The Trauma Recovery Team

Whilst we were in Samoa, we were interviewed by the Samoa Observer and by NZ TV One News which aired on Tuesday 9th March in New Zealand.

On this day, the last scheduled day of our time in Samoa, we were busy and running to a tight time schedule!

Karen and Rachel (Alaria) spent the day with the United Nations.  They ran a 90 minute training about stress and state of mind management for five UN agencies including UNESCO and the Department of Safety and Security (UNDSS).  The participants enjoyed discovering new tools for coping with the various situations they are faced with from crime scenes to disaster responses, and looking after their own emotional well-being.

Trauma recovery sessions were also conducted with 6 members of UN staff.  These sessions were rewarding – especially their surprise and delight when they experienced how quickly they could overcome their trauma.  It was great to see the people who have been trained with us just a few days prior, integrate their new skills so well already.

Asenati and Charlotte accompanied 3 newly trained members of Samoan Victim Support out to a Safe House to support these key workers using their new NLP Trauma Recovery skills to assist the rape victims staying there.  We were able to coach one practitioner from start to finish with a fantastic result.  It was wonderful to see this person from beginning all the way through to the end, and the changes that he experienced as a result of the session.  Our feedback session at the end was also very insightful and an opportunity for learning for all of us.

Asenati and Charlotte also conducted one to one sessions with a local Palangi couple who – without breaking confidentiality here – really needed trauma recovery work.  It was a great opportunity to work with them.

Lisa and Des spent time with two participants from our training from Faataua Le Ola (Samoan Lifeline) and Samoa Victim Support and supported them conducting NLP Trauma Recovery sessions.  They successfully worked with two very serious cases with very successful results.  One of the client’s parting comment was “I want to learn NLP!”.

All in all, we just about had time to say goodbye to everyone and give our gifts of thanks to all those who have supported us and made things happen, pack up, and get in the taxi to catch our flight!  A busy and rewarding day for all of us.  There was a real sense of gratitude for all we had been able to achieve in our short time in Samoa as we debriefed in the taxi on the way to the airport, and, a sense that there was still a lot more work to be done.

Next step – returning as soon as possible to continue the work.

Following the 3-day skills training with Dr Richard Bolstad, the Tsunami warning on Saturday and the customary day of rest on Sunday, the remaining 6 team members continued to supervise and support the newly qualified training participants over the next two days in their field.  There are now nearly 40 professionals with a new set of groundbreaking NLP skills that have already made a huge difference to them personally – now it was time to support them to become experts and use the skills to make a difference to others.

With 4 newly qualified members of Faataua La Ola – Samoan Lifeline, and one other training participant, with the help of FLO’s transport and patience, we ventured out into some of the villages and coastal areas that had been badly effected by September’s Tsunami to let them know about the new services FLO could offer in their trauma recovery.

It was a huge learning experience for all of us and speaking for the whole team, included many touching moments.  One of these moments included a local primary school, who, although they weren’t expecting us on that day, opened themselves to us and gave us an audience with the principle.  She touched our hearts by sharing her own personal story of fear after the first Tsunami last year, and the fear that had been triggered by the recent warning just two mornings prior.

In fact, this was a very common story heard when we talked to the families in these areas.  It seemed a lucky coincidence that we were there at this time of re-surfacing fear, and able to offer support and hope.

Introductions were made, the beginnings of relationships built, appointments booked and future plans made for people to work with FLO for their own recovery.

When the whole team gave feedback at the end of the day, there was a profound and mutual sense that we had really made some headway in reaching people in need and were well on our way to making a significant difference.

Thank you to all those who talked with us and shared their personal stories.

Saturday 27 February, Samoa

It was a surreal experience to wake up at 3am to the sound of the phone ringing in our rooms, with Aggie (junior) letting us know there was a tsunami warning in place and that we will need to evacuate at 6am. The warning had gone out across the Pacific following the Chilean earthquake last night, measuring 8.8.

For those of us having never experienced this kind of emergency before, when the siren sounded an hour or so later, there was a brief sense of the fear and panic some people must experience here in Samoa at the very thought of another tsunami.

There are efficient communication procedures in place here and all coastal areas including the whole of Apia moved to higher ground. While we were in the hills, Luis Roqueta, Regional Security Officer, United Nations (UNDSS), took us to one of the ‘concentration points’ where people gather during a tsunami warning. People were quiet, chatting in hushed tones, mothers were nursing babies. It seems people are used to these precautions now and move up to higher ground as soon as the alarm is sounded.

Today has brought home to the whole team just how very real the threat of natural disasters are here. While many people have been able to let go of the trauma and move on, we can see how traumatising these warnings can be for those still suffering from the September disaster.

We are looking forward to going down to the coastal villages on Monday to work alongside the freshly trained members of Samoa Lifeline (Faataua le Ola).

