HELPING HAITIAN GIRL FEEL AT HOME

At North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center, the vast majority of our clients are from Nassau County communities, but we recently had the opportunity to work with a young girl who came to Long Island from Haiti.

Thirteen-year old Anabelle traveled to the United States to receive life-saving surgery for an advanced stage of scoliosis at Shriners Hospital for Children in Philadelphia. Her condition was so serious that she would not have survived in Haiti. She was placed with a generous and loving host family that lived in Nassau County—far from home for a frightened and ailing teenager.

After about two weeks in the U.S., Anabelle became very withdrawn and refused to communicate with the family in any way. They weren’t sure how to help Anabelle, who didn’t speak English.  The family was desperate to figure out a way to ease her fears and draw her out.

During this period the host family’s son, a recent college graduate, was working as a volunteer tutor at North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center’s Westbury office, known as the Leeds Place. He shared with his mom the broad scope of the work that we do with a very diverse population. She decided to call the Director of the Leeds Place, Dr. Nellie Taylor-Walthrust, to brainstorm about what could be done to help Anabelle.

The discussion led to a plan that included one of our Haitian Creole-speaking outreach workers, Marmeline Martin, who has extensive experience working with special needs children and in training foster parents.  Nellie asked the host mom if Marmeline  could make a home visit to meet her and Anabelle. She was so happy and said, “Absolutely!” Then she asked, with a look of surprise on her face, “You make home visits?” 

She was assured that we do, and added that seeing Anabelle in the home environment would be better, at least to start, than bringing her to an unfamiliar setting.

Marmeline readily agreed and made her way to the home where she met Anabelle who was sitting in her wheelchair, head bowed, with a somber look on her face.  Marmeline asked if she could speak with  Anabelle alone, and the family agreed it was fine. 

At first, Anabelle would not speak to Marmeline. But in a short period of time, she opened up and revealed feeling homesick and alone, sharing that she wished to see her mother and the rest of her family back in Haiti.  As Marmeline continued to speak to Anabelle in Creole, Anabelle began to brighten up, feeling reassured because she could be understood and feel comfortable enough to express her feelings.  Marmeline asked if it would make her feel better if she came back to visit with her and she nodded in agreement. 

Marmeline then met with the host mom to reassure her that Anabelle wasn’t in need of psychotherapy but was feeling low due to the separation from her family.  She promised that she would continue her visits and that Anabelle was going to be fine.

On the next visit Marmeline brought some Haitian music to listen to that reminded Anabelle of being home.  As the weekly visits continued, Anabelle began to smile and became more engaged with the family. 

We reassured the host mom that she was caring for Anabelle in a loving manner and that what she needed to understand was that Anabelle’s adjustment to a new culture, environment and language was naturally frightening to the teen. 

Cultural competency and the flexibility of home visits are key components of providing community-based mental health care, whether preventive care as in the case of Anabelle, or more intensive treatment for children with serious emotional disturbances.

As Nellie said, reflecting back, “It’s the small things that often make a world of difference.”

https://longislandweekly.com/helping-girl-feel-home/

Bio: Andrew Malekoff is the Executive Director of North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center, which provides comprehensive mental health services for children from birth through 24 and their families. To find out more, visit www.northshorechildguidance.org. 

RED DOT IN HAITI, TEAR DROPS ON LONG ISLAND

RED DOT IN HAITI, TEAR DROPS ON LONG ISLAND

By Andrew Malekoff© 2010

Ludmyard Charles, 16, said that when she got home the phone rang. It was her father. He told her to get a glass of water. Then he asked her if she was sitting down. Next, he shared the heartbreaking news that her aunt, Ludmyard, was killed in the earthquake. The aunt she was named after who was pregnant, had lost her life when the earth opened up. The girl’s eyes filled up and she said of her aunt - “We were like sisters.”

A few days ago, I had the privilege of meeting Ludmyard and six of her fellow Westbury High School students, all of whom have roots in Haiti. I asked them about the emotional aftershocks of the January 12th earthquake that toppled national landmarks and shantytown homes and killed and injured untold hundreds of thousands of people in and around the capital city Port-au-Prince.

Each one of the four girls and three boys learned about the earthquake when they arrived home after being together in an after-school program led by North Shore Child and Family Guidance Center. Eighteen-year-old Vayola Justinian recalled, “When I got home my mom was crying. The TV was on. When I looked at the screen I saw a map of Haiti. There was a red dot.”

I asked the students about the media coverage and they said that it was both good and bad. “It was good to have updates,” said 18-year-old Joes Paraison, “but bad to see pictures of the dead and injured.” The others nodded and Joes said, “By the second day it felt like my family was going crazy” watching television. He said that the faces on the screen were hard to see clearly, leading them to wonder if anyone of them was a family member. Joes then recalled a most troubling of images - “a truckload of dead children.” Seeing such devastation from afar, including pictures of people buried underneath rubble, added to their feelings of helplessness and their wish to be there to help.

Their counselor Pascale Beaubrun, a native of Haiti, who is based at the Guidance Center’s Leeds Place in Westbury, later said that they turned their sorrow into action by collecting money and contributing to the Yéle Haiti Earthquake Fund, a charity initiated by Grammy-award-winning musician and producer, Wyclef Jean.

Myriam Jerome, 18, reasoned that it was better that the earthquake happened in the afternoon when everyone was out and about. Had it happened in the late evening when they were asleep in their homes, she explained, there would have been an even greater human toll.

Unwinding from a day at school Michael Belizaire, 17, played a video game, while the youngest in this group, 15-year-old Policia Jean, turned on MTV. Both were later alerted by family members to tune in to CNN. In a short time they too saw the red dot in Haiti. Michael told us that his family’s house in Haiti was near the National Palace in Champs de Mars. He worried about his father and uncle who, he later learned, had survived.

Joes said that he tried to “move on” and had discovered that it was not as easy as it sounded. “Each day when I go to school, I try to forget, but every day when I get there someone else is crying.”

“How do you cope?” I asked. They turned to one another and gestured in a manner that emphasized their deep connection to one another. They talked about the support offered by groups of Haitian youths in school and in the community.

Camy Pierre, 16, said that it was important “to comfort one another and don’t do anything reckless or lose control.” I asked Camy what he meant by that. He said that some of their peers were insensitive and said hurtful things about Haiti. Michael chimed in and stated how important it was to always “think positive.”

I asked about what they did when friends alone were not enough. One of the girls said that she was worried about a girlfriend who was so distraught that she thought she could hurt herself. When she realized that more than friendship was needed, she advised a trusted school counselor. All of them said that they were aware of where and who to go to for more specialized support in school and in the community and found support in that as well.

Expressions of helplessness and grief quickly turned to frustration and anger as they talked about disturbing phone calls from Haiti and learning about mass graves and rampant lawlessness and rape. I said that it must be unbearable to sit with such news. Joes emphasized the importance of talking and not allowing one’s feelings to get "all bunched up."

Long after we said goodbye, I was left with a feeling of abiding respect and pride for this group of thoughtful and deeply empathic young people. They are, without a doubt, among the finest of Haiti’s - and Long Island’s - sons and daughters. Let us never forget them.

To be published in the Anton Newspapers on Long Island New York, February 24, 2010.