Working with trauma

As an OCC volunteer, you will be working with a population of people that have high levels of trauma. This trauma will impact the behaviour of community members, learners, and yes also volunteers. Understanding trauma, how it manifests, and ways of working with trauma, will help you to make a positive contribution to the OCC family.

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a mental health condition that disproportionately affects refugee communities, who have often been traumatised by war, separation from home, family and their community, their journey, and stigmatisation for being 'a refugee'. You can read more here and listen to a great podcast over here from the University of Oxfords Dept of Psychiatry.

An example of how children can be traumatized

Trauma and childhood development

Early Childhood Development (ECD) is an important part of OCC's work. We partner with Refugee Trauma Initiative to provide trauma-informed ECD support to our community. You can learn more about ECD here.

Watch this video on ECD and childhood trauma on the www.preemptivelove.org blog:

Additional information

You can read about the ECD work that OCC do, as part of Refugee Trauma Initiative's 'Baytna' programme, here and here. For resources on mental health, trauma and refugees, check the University of East London's Refugee Mental Health and Wellbeing Portal. You can learn more about the impact of trauma on childhood development here.