Dear Olive Branch

Topic: Living with Uncertainty

Increasing uncertainty has been the story of our lives for the past several years. Uncertainty has disrupted our lives and the constant required flexibility has been stressful. For example, events have had to be rescheduled, canceled, or extremely modified due to the pandemic.

The following stories illustrate ways people have dealt with uncertainty in their lives. The first story describes how a therapist adapted her practice because of COVID. The second story is about problem solving through trial and error. The third story tells how knowledge and education can help manage the stress caused by the fear of uncertainty. The fourth and final story describes how someone listed pros and cons in making a life decision to be certain of the best choice.

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Adapting to Uncertainty

March 22nd, 2020. As a Licensed Family Therapist, I will never forget the date. It’s the day I closed my office doors. I didn’t know how my business was going to survive virtually and how many changes I would be faced with over the next year.

My first change came the night before my first virtual session. I turned on my laptop to email my families that were scheduled for the next day. I pushed the button to turn on my laptop and it didn’t turn on. I found myself at Target at 7:45 am the next morning to pick up one of the last tablets.

My second change came in my first session. I found myself spending the first part of the session talking and listening to tearful, overwhelmed parents. The extra time was spent with children who were worried about the virus, and when they could see their friends again. Teens felt anxiety and began developing depression symptoms, due to their social activities and sports being canceled indefinitely. I, myself, had faced big challenges that dealt with loss and uncertainty. My older sister died suddenly in 2015, and 2 years before that my dad. I was able to look at this challenge and ask myself how I could be the calm for the parents, caregivers, children, and teens.

I should preface this by saying that most of the children and teens I work with have challenges in social emotional skills and have high anxiety. Here was my third change. I changed my focus to what my families, children and teens could do. I found that they were focused on what they couldn’t do. It did not help that most of the day was spent at a computer to do school. I helped teens form a new routine daily and include something for themselves. Some examples were: to connect with friends daily, go for walks, game nights or movie nights. For the elementary school-aged child, I focused on virtual outdoor activities with them. We did scavenger hunts, movement activities, and silly games that reinforced independence and making choices. Some of the children already had a plan as to what outdoor activity or movement activity they wanted to do.

The fourth unexpected change was the reward of seeing families building healthier relationships. I saw children and teens socially growing and taking risks when school was open again. I experienced the thank you from the parents and caregivers for spending that extra time with them during such an uncertain time. I feel like this is how I changed and was able to provide and be that calm for the families. (S. Daniels)

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Problem Solving Through Trial and Error

When my son Jake taught preschool during his college years, there was a child in his classroom whose mother smoked crack when he was in the womb. His grandparents now had custody of him. The grandparents were very sweet, and the child was struggling with social skills. He kept hitting the other children for no apparent reason and no usual discipline methods were working. My son was at his wit’s end. So, he finally said, that only with him, it was OK to hit him back if he hit them first. After a few days of this, all the children were being very aggressive with each other. The parents were calling and complaining. My son sat the class down and told the class that he had made a mistake. And now anytime someone hit them, they had to hug them back. The children were resistant at first. However, the children in the class became more peaceful with each other. And the only problem he had now was the child who would not stop hitting, would not stop kissing people. The grandparents of the child called and said that this was a remarkable turnaround for their grandchild. (D. Satterlee)

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Desiree’s Bubbles

A few years ago, in our group of four-year-olds at the Children’s Center, California State University, Fullerton, there was a little girl named Desiree. She had long blond hair, a ready smile, an eagerness to enjoy life, and scars over about 17% of her body. She was the survivor of a fire. Part way through the year her doctor decided that skin grafts were needed. He tried a then very new technique of helping Desiree grow her own new skin by making two “bubbles” within her skin. These “bubbles” would grow bigger and bigger until such time that grafting could take place. Desiree’s mother explained the situation to the teachers, and we decided not to tell the other children until the “bubbles” were obvious because it seemed difficult to imagine what they would look like. What we didn’t know was that from one day to the next, Desiree’s “bubbles” would enlarge and be very obvious. Naturally the other children were quite distressed when they saw Desiree. We wondered how best to handle the situation and called Desiree’s mother for her thoughts. She wanted the children to understand as well as possible, so we talked to Desiree about how to tell the children about her “bubbles.” Did she want to tell them, or did she want the teachers to tell them? As so often happens with children who have been trusted to create their own best solutions, she came up with a third choice. She would tell the children at circle time by whispering what she wanted to say into the teacher’s ear and then the teacher could repeat it. Everyone sat down and the teacher explained that Desiree would be telling them about her “bubbles.” The children were respectful and full of questions as Desiree and the teacher proceeded to jointly communicate to the group… but for one statement only! Then Desiree got carried away answering their questions and forgot she “needed” the teacher. Once the children understood what was happening with Desiree, they no longer were distressed and fearful. They wanted to play with her as usual. Education is an important key to conquering fear and coping with uncertainty! (S. Hopkins)

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Two Job Offers – How to Decide?

Living with uncertainty was my constant situation a few years back. I was in the final stages of earning a Ph.D. in early education. My husband had suddenly passed away. I was in the midst of a nationwide job search. For the first time in my adult life, I had to make important decisions alone.

As I looked at job announcements, I also wondered about the quality of life outside the job. Was it an environment where I could find meaningful things to do, where I could form friendships? Could I stay busy and involved and not sit around being lonely and depressed? So many questions swam through my head.

I was lucky and ended up with two job offers at the same time, from adjoining states. Now the uncertainty really got out of hand. How could I go about making the decision? Somehow, I decided on a strategy to help. I would make lists of the pros and cons of each position. This was hard. Both positions would be good fits for me professionally. I felt comfortable and welcome at both sites. As I asked more questions, the lists kept getting longer and longer. Each position had at least a full page of pros and cons, both had more pros than cons. There was very little difference in the pay and benefits. One job was closer to family, but I could fly home quickly from the other.

So, after all my listing and analyzing the pros and cons, one thing that stood out as being remarkably different was working alone or joining a team. The first offer included joining a group of five other people, and an opportunity to teach a wide variety of classes, and even develop new ones. The second offer was a position where I would be working alone, responsible for teaching the same two classes (every year) and half of the time running the childcare center. There was limited opportunity to grow in the second position. I realized that I would get bored after a few years and needed new challenges.

So, after all my listing and analyzing the pros and cons, the process let me see that I valued teamwork lots more than solo work. I also realized that I needed opportunities to take on new challenges. The uncertainty was gone. I accepted the team-player job and stayed with it for 30 years. I have never felt like I made the wrong choice. (M. Shelton)

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NOTE: We chose “Dear Olive Branch” as the title for this column for several reasons – foremost as a sign of peace. Also, olives come in many colors, sizes, tastes, uses – a sign of diversity just as there are many types of questions and those who send the questions. We hope “Olive’s” responses will help you, the reader. If you have a question for Olive use our contact form. Please put OLIVE BRANCH in the subject line.