respectful and civil thugs I have met.

Most of the blokes that day had no idea when they were going back to court. The unknowing or fatalism or vagueness seems to go with the circumstances. Life is brutal and hard and it ends quickly. Somehow they were grown up and took responsibility. They expected no mercy or quarter. There would be no mitigation or social or family circumstances pleaded. The appalling pre sentence reports and sociological rubbish I meticulously presented to court on behalf of viscious young felons 35 years ago in Australia seems so mercenary now.  They share accommodation on a cement slab with a toilet and shower. There is a roof but only cement quadrants that hold up the galvanised iron roof against the elements. There is a guard beyond the barbed wire with an Armalite rifle. His observation deck in the lush jungle separated from us by razor wire. He sits on a plastic chair, his space littered with bottles and rubbish. The Raskals occasional visitors bring them vegetables or noodles or rice and some tatty clothes. If they have visitors. If they can spare them food. I notice that the guards that day were pretty fatherly in an officious sort of way. The exception is the white screw. He has something of an air of disdain. He does not like the intrusion of these students and lecturers. He especially does not like me, a whitefella. He hides his contempt behind the usual cloak of bureaucratic efficiency and deference to procedures. I am getting impatient and the heat and humidity is playing on me.  He wears proper uniform and remarkably a beret in the vicious heat and humidity. I want to tell him it would be far more comfortable if he wore a native koteka on his head. For the sake of the students and lecturers I refrain from making the suggestion. I’m sure he would boot us out. Even in the heat, common sense suggests that he probably hasn't got a sense of humour.

I heard stories of violence. Reliable sources tell me stories of the summary justice dealt to Raskals in lonely places. You heard stories of one way trips to isolated beaches with the police. Just before I arrived the Australian Broadcasting Corporation announced  a pastor in a church had been buried alive for sorcery. Some of the locals suspecting he was using black magic to cause landslides. I was horrified. When I arrived a couple of days later in PNG it was news. But not a big story. There were stories of hand grenades and home made shot guns and the universal bush knife.  These things and other obscene ways of killing were not uncommon. I was told Yes it was awful. But, it was not in this province.  Out in the bush miles from no where there was a First aid station a teenage girl with her mother shivering from malarial infection. Lots of Australian aid money for medication but no drugs, money having been diverted by local politicians.

I go to house cry one evening down by the river. Someone's son had died. All that is known was that he was shot and murdered. Was it the police? Raskals ? Prison staff ? Local wontoks? No one knows. The true story is not disclosed. It could have been any one of those groups.  But in this place, it is, what happens.  The story conceals the shame. In this place there are things that are best left for tribe and clan and family to sort out. And you feel certain that they will.

At the University some buildings have been burnt down. A student leader killed horribly with a bush knife. Bush knives are common. Long slashing ones . Shorter stabbing ones. They appear to be carried as weapons but are invariably to slash and cut the long grass and the vegetables and cut what can be made palatable for the pot. We ask for directions in the Ramu valley from our 4 wheel drive. The helpful villager, by himself, approaches our car on my side window. I am pretty sure he will give us directions. But he has put his bush knife at port arms. Its in the bush and perhaps he knows better than us that anything goes. Even white ones. If you don't know who is asking you questions its best to be suspicious and prepared. 

Up the track out of Lae the local police station is a charred twisted heap. The locals set it alight with a villager inside. They came to the conclusion about his guilt. Poured petrol into his cell window and set it alight. Here security companies provide policing. You contract with one of the big three companies for protection and call outs. You have a radio for such contingencies. You would call the security first. Its unlikely you would call the police. Roadblocks by the police are common enough. The security companies seem quite disciplined have their own barracks and logistics and communication. I do wonder if the government has to keep an eye on them. The nights bring the torrential cooling rain. If your fortunate the electricity is working and the fans are working and the fridge will have something cold in it. You need to shop frequently because food goes off with intermittent electricity.

