“God is closest to those with broken hearts.”

~Jewish Saying

I am quite sure that for many of us the date 9/11 will forever bring back memories of where we were and what we were doing when we first heard the news about the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the plane crash in Pennsylvania. Perhaps you worried about the safety of your own family or maybe you had concerns over how you would begin to discuss the events with your children. As a nation we grieved together knowing that other families were in real pain and we looked for ways to show our support all the while knowing that nothing we could do or say would be adequate enough.

At the Home Visiting Training Institute we remember and our thoughts are with those that loved and lost family members. While we hope we never see a tragedy of this magnitude on American soil again, we would like to point home visitors to a resource to help families that are experiencing a stressful situation like a disaster or other type of emergency. The handout, “Helping Parents Cope With Disaster,” is available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in PDF format at:

http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pdf/Helping-Parents-Cope-with-Disaster-a.pdf .

Also, we are currently working on on a new training module concerning stress and families and how stress impacts children. Look for upcoming training dates on our website in the next few months!

Posted by: Dr. Kathy Pillow-Price on September 11, 2012