What I have learnt about MIND (mental) health whilst working in a children’s home. The Cruise Texts, vol. One

Last year I was asked to write a series of blogs for publication. As ever, they disappeared down a rabbit hole, having just uncovered them, they are I feel ripe for release so here they are. Written whilst on a cruise around the North Sea and the North Atlantic on the P&O cruise ship Aurora organised by Laura Childs of Pure Travel. Hence Cruise Texts.

First and foremost, that often those who are the most caring, are those who are the most damaged.  Life is about opposites and finding balance. To know wealth and appreciate it, you have to have known poverty to some extent. To know and appreciate any kind of strength, you must have experienced weakness. To be able to extend great tolerance and understanding you must have known those who are overtly controlling and selfish. To know great peace, you will likely have experienced great anguish.

A children’s home is a place where the extremes meet. Often on both staffing levels and those who are cared for.

Staffers are often those who have learned great tolerance for the extreme behaviours that the children we look after exhibit, and exhibit on a regular basis. We (staff) all know that caring for children unlucky enough to need to be in care is not for everyone.

You can’t come into this profession with rose tinted spectacles. The work is hard, challenging, with a lot of paperwork, and poorly paid. You have to want to do the work, want to understand, to some extent, what’s going on in these children’s heads and we all have some empathy for the behaviours they exhibit.

Its in the quiet times after an incident of extreme behaviour or a physical intervention when staff talk, and often talk openly that we realise we are all damaged, imperfect humans who have managed relationship difficulties, financial hardship, or have been diagnosed with some of the mental disorders the children are often diagnosed with, ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) is a common one. 

It’s funny how often life propels you to where you do your best work.  Staff become therapy for each other on a regular basis. We compare the behaviours of the children to our own experiences.  Working with those who have similar experiences and are sharing them on a day-to-day basis is therapeutic.

It also allows you to focus your efforts on the behaviours and not the individual.  This is of paramount important for the children we work with, but also a vital life skill.

The children themselves have many difficulties to contend with.  So much of who and what we are is established before we reach the age of two, and if most of what you have experienced is abuse, whether, mental, physical or often sexual too, over long periods,  then that becomes trauma.

Trauma will result in some extreme behaviour and lead to thought processes that whilst successful on whatever personal level, are often self-depreciating and do not lead to living successfully in the society we have created for ourselves.

A society that is already removed enough from the one we were created to live in. Often children have learnt to hate themselves and believe everyone else does too.  Once established, at a young age, this belief is very hard to change.

Mainstream schools have a difficulty in managing the behaviour of these children. This was often clear when working as a field teacher for the RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of Birds). School parties would arrive, and it was usual for teachers to point out those expected to exhibit poor behaviours. These where the children who regularly engaged with outdoor activities far better than their better ‘adapted’, intellectual peers.

All mental health difficulties whether for adults or children are improved if utilising the outdoors and fresh air which aids thinking and thus the ability to function as a human being. As long as those there accept the environment willingly, whether consciously (adults) or unconsciously (children).

This is clearly evident within the community of a children’s home.

It’s also why a forest school or outdoor activity centre should be available to all children, especially those who are struggling to manage poor mental health and a difficult start to life.

Simon Pollard   July 2024