What is a therapeutic story?
Therapeutic stories, sometimes referred to as healing stories, are stories to help children, and young people particularly, understand, process and heal from traumatic experiences.
What is a traumatic experience?
In short, a traumatic experience is anything that requires a new normal. These experiences might range from what we’d probably consider ‘everyday losses’ – things such as families separating, changing schools, friends moving away, or a grandparent dying – all the way to horrific abuses perpetrated on children by their supposedly trusted adults.
What I refer to here as ‘everyday losses’ isn’t to undermine their seriousness, or the impact on the child(ren) and whole family, but to demonstrate that mostly, we have a frame of reference for these things – if families separate, we hope the adults can remain civilised enough to maintain contact for the children’s sake (of course there are times when ongoing contact might be abusive or untenable); if a grandparent dies, we have a ritual – a funeral – to mark an accepted process of grieving; if friends move away, it’s relatively easy usually to keep in touch – especially with the myriad of communication methods we have available to us now… You get the idea.
Horrific abuses perpetrated against children by their supposedly trusted adults, however, are not things most of us have a frame of reference for, thankfully. Mostly, horrific abuses are kept VERY secret – the horrific adult will do and say anything to protect themselves from repercussion, so the child(ren) are often more terrified of the consequences of telling someone than they are of the ongoing perpetration of the horrific abuses…
This is where storytelling, and particularly therapeutic story telling can be invaluable tools to have in your toolkit.
We must remain mindful that from the child’s point of view, the horrific abuses are part of their ‘normal’, so from their perspective, there’s nothing to talk about… Characters and events in therapeutic stories can mirror the circumstances of the child, and introduce the idea, for example, that certain ‘behaviour’ is not ok. It’s not unusual for a child to make an initial disclosure while sharing a therapeutic story with a trusted adult – listen out for phrases like, “That happens in my house!” or “I feel like that…”
The Power of Story Telling
All story telling is therapeutic in its own way – if we tell someone how cheesed off we were when someone stole ‘our’ parking space at the supermarket, we feel better! Storytelling is cathartic.
Story telling is a huge part of most cultures; how stories are told (whether they’re written, spoken, drawn…) and what the stories are about vary from culture to culture, but there are some that are universal, even if the specifics of them are different – all cultures have a story about a Holy Day – the stories and their purposes are different, but those stories will be handed down, generation to generation, never really changing too much. Just think about the nativity story if you went to school in the UK.
These stories, handed down, unite us; they bring communities together and provide common ground, common knowledge.
Therapeutic stories are especially designed to tackle a specific issue or event. They portray the commonalities of the issue or event in such a way that the child feels connected to, but not necessarily part of. There are similarities between the child’s situation and the character in the book’s situation, but there’s also enough distance between the child and the issue or event that they can empathise with the character going through the same thing without feeling anxious or triggered by it.
A therapeutic story can create a safe enough space to open a conversation with a child about something they’re usually unwilling or unable to discuss – it can help the child to feel heard and seen – if the character in the book is going through the same thing, it must be ok to talk about the thing, even if only in relation to the character in the story.
Therapeutic stories are also a great way to help children develop empathy – if they can think about what the character in the story might need to feel better, they may be able to think too about what they might need to feel better… The great thing about a story is it can go wherever the child wants it to – they can ‘test out’ their suggestions for helping in a space where there’s absolutely no danger to them – if they’re talking about the character in the book and it’s ‘just’ a story, what could possibly go wrong?!
The opportunities for the adult to be curious are endless here – using questions like, “What do you think would happen if we did…?” or “How would you deal with that if it happened to you?” will give instant insight into the child’s view of the world and start to sew seeds of self-regulation thinking.
The importance of co and self-regulation
Co regulation is fundamentally what happens when we share our calm instead of investing in a child’s chaos.
Nobody has ever been made to feel better by being made to feel worse…
If a child or young person is struggling to manage their emotions and feelings, they sometimes need an adult to help them ‘calm down’ so they can think rationally. Sharing a story together is a great co regulation activity, and all the grown up has to do usually is get the book out and start reading… the child will probably join them.
A child’s ability to self-regulate is the visible outcome of that child having experienced thousands of moments of co regulation – if we model and support the child to do things that help them feel calmer and more in control, eventually, they’ll learn to do those things for and by themselves. That’s not to say that they won’t still need our help occasionally, but for the most part, they’ll be able to ‘calm down’ successfully on their own – they’re building some positive resilience and developing useful coping strategies.
Some other good co regulation activities:
Colouring in
Counting
Breathing exercises
Mirroring exercises (‘Copy me’ games)
There are loads more suggestions for regulation activities in our newest resource,
a book full of easy-to-use activities to support four key areas of SEMH (Social Emotional Mental Health) development:
Self and co regulation
Mindfulness
Building Self-Esteem
Problem solving / working through worries
The key thing about developing regulation skills is that all the techniques MUST be practiced over and over again while the child is CALM. Introducing a new thing in the middle of a giant meltdown is unlikely to be successful or useful to the child – they need the tools to be well established in their brains in order to be able to access and use them in times of difficulty.
JLTS has published five therapeutic stories to date:
The World’s Hairiest Fairy – A story about friendship, kindness and managing big feelings
It’s OK Little Fishy – A story to help children and young people understand adult mental health
Dexter’s Birthday – A story about working together to solve problems and worries.
Once Upon a Shoebox – A bespoke* story about believing in yourself, being brave, and the importance of having a good support network.
Sometimes I Feel… - A story to help children and young people (and adults too!) find new and better words to say how they feel and what they need.
*Bespoke stories are written on request to help a particular child or young person get to grips with an issue that is particular to them – Once Upon a Shoebox was commissioned for two children who were anxious about their transition from primary to secondary school.
Top Tips!
1) Sharing a story is a great way to share our calm with children and young people who are struggling with their own chaos. Often, simply opening a book is enough to shift a mood.
2) Children don’t just know how to self-regulate – they need to experience thousands of moments of co regulation for these skills to be developed and honed.
4) Regulation techniques and activities must be practised, over and over again, in moments of calm. This process develops neural pathways which become well-enough established that the child can access them during moments of chaos.
5) All our therapeutic stories come with a Guidance for Adults section at the back, explaining the basic therapeutic techniques drawn on in the story and offering some guidance on how to utilise both the stories and the techniques.
Image Credits:
Katie Baldock
From Pixabay
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