The main focus of today was experiencing and practicing the NLP Trauma Cure Process.  Today they saw it demonstrated by Richard working with one of the participants overcoming a challenging stressful response he used to have.  Afterwards when Richard asked about the kind of situations that used to be a problem, he said “it feels OK now.  It feels simple…”.  He laughed, and so did everyone else.

Participants practised the process throughout the day both being the client clearing issues for themselves, and becoming an expert in running the process.

Following a day of profound learning and changes they received their certificates at the end of the day.

We were blown away with the short ceremony that followed; we were presented with a table laden with gifts and for many of us the most moving was the beautiful songs the group sung for us. The harmony of voices flooded us with an overwhelming sense of love and gratitude. It helped to say our goodbyes knowing we would be working with many of the group over the next few days.

Our principle trainer Dr Richard Bolstad and our Samoan team member Asenati, were interviewed by Samoa’s TV3 news.  We made headline evening news in Samoa and the next morning’s news!  We got a chance to broadcast to the nation what we are doing in Samoa and our intentions with this work – to support our participants to do this trauma recovery work in their field and to reach those that need the help to overcome their own emotional trauma and stress.  We got to give our contact number out on the TV and had our first member of the public come to us as a result the very next day.

We will post a copy of the TV report as soon as we receive one.

Our team member Charlotte and three of our participants; Runa Pavitt-Curry, acting Director for Samoa Lifeline, Senior Sergent Hebert-Aati from the Police and Oscar Netzler from Samoan Victim Support were interviewed for Radio NZ which broadcast shortly after 6pm on Friday 26th February New Zealand time.

It was an insightful experience hearing the participants talk to the reporter and hearing their personal take on NLP and the skills they are learning and what a big difference this will make to them and to the people of Samoa.  Thank you to all of you for being willing to share your stories and points of view.

Click here to listen to the full story report in audio.

Click here to see and listen to the story from their website.

Two of our members were interviewed for local paper The Observer.  Once we have a copy we will post it up.

It’s an absolute pleasure to see everyone back on Day 2 and fully engaged.  Today’s training covered some more essential building blocks of using NLP effectively with people and we introduced the NLP Trauma Cure Process.

One of the pleasures for the Team was seeing the energy in the room raise excitedly as, even though they hadn’t even personally experienced the process yes, the various representatives of health care workers and emergency services engaged in a lively discussion about how they can take these skills out to communities and use them as an effective way of moving Samoa forward.

It was also a day of interviews!  Two of our members were interviewed for Samoa’s TV3 and one of our Team members and three participants from the training were interviewed about the NLP training – what they are learning and what it means to them personally and for their valuable work with people.

We looked forward to the full integration of NLP skills on the final day – Day 3.

Today has been a day of interviews!  Our principle trainer Dr Richard Bolstad and one of our Samoan team members, Asenati, about the work we are doing here and the difference it will make in Samoa by Samoa’s TV3 – airing in Samoa today.  They will also be making people aware that we are providing 3 days of one to one coaching and-field support on Saturday 27th February and Monday 1st and Tuesday 2nd March.

An extensive feature about us and the work we are doing will air on Radio NZ today, Friday 26th February New Zealand time – shortly after 5pm.  One of our team members Charlotte has been interviewed, as well as several of the participants on the training including those from Samoan Lifeline and The Police.

Day One opened with the Samoan Prime Minister welcoming the team and talked about how important the skills people are learning on the training are going to be for what he called re-building people’s minds to enable them to rebuild  communities in Samoa.

It was a great privilege to have him here and involved and to hear him so supportive of the NLP work we are doing in Samoa.  He even sat down in the front row and enjoyed the first part of the training including the NLP Pointing Exercise for those who are familiar with it.

Many thanks to Runa Pavitt Curry of FLO & Samoa Lifeline for organising this for us.

Participant numbers were even higher than expected with 37 participants representative of range of community and government organisations including Samoa Lifeline, Ministry of Police & Prisons, Fire Service, Samoan Victim Support, Mental Health Service, UNESCO, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and others.

The participants were introduced to the foundations of NLP helping skills.

Our team is looking forward to flying to Apia today. We have 23 people booked to attend the training, with another six to be confirmed – we’ve had a fantastic response!

Richard has generously tailored the materials for our audience and Asenati has done a wondeful job of translating all the materials into Samoan. The rest of us are practising our pronounciation of this beautiful language.

We’ve been advised that Samoan Prime Minister, TUILAEPA Lupesoliai Aiono Sailele Malielegoai will open the training on Wednesday morning, which is a real privilege.

Thanks to everyone who has supported us, and if you can still help, we still have money to raise, so we’d appreciate any support you can give us.

Tofa!