Abstract
According to George W. Doherty, every person has had stress in life. Such stress is caused by too much pushing of the body. The result is the body getting sick. Professionals push themselves so much to get good results. A good example is an athlete training so hard to win one race. These people have devised ways to deal with stress. One finds himself making difficult decisions or unexpected responsibilities Stress can occur for long periods or short periods. Stress reduces the body’s urge to fight.
Chapter 8: Stress Management
The types of stress includes: psychological stress, prolonged physical stress and strenuous stress. Stress triggers emotional events which caused straining sometime in ones life. The response of the immune system is affected when one is stressed. This is because the nerves and hormones activated by stress change the functioning ways of the immune system.
After a disaster debriefing should be done. Trained people should hold meetings with the respondents and discuss what happened in the scene. Everyone affected by the disaster should attend the debriefing. Incident briefing should be taken separately for different age groups. Informal sessions and verbalization sessions should also be held.
Follow up and counselling is an important part of the recovery procedure. This should be done both at individual level and group level. If a counsellor feels not comfortable he/she should seek help immediately. The follow up should be long term to enhance full recovery of the victims.
Chapter 9: Coping and Resilience
George W. Doherty defines rresilience and coping s the ability of a nation, community or individual to withstand the damage or loss and recovering from the effects of an emergency or a disaster. When a nation, community or individual is exposed to these conditions, he/ she become more vulnerable to these effects.
Many emergencies and tragedies have struck the USA. The August 2011 bomb blast, the cold war in the1950’s, the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963 and the Watergate scandal of the 1970’s are examples of disaster and tragedy hitting the United States of America. The Americans are not new to emergencies and disaster as a country.
A nation uses resilience levels come up with a planned program to deal with disaster aftermath. To prepare a plan to use when dealing with a disaster struck community, one needs to know which level of resilience the nation is. The phases are heroic, disillusionment, honeymoon or recovering.
For individuals, there are many worries and problems. Some people feel hopeless, others helpless, and even have nightmares. These problems are for children and adults. To help this individual, his / her feeling should be understood. Support groups are a good method of helping an individual.
There are certain needs that should be addressed to come up with a plan to address these individuals. These include; resources to be used, relevant information needed the management capacity and the need for consultation.
The people from the crises need a lot of counseling to restore their confidence. Information sessions to individuals or the whole affected community should be started. The most effective way of dealing with stress is providing verbalization sessions. Follow up at individual levelshould be a priority of every organisation in this program. Also, these individuals should be provided with post disaster counselling.
References
George W. Doherty (2007) .Rocky Mountain Region Laramie: D M H Institute press