With the rain, it sometimes brings the Raskals. Their soft footfall is deadened by the thick rain on the long grass. We have security downstairs at night. They might or might not be reliable. We have grates all over the house and grates on the windows. We also have Fluffy. A Doberman Rottweiler cross who pads about inside or downstairs. I had made friends with him quickly. Even with my natural affinity for dogs I knew I had to be careful of upsetting Fluffy. Many of the itinerant locals are aware of him and keep well away from him. I wonder if there is a price on his head.  Those who live around the house with me have grown accustomed to him and realise his bite is worse than his bark. So best to keep on his good side.  I get up early to finalise my lecture notes. Coffee and vegemite. If I'm lucky the wild passionfruit and a portion of a bunch of peanuts.  Fluffy does not care for the expresso but he likes the Vegemite.  One slice for him. One slice for me. This is our ritual before the bells for lectures ring at 7am in the cool of the morning. I have to wear trousers rather than shorts to the lectures. At one stage academic gowns had to be worn as well.

 Fluffy like other dogs I have seen, has slash marks from the cruel bush knives. I had seen dogs wandering blind in the streets obviously and deliberately cut across the eyes. There seems to be a war of animal and locals.  

Horror stories kept emerging in this tribal land. Domestic violence and pay back are common place. I could see nor did I hear of evidence of large drug or meths and Ice culture. With the growing prosperity of international mining interests and the interest of the Chinese military and commercial ventures in the region, drugs are inevitable.

One of the benefits of travel is that you compare and contrast your own world with that of others. I think a bit about the Raskals in the prison and the tribespeople at the funeral. That world is totally different to the world of Australia. Its business offices its Universities its schools its media. The very concept of resiliency programs and coping mechanism and stress management is both bizarre and comical in the PNG I have just described. The issue of domestic violence and gender equality. Also another planetary system altogether. Yet for the past generations a large cohort of Australians have been brought up with a view filtered by education and generally what is called the nanny state that every one is precious , unique and an individual. They have grown up with the mantra of uniqueness and a worth that is unearned and that they should be respected for just being alive or having achieved a role in a job. Australia for perhaps the past 50 years has subscribed to various psychologies and social movements that reinforce this perspective. Australia of the past 50 years has been free from daily violence or war or tribalism. It is free from the the corruption and civil corruption of clans and families . Australians have never had to be confronted with having to work solidly to eat or survive. If you don’t work or labour in some way in PNG you starve. In Australia Centrelink stands by. Death is not commonplace experience to many people in Australia. Its part of daily business in PNG. I don’t wish what I saw in PNG on Australia. However the entitlement to a good life without thankfulness or acknowledgement is alive and part of the narrative in Australian society. I also wonder if in Australia resilience mantras need to be replaced with strong spoken words about just growing up and acting your age. Life is not about living life like your a permanent adolescent with a inherent sense of entitlement and prosperity owed to you by others.

after a death or severe loss in workplaces…….

We live in a unpredictable and sometimes brutal world. Our world in Australia or New Zealand is a lot more predictable than a lot of other places.  Often we think that life is going to be predictable. A predictable day . A predictable work place . A predictable and routine visit to the Doctor. Plans are made to live out a reasonable and safe life. A predictable relationship or financial income or plans about the future involving family or friends. We also have in our minds an unconscious belief that good things happen to good people. In fact we know that its not true. But we hope that right will be done and that life will be fair. 

 Any number of incidents can happen that involve the loss of life or injury or a near miss. They can involve death or serious injury or deep hurt.  A critical incident might be a death or suicide or assault in a workplace. Or it might be a serious accident in a workplace which results in serious injuries for one or numerous people. An accident offsite or in its proximity affecting  family members or workers. It might be the death of a friend or colleagues family member or the failure of a medical procedure. 

 It might include violent or very threatening behaviour on a site such as a robbery. It could be a catastrophic industrial implosion or explosion. 

Or it may be one of those life tragedies that never makes the media. Some one young dies because of medical issues that no Doctor ever detected or suspected. No one ever saw it coming. But it leaves people and workmates crushed and hurting. All these events might be considered to have an affect on people emotionally psychologically and behaviourally.

The time after death or severe loss in some ones life.

