Post-Yolanda Stress Debriefing

CapSU faculty, staff cite personal, professional gains

By Niño Manaog

Extension Associate

Capiz State University

On Dec. 19–20, 2013, the Capiz State University Research, Development and Extension Center (Center) led the Stress Debriefing Training Workshop at the Roxas City Campus, in Roxas City. It featured Dr. Johnny Decatoria of Bacolod assisted by Ms. Gina Ferrer-Castro, Social Worker III of Bacolod City.

Participants share their firsthand experiences with each other even as they are also taught techniques on handling and managing the stress brought about by Supertyphoon Yolanda.

JP Lota Santiago of CapSU Sigma said the training served as refresher course for her. Santiago noted that it only affirmed her knowledge on handling psychological first aid, or trauma healing, noting the step-by-step approach of stress debriefing.

For Santiago, it also served to empower the personnel who must be able to help the victims cope with the shock and the aftermath of the tragedy. She said she is excited to apply her learning to her clients.

For her part, Dr. Leah Abella, faculty of Dumarao Campus echoed significant learning from the workshop. Abella saw the need to help the victims to cope with the shock or trauma caused by the tragedy. For Abella, it is not correct that [you] ignore what the victims are feeling or thinking or saying or even doing. She said that "the more the victims are able to ventilate their feelings to others, the more that they will be able to cope with it and move on."

Based in the hilly area of Dumarao, Abella herself claimed how she had a near-death experience when Supertyphoon Yolanda struck the province of Capiz. She said she had been  stressed that she herself thought she needed to talk about her harrowing experience. She volunteered to narrate her experiences during the workshop proper. Abella likewise noted that those who will process the traumatized need to address one tragedy at a time so that healing can happen.

Mr. Gerard Lee Atienza, English teacher at Burias Campus, had to say that everyone should be strong enough, or formidable, during times of tragedies like Yolanda. Atienza said that there is also the need for one to open up to others, so that he or she will be able to move on.

After the workshop, Atienza personally asked his students regarding their Yolanda experiences. But he is happy to note that most if not all of their students were back to school when classes resumed in the first week of December, as if "parang walang nangyari (as if nothing happened)." Nevertheless, he also saw the need to conduct their own stress debriefing sessions with the students anytime soon.

Ms. Lorna Villaruz, nurse at the Dayao Campus, said that it is good that they were taught the step-by-step process in stress debriefing. The workshop gave her an idea on "how we can be of help to our community," especially in times of calamities in which people get depressed after they have experienced the loss of their loved ones, properties and their livelihood. Villaruz noted that by giving the victims opportunities to open up and share their experiences to those who empathize with them, their pains and fears are eased away bit by bit, and their anxieties alleviated.

Stress debriefing is also good because the process allows victims to share their experiences which caused the trauma, while being able to provide avenues that allow them to recover and rebuild their homes and, most importantly, restore themselves to life.

The workshop is the initiative of Vice-President for RDE Cora Navarra (far left) who sought the expertise of Dr. Johnny Decatoria (center) through Ms. Gina Ferrer-Castro (far right) of the DSWD Bacolod City.