In May 2022. CBN Balkan and Orphan’s Promise, in cooperation with the association Fokus, organized a one-day seminar on trauma to which everyone who cares for children and/or adults with a traumatic experience was invited. The training was held by Julie Cooper from the international organization Trauma Free World. Julie researches, develops and delivers high quality, trauma-informed training for individuals who care for children – from helping professionals to teachers to birth parents, adoptive parents and foster parents.
Through her previous professional experience in residential care, crisis inpatient care, foster care, adoption, and litigation, and as a foster and adoptive parent of over 20 children, Julie draws on her hard-won personal and professional experience to provide accessible trauma training that anyone can use. , regardless of origin or education. Education about trauma brought together participants from the non-governmental and state sectors, children’s homes, as well as foster parents and adoptive parents in Croatia. The goal of the education was to provide a thorough introduction to trauma in order to provide as much knowledge as possible to care for those who have experienced trauma and to offer practical tools applicable in everyday practice.
The lectures were divided into 5 basic modules: Trauma and its impact on life, Attachment, self-regulation and sensory processing, Increasing the child’s sense of security, Reducing uncontrolled emotions and Reducing uncontrolled behavior. Julie transferred her knowledge and experience to all participants in an interesting and dynamic way, leaving a lot of room for upgrading the acquired basic knowledge about trauma. During the presentation, sounds of surprise and astonishment could be heard at some of the statistics and facts that trauma causes, in which many recognized themselves or recognized those they work with. The practical advice and knowledge that the participants received can be applied in all aspects of life, both private and professional.
How much education about trauma is needed in our region is evidenced by the comment of Vanja Bula, director of CBN Balkan and Orphan’s Promise manager for the Balkans: “The Balkans is a very complex region because it is home to several major global religions and this area is marked by a very traumatic past that resulted a generation that has behind it an unhealed past and an unrealized present. As someone who meets people and children who have gone through traumatic experiences and works with those who care for these children, I believe that education about trauma is a great need for everyone from the Balkans, and we hope that this education is only the beginning of a good cooperation and process healing in these areas.”