If you or workmates or family members have been involved, or have witnessed or been in the vicinity of a grief event, it can bring about dislocation and disruption to life in some shape or way. Sometimes its not about witnessing anything but listening to the narrative or just becoming aware of what has obviously happened. Our imaginations feed our feelings.  We will feel sadness and hurt that may not or cannot match a colleagues loss.But it is real and it does effect us.

 Being involved in grief after a friend or colleagues death will affect us in our thinking, it will affect our emotions, and even our behavior and physical health. A great deal will depend on the degree to which we are directly involved in the person who has died.

A spectrum of thoughts and emotions. 

There can be a whole series of emotions when someone dies suddenly. There can be guilt, or shock and numbness, regret, agitation, anger or fear or rage. The range of thoughts and feelings can be jumbled together or experienced like a rollercoaster ride. 

Grief is real in our lives and initially people can experience a sense of being emotionally and psychologically “all over the place” This is not uncommon and does not mean people are losing their minds.

Some of the responses to grief.

People react to grief and loss in different ways depending on their personalities and characteristics. The invasion of the unexpected into an otherwise predictable world sets the thinking and feeling world of individuals on its head. 

It should be noted there are no set rules about how feelings are expressed. Nor are there rules about what people should be feeling. Or time frames or rules of how long it should take for people to recover.

People who have gone through grief sometimes speak of it as if they are on a journey. They are  making sense and responding to the thoughts and feelings or images of real life events in slow motion or with a heightened sensitivity. Its a place where  those close to the person who has had the loss or has died will know the depths and anguish. Some of us on the outside of the grief can imagine it. But we can't really know they anguish of a family member or close friend. But we can still be affected. .

Getting practical 

•  Confusion and disbelief that the grief  has happened at all. Some people report feeling physically numb or initially being in a dream like state.

•  Disbelief and denial and an ongoing thought, that this awful thing, should  not have occurred.

•  People will feel overcome with emotion and cry. They can might display great resentment or anger and want to blame someone for the episode.

•  Personal guilt at being involved can be a behaviour and as much as it was not a persons fault in any way. 

•  Many questions buzz around a grieving persons head .”I could have, I should have, why didn’t I,”.These are all very normal.

•  Sadness and feeling isolated or hopeless in the circumstances or just pushing friends away. 

Being practical:

If a colleague is hurting or in grief we can  feel unsure about what to do or what to say.  In work situations colleagues can be fearful of saying the wrong thing. I think its far better to be real. If you have shared information with a colleague about your family or children and have laughed together in the past your safely in the category of being able to share your sympathy. Simply express your pain or hurt or sadness at what’s happened. You will pick up the clues if they want you to stay or go.  If the grief involves a whole workplace with a colleague dying or having died don’t be flippant but simply respect the space of others and take lead in making sure people are going well and safely. I always find asking people how they are travelling rather than “are you OK is” a far better starting place for conversations.

People also want to be treated normally in the work place without others treading around them preciously . If people are having a bad day they will show it or tell some one.

At times of grief its important to know that no words or lengthy optimism will alter the circumstances. People who are grieving just want to know that genuinely caring people are there to listen and then listen some more. They may want to be in a private alcove in the office or just express it publically. Let them initiate that. 

Don’t be alarmed or surprised by the roller coaster of emotions or thoughts that people might have. Once again to sit with a person and listen .To convey understanding without sentimentality or cynicism is very important.

Being practical with food, with transport, with toddlers, with the small but essential matters of life is important. My own rule of thumb is allow 6 weeks for such practicalities.

Some matters of grief are discrete and people want it kept that way. Others may say they don’t care who knows. It’s always important for those close to a grieving person to ask what they want and if the matter is public or they wish the matter to be respected as private.

Don’t assume that people will not be able to function at work. Work  and being with friends at work can be one of the more therapeutic  environments for people to recover in. 

What’s going on in the mind and with the emotions also affects behaviour. Don’t be surprised by different moods. 

navigating chaos for counsellors…..

