| After Disaster: What Teens Can Do | | | | • While it may feel better to pretend the |
| 04th April 2007 | | | | event did not happen, in the long run it is best to be |
| Author: Arthur Buchanan | | | | honest about your feelings and to allow yourself to |
| Note: Information based on brochure developed by | | | | acknowledge the sense of loss and uncertainty. |
| Project Heartland -- A Project of the Oklahoma | | | | • It is important to realize that, while things |
| Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse | | | | may seem off balance for a while, your life will return |
| Services in response to the 1995 bombing of the | | | | to normal. |
| Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. Project | | | | • It is important to talk with someone about |
| Heartland was developed with funds from the Federal | | | | your sorrow, anger, and other emotions, even though it |
| Emergency Management Agency in consultation with | | | | may be difficult to get started. |
| the | | | | • You may feel most comfortable talking |
| Federal Center for Mental Health Services. | | | | about your feelings with a teacher, counselor, or |
| • Whether or not you were directly affected | | | | church leader. The important thing is that you have |
| by a disaster or violent event, it is normal to feel | | | | someone you trust to confide in about your thoughts |
| anxious about your own safety, to picture the event in | | | | and feelings. |
| your own mind, and to wonder how you would react in | | | | • It is common to want to strike back at |
| an emergency. | | | | people who have caused great pain. This desire |
| • People react in different ways to trauma. | | | | comes from our outrage for the innocent victims. We |
| Some become irritable or depressed, others lose sleep | | | | must understand, though, that it is futile to respond with |
| or have nightmares, others deny their feelings or simply | | | | more violence. Nothing good is accomplished by hateful |
| "blank out" the troubling event. | | | | language or actions. |