Word is out in the community about Courage Homes. A concert is now booked for early August at the American Embassy School (translation: connections and finances) where our Cameron Stymeist, of the Reel and Placerville, along with Ken Burkey will be coming out to India to put it on. Others in the community are also becoming more and more aware of us, and donating proceeds from plays, etc to Courage Homes – yea!
February 21, 2011 was the first day for three of our new staff. We have hired one Social Worker, one Caregiver, an Assistant/Driver, and may be hiring a Lifeskills/Educator. We began orienting our new staff to sex trafficking so they would be prepared for intense therapy training. As our caregiver began to comprehend the abuse and trauma the girls have gone through, she wept as her heart broke for the girls. Her raw emotions remind us of our first reactions and why we are doing this.
Together, our staff and team completed an overview of Trauma Focused – Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. Dr. Becca Johnson is here giving the training and it has been excellent. She’s adapted this well researched approach to trauma therapy for non-therapists and different cultures. The Indians who sat through the first 3 days really appreciated it. North India has VERY FEW counselors, and none that we know of trained in trauma. So, we opened the training up beyond our team and staff, to people in our network to better equip Delhi in handling counseling needs.
Our team is now taking turns in training our new staff. They already had 1 1/2 excellent weeks of trauma therapy training. Now 3 days per week we’ve been training on other topics and expect this to continue for quite some time.
I have begun working with Emmanuel Hospital Association (EHA) to assist them in developing a prevention program to use in their Community Health and Development Projects, raising awareness in the villages. I hope to use our final months here to really get that going.