Essay Sample on San Antonio Family Emergency Shelter: Helping Victims of Domestic Violence

Introduction

San Antonio Family Emergency Shelter is a program that I create to provide temporary services to communal living especially to families experiencing domestic violence case, it offers short stay refuge for these victims. The facility is located in Texas. It can hold twenty beds. I welcomed any wiling party to participate in maintaining a safe, friendly and clean environment within the premise. This is because the affected victims usually need peace of mind to go through the trauma experiences. The facility not only provides shelter, food and emergency clothing to victims but also provides home-like surroundings and support personnel who help the family to stay together in harmony during the crisis. Furthermore, all program residents work actively together to integrate the society and community as they find a better and stable home for the affected families.

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The shelter assists with skills ranging from parenting, life skills, personal planning cases, housing support and utilization of community available resources. Additionally, the shelter program provides no-cost emergency housing to women and their children most affected by domestic violence. The shelter handles victims who have experienced trauma. Children, in this case, are the major victim. The San Antonio Family Emergency Program aims to provide an ideal home-like environment that helps these children to recover from the informed-trauma experience.

The purpose of San Antonio Family Emergency Shelter program is to understand and have knowledge of how children are affected by trauma, the various causative agent of trauma, the importance of the Family Emergency Shelter programs, and the principle to deal with children trauma-informed issues effectively while adhering to HHSC minimum service standards.

Before I embarked on creating the Family Emergency Shelter program, I had to study on how trauma affects children's brain structure and functioning. I found that brain structure and its functioning is responsible for children's behavioral, emotional, and cognitive development. For instance, if the child had experienced domestic violence, their brain will always focus on survival instincts rather than reasoning and learning. I also learned that; children may perceive a particular situation as life-threatening when others don't. Therefore, I created Family Emergency Shelter program services to assist in children's response and behavior by helping their intermediate parents to understand and identify these behavioral patterns, usually resulted from domestic violence.

San Antonio Family Emergency Shelter program has various approaches when working with children who in one way or another, get exposed to the traumatic condition, in their life experiences. The Family Emergency Shelter program aims to benefit children and their families through reductions of children's posttraumatic stress as well as behavioral problems while adhering to the Health and Human Service Commission and Family Violence Prevention services regulations. (Sullivan, Murray, & Ake, 2016). My Family Emergency Shelter program uses various approaches assumptions which help to recognized sign and symptoms of trauma, ways to resist re-traumatization conditions, have knowledge about trauma by integrating it to their policies and practices, and comprehend the great impact caused by injury and understand likely paths that could lead to recovery.

For effective Family Emergency Shelter program, I developed a principle that I consider fundamental on the Shelter program operation, which includes an emphasis on safety, providing the opportunity to rebuild control, strength-based design of the shelter and creating trauma awareness.

Emphasis on Safety

I learned that children who survived trauma often feel they are not secured and may be in great danger: for example, children who are victims of domestic violence. San Antonio Family Emergency Shelter program service always works towards building initiative for physical as well as emotional safety for sheltered children and their parents. The Family Emergency Shelter program has taken all necessary precautions to ensure that the shelters are physically safe. The Shelter program is aware of possible and potential triggers for a child's trauma and working on the best ways of avoiding any case or situations that can cause re-traumatization. I am also concerning that interpersonal trauma could exist within the shelter program, it could involve abuse of power and violation of standards set boundaries (Steele, & Malchiodi, 2012). Therefore, it is important to incorporate the Health and Human Service commission on child safety plans, which advocate using systems that are aware of the dynamics of trauma with clearly established roles and boundaries as a result of effective collaborative decision-making. The Family Emergency Shelter program values personal privacy, mutual respect, and confidentiality since it is vital in developing an emotionally safe and sound shelter environment. Moreover, the idea of diversity and cultural differences in gender and ethnicity is seriously taken into consideration and respected by The Family Emergency Shelter program.

Opportunity to Rebuild Control

I found out that, during a traumatic situation, children are always taken away from their control over their lives, and most are dictated and forced to do things against their own will. To add on that, more often, they found themselves homeless in the process of domestic violence, where the mother and children are chased away from home. Indeed, such an act is disempowering and causes tremendous trauma (Tomlinson, Gonzalez, & Barton, 2011). San Antonio Family Emergency Shelter program on these children and their parents usually emphasize the importance of providing choices to the victims. According to Family Violence Prevention Services, the Family Emergency Shelter program should create a predictable social environment and atmosphere that provides the victims' sense of personal control as well as efficacy over their lives. Additionally, the Family Emergency Shelter program should involve the children and parents to participate in the design and evaluation of their services and programs.

Strength-Based Approach

San Antonio Family Emergency Shelter program is designed in a strength-based approach delivery method rather than being deficit- oriented. The Family Emergency Shelter program services are built on a criterion that helps the children to identify and know their exceptional strength and also allow for coping valuable skills that can assist them in their day to day live activities as they fight over the trauma condition, they may have experience (Steele, & Malchiodi, 2012). Regulation on the HHSC and FVPs advise the Family Emergency Shelter program to create services that focus on the children's future and utilizing available skills by building them further to develop their resiliency.

Trauma Awareness

San Antonio Family Emergency Shelter program involves a detailed understanding of trauma into their services and work. The Family Emergency Shelter program ensures their staff are aware of and understand various behavior as well as symptoms of trauma victims and how well they can thrive by adapting to traumatic experiences. HHSC recommends staff supervision, training, and consultation, which are essential for any Family Emergency Shelter program practices that should be modified to include awareness on trauma devastation (Tomlinson, Gonzalez, & Barton, 2011). The regulation also requires the Family Emergency Shelter program to implement and conduct regular screening to assess the history of childhood traumatic exposure, and systematic safety assessment. San Antonio Family Emergency Shelter program has created credible strategies that would increase accessibility to Family Emergency Shelter program services to help and assist trauma-affected children and their parents.

Conclusion

Conclusively, during my Family Emergency Shelter program set up, I was able to find out child trauma majorly resulted from domestic violence. Children become the victim of circumstances where they find themselves dragged into family affairs unwillingly. Therefore, these experiences resulting in both physically and emotionally abusive. For children to recover from such trauma, services such as the Family Emergency Shelter program have to be introduced. These programs are provided where these children are sheltered. The Family Emergency Shelter program plays an important role in the recovery of children from trauma and provides an environment that prevents re-traumatization. However, the Family Emergency Shelter program has to follow rules and regulations provided by HHSC as well as FVPS in conducting Family Emergency Shelter program services. Moreover, following certain principles which act as a guide for better recovery and peaceful coexistence with the victims of trauma. Perhaps, I recommend every society to be aware and accept that traumatization among children exists in our community, thus they should be assisted to recover and live like other normal children by partnering with bodies and agencies supporting Family Emergency Shelter program services.

References

Adams, E. J. (2010). Healing invisible wounds: Why investing in trauma-informed care for children makes sense (p. 1). Washington, DC: Justice Policy Institute.

Sullivan, K. M., Murray, K. J., & Ake III, G. S. (2016). Trauma-informed care for children in the child welfare system: An initial evaluation of a trauma-informed parenting workshop. Child maltreatment, 21(2), 147-155.

Steele, W., & Malchiodi, C. A. (2012). Trauma-informed practices with children and adolescents. Routledge.

Tomlinson, P., Gonzalez, R., & Barton, S. (2011). Therapeutic residential care for children and young people: An attachment and trauma-informed model for practice. Jessica Kingsley Publishers.