I use the word joy sparingly in life and in work. Two things will produce it in my work. The first is when someone comes back into safety from the dark brooding land of depression or that scary nightmarish land of anxiety. The second is much more beyond my control. Its when I’m called in to do a de-briefing after a near miss. Usually on a mine site or construction site. Someone has had a narrow escape from death. We unpack what happened. Its obvious they should be dead. Its very moving.

Counselling is not necessarily enjoyable. But it is satisfying.You utilise all your therapeutic knowledge and your history and your experience and focus on listening and opening your mouth strategically. Its about a person or families story.

Stories are not just entertaining. A story decants the experience of being human. It’s why I dislike so much behaviourist and medicalised psychology and therapy. Humans treated as zoological or higher animals. A 10 minute consult. The ritual of writing a magic script. Some stoic or scientific incantation.

In counselling people might tell you their story for 10 minutes or an hour. But its still not their whole story. Such a brief time cannot capture their whole life. Not all stories are awful. I have heard much over 40 years. Many stories are intriguing. Some are heroic or comical. Some seemingly unbelievable and of bizarre coincidence. I am amazed at the stories that people tell me of their lives. They fill in the back story. A summary of what’s important or what their life means to them. Or told with such nonchalance life means nothing. Stories of dying or being bereaved. The aftermath of a child’s deaths with parents. Of shame or fatal mistakes that people believe can never be forgiven. Adolescents suicide. Stories of terror or hurt or savage abandonment in childhood or of attempts at murdering them or of things done in wartime. Individuals awaiting the hangman’s noose and even separate narratives from the hangman himself and then stories of the Judge. Of being pursued to death by entities legal or illegal without mercy. Or betrayals or cruel actions in marraige. Bizarre family dysfunction. Of allusions to being in dark places of the mind and without hope. Nightmarish places drug induced. Occult involvement getting out of control. Of being saved quite miraculously when there was no rationale hope. Or sometimes only half the story. Individuals trusting too much and being tricked of their life savings. Individuals never trusting and never abandoning their suspicion of others. At other times a great deal of the story without inhibition except for the deep hidden shameful parts. At others times no boundaries and with malicious intent to be scandalous and obscene in what they say. Of the misuse of power or the neglect and corruption of those in power. Or domestic or workplace despots. I think the back stories are just that. They are the back stories. Not the full story. Or they have left out parts because its just too horrible. Or they leave out parts because its too shameful. None the less you are at the receipt of the these stories and you take them and you don’t share them. Stories are powerful. Tens of thousands of them. The above barely touch the surface.

There is another feature to this. There is a whole spectrum of counsellors listening and hearing stories on a daily basis to material dark and ugly. Its not always just counsellors say in Psychology or social work or occupational therapy but in other professions which have exposure to people and are mandated “to listen” or take into account peoples stories in some legal or medicalised or human resource fashion or caregiver role.

Listening and empathising and collecting narratives and stories has its own impact on counsellors and those who work in chaotic settings. Witnessing such material on a daily basis will have its own impact. It goes to the inner spaces of the heart,so to speak. We have to do something with what we have witnessed or what we have heard. What has been narrated to us has become a picture adhering to our thoughts. Its like a short piece of cinema on a repeating loop in our memory. Sometimes its uglier. Like the house visit where dysfunction reigned and the spooky unblinking kid had pressed turd into the fly wire mesh of his bedroom window. The stories stick like that to memory. There are other fields where people choose to work in contexts where obscenity and filth and threats of violence are played out on a daily basis. I’m thinking here of custody situations or community guardianship scenarios or policing. All the while being at the receiving end of tirades and narratives and brutal sadness but having to act professionally and having to suppress their personal opinions or thoughts and act within procedural guidelines. The bottom line is that these professionals and carers whatever their job have to go home to lasagne and kids and credit card debts stuck on the fridge door like everybody else. They go from a work shift and from a chaotic , crisis prone world to that of home life and recreational life where their story of work can’t or shouldn’t be told. Even if that was the case there are occasions when words would escape description. So,I have set the scene. I want to pursue a series of essays on dealing and separating or navigating safely away from the chaotic and destructive dimensions of professional exposure.This is in preparation for a series of seminars in 2019 on clinical supervision.