On Thursday night Cindy addressed the Club on the issue of Child Protection. This was a particularly pertinent topic as this week is Foster Care week.
Cindy trained as a teacher and was director of the pre-school in Coleambally before returning to study to complete a Masters focusing on Child Protection. Since completing her Masters, Cindy has first worked for the Department of Community Services and now works for Community Health. She has over 11.5 years experience this in field. As part of her current role, Cindy works with families who whose children are at risk, providing them with education and support to enable the children to remain in their home environment. Cindy also assists parents whose children have been removed to develop and make changes in their lives so that they can resume care for their children.
There are four main areas of risk for children. These are:
- neglect (the continued failure to provide the basic things needed for life)
- sexual abuse;
- physical abuse; and
- emotional abuse (behaviour which damages the confidence or self esteem of the child resulting in serious emotional disturbance or psycological trauma
Adverse childhood experiences have a detrimental effect on the development of the brain. The brain develops sequentially. The brain stem develops first, then the mid brain, followed by the upper brain in two parts. Children who experience a lot of trauma growing up develop over sensitised brain stems and mid brains. These are the parts of the brain which control autonomic functions including the flight, fight or freeze function. Such children tend to be more impulsive and reactive as their ability to moderate these activities (which rests in the upper brain) is reduced.
Cindy was thanked by Roz Thompson/