Introduction

How the Workshop Came to Be

The Strengths of Shelter Workers

What is Abuse?

Why Abuse is Happening in Inuit Society

Understanding the Cycle of Violence

Inuit People and Healing

How My Shelter Helps Healing

Counselling 101

The Purpose of Counselling

Building a Counselling Relationship

Confidentiality

Good Listening

Gathering Information

Setting Goals

Taking Action

Suicide Prevention

Children and Abuse

The Impact of Abuse on Children

What Children Need

Helping Children Express Their Feelings

Safety Plans for Children

Working in a Shelter

Creating Physical Safety

Emotional Self-Esteem

Building Self-Esteem

Caring for Yourself

Dealing with Difficult Residents

Dealing with Conflict at the Shelter

Shelter Procedures and Records

Building Links with the Community

References

Caring for Yourself

Here are some tips and advice about how shelter workers can take care of themselves.

Build your support: Try to have friends and family that you can talk to who are outside of the shelter. You need to have someone you can trust to share your feelings about your experiences working in the shelter. Be sure the person you talk to will not tell others what you say.

Relax: You will need to find ways to relax and build up your energy for your work in the shelter.

Take care of your health: Eat properly. Ask the nurse about food that is good for you. Exercise and rest so that you can feel upbeat.

Be kind to yourself: Don’t be too hard on yourself if there are challenges at work. Many people feel this way. If you make ‘mistakes’ you can learn from them.

Don’t take the world on your shoulders: DON’T feel that you are responsible for the way other people act. This is a sure way to burn-out. Some people learned their ways of dealing with others a long time ago and you are not to blame for how they act or how they feel. They are the only ones who can change their lives. No one has the power to control another person’s life. We only have control over our own lives, and that is enough!

One approach that can help shelter workers to cope with the challenges they deal with each day is to keep a journal. Writing about positive hopes, feelings, events and strengths can be a powerful tool. It gives us a chance to organize our thoughts. It gives us a chance to really think about what we want to achieve and what we are doing to achieve it. It brings strengths out into the open.

Keeping a journal can help shelter workers as well as women who stay in the shelter.

Examples of things that can be recorded in journals include:

• what worked — even small positive changes.
• what did not work out well and how they might do things differently next time.
• specific situations in which their efforts worked well.
• strengths they have seen in themselves.
• new ways of handling problems that they thought of.
• things they have learned about themselves.
• daily positive events and feelings.
• things they have learned from others or about others, which will help them change their own situation.

It can be very helpful to write out anger or frustration by writing down all the thoughts, the reasons for the anger etc. In writing, you can release strong emotion.