And like crime, the pandemic continues to rage on. While everyone is feeling the affects of the virus, children are one of most vulnerable groups in terms of mental health. This week is counselling awareness, and school counsellors in Belize are speaking out about the strains that children are faced with. Courtney Menzies has the story.
Counselling children can be complex and involved. For counsellors, interactions have to be careful, compassionate and empathetic. Counselling children during a pandemic makes that job even harder.
During school counselling awareness week, the Belize School Counsellor Association is highlighting their work with students during this time. One major change is that counsellors must now do their job from a distance.
Roxanne Jones, Primary School Counsellor
"If you were in the school setting the teachers would refer them to you for tardiness, for academic issues, for behavioral issues, and so now it's different because you have to reach out to them because they might not have credit to call you, or whatever they have, they have to be using the devices, so different times you would be reaching them. Since I'm in a primary school and they send packages, I have been sending one sheet, because they have their academic stuff so you have to consider that, so sending home one sheets of information and trying to make it dual where the parent would benefit from that information because they are the one who would have to be helping the child. So that's the shift I have been facing."
Khristal Jones, High School Counsellor
"Having to take the counselling from out of the office to now a virtual concept and realizing the realities of what our students are facing, having to not be able to access some of the virtually due to their expenses of them having to pay for internet or maybe having to find that extra money for data. We have been, at my high school, doing calls, a lot of phone calls, from my personal number and as well when I go into the office I would engage in some communication with parents through the phone, with some of my girls I also post some required psycho social supportive information."
In a time when children may need more care, attention, and affection they cannot be afforded that by their school counsellor. Both counsellors explained the mental anguish that kids at both the primary and high school levels are currently faced with.
Roxanne Jones, Primary School Counsellor
"Children are a living representative or an extension of what's happening in their home. So this is just saying that parents are stressed. And the population I serve are persons from vulnerable communities and you know there are lots of needs. And so as this happens, you know, the children natural will feel the stress because they see it on the parents. I have faced issues where I had students where there are food issues in the home, there are housing issues, I had students, one or two, who had lost their home because of the parents not having the chance to get the funds to pay because they used to go out and, you know, what they would call hustle, do little odds and ends, and so they weren't able to do so and so I had to reach out, so I would go to them and then we would find ways to reach the need."
Khristal Jones, High School Counsellor
"What I have learnt is that my girls have most definitely understood the importance of being at school, they now understand how important it was, or the benefits that school gave them to be away for those few hours daily, so I have seen an increase in a great need of emotional support. A lot of the girls are frustrated and they lack a lot of motivation having to be at home all day everyday for ten months now."
"There is that great level of worry, for some of my girls I've asked them have you gone out anywhere maybe even to the store or if you need anything urgent, no miss I'm really scared I'm worried for my parents or my grandparents. In some situation where some of them have got some kind of illness over the past time period, my girls have definitely stressed on a great level in comparison to how it would have been back in March last year or February last year."
And while the counsellors do their best, they also need to take care of their own mental health.
Roxanne Jones, Primary School Counsellor
"Before I came into counselling I was a social worker so you know that is a heavy role as well, so you have to make sure you establish your own wellness, your own network of support, I have found that in the School Counsellors Association, I have found that in family."
Khristal Jones, High School Counsellor
"I try my best to exercise, I read a lot, when its time to step away from the online hours I do so, do my best to eat healthy, drink a lot of water, get massages when I come so I do make it a very important part of my life to take care of myself."
