I Love Child Life

I have reached 500 followers! Thank you for your continued support. I could not have done it without each of you. 🙏🤗🎉

This is real! 😥 From the challenges I faced attaining my LPC versus my CCLS I will say it was by FAR more difficult to get my CCLS.

And the struggles still exist as I continue to raise awareness about what child life is, the value of child life and how they are such a valuable member of the interdisciplinary team! 💉🧸❤️

Fact: No one outside of the child life world knows how hard it is to get those 4 letters after your name.

Rejection can feel like a punch to the gut; it's hard not to take personally, especially when you've worked so hard.

For those of us who are passionate about child life, there is simply no other profession we would rather pursue - yet that level of competition makes success far from guaranteed.

So, today, I wanted to tell you that I see you. I see your effort and I feel the rejection that you feel.

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❤️Tip Tuesday❤️

How would a child life specialist help Deuce not be scared for his blood draw??

🩸Prepare! Prepare! Prepare! Children have a right to know what is going to happen-especially to their own body. Or maybe he chooses not to know anything. It's up to Deuce. Using real medical equipment, Deuce would be shown step by step what an IV is, why his body needs one and his job during the procedure.
🩸Comfort positioning. Deuce would be given the choice of how he wants position himself. Sitting up? Laying down? In mom's lap? While holding mom's hand?
🩸Choices during the procedure. Does he want to look or not look? Utilize distraction-such as watching a favorite video, playing in the iPad, counting, hold onto a comfort item, using a fidget with the other hand?
🩸One Voice. Only ONE person is speaking throughout the procedure. This person is explaining exactly what is happening as it happens, reminding him of his job and encouraging Deuce to utilize the distraction tools he has chosen.
🩸Pain management (if available). Offer use of topical numbing agent or Buzzy to manage the pain associated with the needle.
🩸Medical play. This can occur before, after or both. Medical play helps resolve misconceptions, normalizes medical equipment and allows children to master procedures like an IV start.

Contact [email protected] for support with your child's IV/blood draw.

Deuce was scared to draw blood

Teen builds LEGO replica of MRI machine to help young patients feel more comfortable with scans A teenager who knows what it's like to have an MRI scan wants to help other kids get through it.

Happy Child Life Month! Stay tuned for more facts about Child Life!

Stay tuned next week for my first ✨Wonder Wednesday✨ video!! I will begin to break down some of these tools and strategies and provide more information on what an invaluable resource child life specialists are. 🥰

Reducing medical trauma in kids is straightforward. So why aren’t we doing it? Mom of two and the founder of Piper + Enza shares that using child life principles in everyday parenting can reduce medical trauma in kids and improve fear of needles. Category : Children's Health, Mental Health

Medical play 💉 and syringe painting 🖌️

Something magical happens when a clinician in the hospital looks at a parent and says, "I have the time."

Both the clinician and family are able to remove the weight of time restraints and have an open and honest conversation.

Child life specialists are clinicians who do this with families as often as possible. Unfortunately, not every family has access to child life services.

As someone who has struggled with this throughout my career - knowing that I wanted to do more, but couldn't - led me to burn out faster than I had hoped.

I want a future where every family has access to child life services. Who is with me?

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In my work as a mental health practitioner at St. David's Center's Autism Day Treatment Program, I had the privilege of accompanying so many families on their journey.

As a child life specialist, I can absolutely appreciate the challenges of feeling heard in the healthcare setting. This is absolutely worth reading. 💕💕

"What if I bring a concern to the attention of my child's health care provider and I don't feel heard?"

In this blog post, St. David's Center Medical Director Dr. Rachel Bies discusses the communication barriers parents and caregivers experience in healthcare settings and how to overcome them.

Click here to read more: stdavidscenter.org/article/when-you-dont-feel-heard

So amazing!!! 🤩 I completed my child life internship at this campus. So proud of the progress.

November is Children's Grief Awareness Month. 💞

Child Life Specialists are not often professionals that come to mind when looking to help children and teens who are facing grief/bereavement or who have experienced an end-of-life situation.

