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Someone To Talk To
6/8/2008
JRI's Taunton Community Based Program is featured in the Sun Chronicle!
BY SUSAN LaHOUD SUN CHRONICLE STAFF
Sunday, June 8, 2008 1:28 AM EDT
On a scale from 1 to 10, 10 being the best, 17-year-old Samantha rates the course of her life now as "8 on the way to 10."
The numbers are behind the Mansfield teen, and so are some life-coping skills that she learned through a behavioral therapy group companioned with a youth mentorship program through the Justice Resource Institute's community-based services program.
For Samantha, whose case was closed in November because she met her treatment goals, the program worked, in part, to help her find appropriate ways to vent. Paired with the listening ear of a youth mentor on a one-to-one basis, it's also given her a better outlook about herself and her future, the soft-spoken young woman said in a recent interview at her home during a visit with her former mentor.
Samantha and her mother Stephanie, who requested that their last names be withheld, spoke with Christina Amaral, program coordinator for JRI's community-based services program in Taunton and a youth mentor, about how Samantha's life has gone since she finished the program.
Amaral helped lead the 8-week therapy group Samantha participated in and conducted home visits with her.
This particular visit, coming several months after Samantha's case was closed, was set up for the benefit of this story. Typically, follow-ups are made through telephone calls.
Group sessions
Samantha, when asked by Amaral how things have been going for her and how she felt the program helped her, said she especially appreciated the group sessions. She has also continued to use some of the coping skills she learned. When she gets aggravated at school, for example, she uses the method of writing down what's aggravating her on a piece of paper and then rips it up and throws it away.
Amaral tells Samantha that's a particularly good way to deal with an issue, especially at school.
A student at Southeastern Regional Vocational Technical High School, Samantha said she would like to switch next year from the graphics program to culinary.
"You can cook for your mom," Amaral said. Samantha laughed. "I like to cook. I cooked brownies."
"You should have cooked brownies today," Amaral said, joking with the girl.
Both Samantha and Christina, 14, of South Attleboro, who also participated in JRI's program, said the youth mentors were people who listened to their troubles and that meeting with a group of other girls who could relate bolstered them.
Christina, interviewed by telephone, said in home visits by her youth mentor, Courtney, "would come and take me out and I could get stuff off my mind."
"They were always there for us. We could call them and talk," she said of the youth mentors.
She described the group experience as "awesome."
"I would go with any problems and come back feeling better," she said.
Christina said that while she misses the group and the face time with her youth mentor, "I can cope better with everything," in the month that she has finished with the program.
She described one coping mechanism, which she labeled "realization," where to calm down you go through the alphabet on any topic, such as attaching animals to each letter.
Christina said those and other skills she picked up through the program has helped in her relationships.
"Now my mom can understand where I'm coming from if I say I need my space. Then we can work things out later. It helps us to get into less arguments."
Samantha and her mother Stephanie, in their round-table interview, said the program, too, taught them both to back off from each other when conflicts were reaching a boiling point.
Yet another positive aspect to come from the experience, said Stephanie, is that Samantha no longer gives her a hard time about getting up and going to school every morning.
According to JRI's own statistics garnered through a recent survey of a sample group of clients, 95 percent of those that have been through the JRI community-based services program are still living in a community setting. Under 10 percent of those surveyed are either truant or sometimes skip school. About 9 percent of those surveyed have been known to have had a subsequent arrest or hospitalization.
Details of individual cases are private, but in general, the aim of the program is to either divert those entered in the program from out-of-home placement or to help them to transition back to the home environment, Amaral explained. The programs are generally for young people ages 12 to 22 who are considered to have high risk behavior, either having exhibited injurious behavior or encountering other problems, including running away from home, Amaral said.
JRI describes itself as a non-profit organization whose mission is to partner with state agencies to bring social justice to children and adults with physical, emotional or learning-related difficulties. They are based in Boston and operate programs across Massachusetts.
The organization's clients are typically referred by either the state's Department of Mental Health or the Department of Social Services.
The focus of the DBT, or Dialectical Behavior Therapy group, is to give adolescents and young adults a place to share their problems and guide them in better ways to deal with them. Often, the youths are dealing with school or home adjustment emotional and behavioral issues, problems with interpersonal relationships and low self-esteem. Mental health components also largely play a role in those issues, Amaral said. The goal is to outfit the youths' skills to better deal with those behaviors and emotions.
With the home-based mentoring, a person from the program works with both the individual and a parent or caregiver to give them skills to be able to better communicate with each other. The youth mentor takes their charge into the community, whether it's the YMCA, or in Samantha's case, area animal shelters, to try to plug them into a healthy activity, as well as lend an ear and talk about issues they may be facing in their lives.
"We're trying to build natural supports in the community instead of relying on the system, so that once we leave, they have a support network," Amaral said.
A break from the world
The way Samantha and Christina, who more recently concluded the program, put it, those visits with their mentors gave them a break from what was going around them and someone to talk to in an environment away from home and school.
Samantha, a petite young woman wearing a black headband in her dark hair streaked a lighter shade at the side and a black shirt and silver cross, often looked to her hands while talking during her interview. But she looks up and is more animated when asked about the visits with Amaral when they went to area animal shelters. She said those visits gave her a chance to vent and "get things off my chest. I could talk to someone about it."
"It's like a Big Sister - you can trust someone and talk to them," Samantha said.
Her mother Stephanie said the program and Amaral have given her daughter "self-esteem - a way to speak up and tell people what she wants."
"Things are better - more normal," she said, in response to Amaral's question about how her relationship is going with her daughter.
"We go shopping," Samantha interjected. They also talk about how Samantha, then 16, has a birthday coming up. She's looking forward to getting her permit, something her mother will also be involved in since parents must also take an associated driver's course.
Samantha, when asked after her discussion with Amaral how things had changed since before the program, said "I used to keep everything inside. I used to scream at her (Stephanie). We somewhat talk now."
Now, when she feels things at home getting out of control for her, she'll go to her room, listen to music to calm down and then talk to her mother later on, after she's cooled off.
Stephanie, on her part, said she used "to just yell and scream and we'd argue. I kind of just walk away, too, so that we don't argue."
Called "taking space," she said, "you walk away, think about it, talk another time."
She said the two of them are also "trying to spend more time with each other than we had."
"We take more time for each other."
Stephanie said the program provided what she was looking for: "Somebody to try to help Samantha with her self esteem, to take her out and talk to her." With Amaral, she said, Samantha had "somebody to talk to. It took pressure off me. It gave me some relief."
"Someone more fun," Samantha added.
Samantha said she also better understands where her mother is coming from. "I know how she feels with two kids getting on her nerves."
The young woman also said that she tries to remember what she learned through the group and from Amaral in applying her coping skills. Her grades have risen from Fs, to Bs and a couple of Cs.
The tenth grader is looking to play after-school volleyball next year. She likes to spike. And now she wants to go to college for cosmetology. "Before I wanted to do cosmetology, but not go to college."
"I want to get married and have kids, but I'd rather go through school, get through everything first," Samantha said.
SUSAN LaHOUD can be reached at 508-236-0398 or at slahoud@thesunchronicle.com.
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