Sometimes it's hard to know how to help and support children when you may be grieving also. Here's how a Certified Child Life Specialist can help:

❤️ Facilitating Legacy building activities
❤️ Preparing children for viewing dying loved one and environment
❤️ Educating children about death and what death means
❤️ Preparing children for funeral
❤️ School re-integration support
❤️ Providing parental support

Please reach out at [email protected] or 832-620-1548

I need to fill my cup before I can help others.

Child life specialists are instrumental in supporting grieving children. Whether it be grieving the loss of a sibling, parent, friend, or family member, child life specialists help children understand what is happening/what has happened, develop positive coping strategies, initiate therapeutic activities, engage in memory making, and provide information to caregivers regarding developmentally appropriate responses associated with grief.

In honor of National Children’s Grief Awareness Day (November 21) and National Children’s Grief Awareness Month (November), we wanted to share a couple of great resources:

Children's Hospital of Orange County has a great resource on Grief and Bereavement Education and Support here -- http://bit.ly/2rNFavq.

Child Life Resources offers additional information on resources including books, activities, and organizations that focus on supporting children through the grieving process -- http://bit.ly/2rNTaFw.

Explaining a complex diagnosis such as cancer to a child can be intimidating, stressful and confusing.

This is how a child life specialist can help. We are trained in how to do exactly this: explain a complex diagnosis or have a hard conversation with the use of developmentally appropriate language and play. 🧸

Check out this free resource from Nicolle Bengtson, CCLS and featured in this month's Childhood Cancer Awareness Blog.

"When explaining cancer to a child, I first focus on the cell by explaining the healthy cells within our bodies and how they work together to keep us healthy. Then, I transition into explaining cancer and the need to treat it," writes Nicolle.

You can read more about how Nicolle approaches childhood cancer diagnoses on our at https://www.childlife.org/resources/childlife-blog-podcast-of-aclp

Child Life Specialists help make this needle less scary. 😱 Before it is even introduced to the child, we talk about why this special medicine, chemo, is important and what it's job is. 💉

We teach about the medicine box, port, and this is how your body will get this special medicine.

Medical play and normalization is super important to help kids master this new and scary equipment. We make a plan for the poke, when the port is accessed, like who will be there, how they want to position their body or what special items they want with them. 🩹👨‍👩‍👧

Cancer sucks!!! But we're here to help. 💓

This is a port access needle, looks a bit scary doesn’t it?

The photo is very close up so, it looks bigger than what it is but, it’s still a very big needle.

A chemotherapy port (also known as a port-a-cath) is a small device that is implanted under the skin under general anesthetic to allow easy access to the bloodstream.

Many kids hate needles so the port gives an easier way to draw blood and infuse chemotherapy drugs with minimal fuss. The port itself is attached to the chest muscle, and the line goes up and around, through a vein, to the top of the heart. There, the chemo drugs go directly to the bloodstream.

Many parents will tell you about the heartache involved whilst trying to get your child to comply with the medical team and stories of physically having to hold down your screaming panicking child are, sadly, not uncommon. Numbing cream is usually used to minimise any pain but, many children still panic when it’s port access time. Not all kids panic but, some do.

For many though, the port, hickman or broviac lines offer a much easier way to get these much needed procedures done safely and with less distress to the child.

Tomorrow we will be sharing information posts about the types of long term venous access devices children teens and young adults have to facilitate “easier” venous access.

How it should be done! 🙂🐝

Hey ROCers!
A new program is starting 8/20 and bi-weekly on Saturdays 11-12:30pm.

Ages 3-10
$25 per session

We will alternate each session between a therapeutic activity and a medical themed play activity.

SPACE IS LIMITED!!!
Email Jenn at [email protected]

'Autism is a “dynamic disability”. What this means is capacity & functioning are not concrete & may fluctuate dependent on factors such as environment, cognition, executive function, processing capacity, Interoception/exteroception, neuro-fatigue, anxiety, communication differences, burnout & sensory overwhelm. This means Autistics may be capable of a task one day, but unable to perform the task at another.'

Credit: Neurodiversally unbroken

It's this Saturday!! Come play with us 🦷🪥

Up and coming!

We are starting a new support group!