Children's Mental Health Intervention Training Center

The Children's Mental Health Intervention and Training Center essentially fills the service gap between child psychiatry departments in public hospitals that "emphasize diagnosis and neglect long-term intervention" and ordinary family education that "lacks professional methods and tends to go to extremes." It is an important support scene for children aged 6-14 who have deviations in emotional, behavioral, and social development and their families. It is neither a "problem child shelter" as misunderstood by the public, nor a magical factory that can "correct personality and cure all diseases" as promoted by some institutions.

I was on duty at the front desk of the center last Wednesday when I saw a mother dragging a third-grade boy in school uniform inside. The boy was squatting on the ground crying with half a box of crumpled Ultraman cards, and refused to step in the door. My mother's eyes were as red as peaches, and her voice trembled when she saw me: "The teacher said he couldn't sit still in class and always poked the girls in front of him. The hospital said he had attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) tendencies. I was beaten and scolded at home, and I really didn't know what to do." ”

This is the state in which almost 70% of the families come to the center for the first time. They are panicked, confused, and even have a little self-denial of "Is my child a cripple?"

There are actually two mainstream operating ideas in the entire industry, and they have been arguing for almost five or six years without reaching a unified conclusion. One group is composed of practitioners with a medical background. They insist that all interventions must be based on a clear diagnosis from the child psychiatry department of a tertiary hospital. Children who do not meet the pathological standards will not be admitted. They are afraid of labeling children as "sick" in advance, which will cause psychological burden to both parents and children. I know a senior who runs an institution in Shanghai. Because of this, almost 40% of the families who came for home consultation last year were rejected. They would rather not make money than create anxiety. The other group are practitioners with educational backgrounds. They believe that many children only have temporary deviant behaviors and have not yet reached the level of needing medication or diagnosis. Early intervention and adjustment can prevent the development of symptoms. Just like the little girl in second grade we picked up last year, she always chewed her nails until her fingertips bled during class. She didn't dare to raise her hand to speak, or even tell the teacher that she needed to go to the toilet. She didn't meet the diagnostic criteria for anxiety disorder when she went to the hospital. Her parents were extremely anxious. We used sandbox games for three months to provide emotional counseling. Now she can take the initiative to go on stage and read her own compositions. If she had waited until the diagnosis was confirmed before intervening, she would have suffered.

Many people have really deep misunderstandings about our industry. Last time my relatives found out that I worked in an intervention center and asked, "Are you all mentally ill kids?" ”I rolled my eyes on the spot. To be honest, almost one-third of the children in our center cannot be said to have "problems" at all. It's just that their parents don't know how to communicate with them. Just like the fourth-grade boy who came last month, his mind is filled with dinosaurs, and he always talks to people about Tyrannosaurus rex and Triceratops. If others show that he is not interested, he will lose his temper and throw things on the spot. His parents say that he has "low emotional intelligence". In fact, he has low emotional intelligence. It's just that no one has taught him how to observe other people's expressions and how to change topics. Every time we chat with him, our interventionist starts with dinosaurs and slowly teaches him, "Look, the teacher is looking at his watch now. Is he not interested in the topic of dinosaurs?" Do you want to ask the teacher what he likes? ”After practicing for just over a month, he actually took the initiative to give dinosaur stickers to children in the same community last week, and told them, "If you don't like dinosaurs, I still have Ultraman stickers." His mother was so excited that she cried on the spot.

Of course, not all intervention centers are reliable. In the past two years, the field of child psychology has been booming, and all kinds of monsters and monsters have come in to make money. The most outrageous thing I have seen is the one that tests seven or eight sets of scales on children right from the start, including attention, IQ, and sensory testing. Then you start to say that your child has sensory disorders and needs to sign up for a rehabilitation class worth 100,000 yuan. In fact, there is no need. The concept of sensory disorders has been abused in China. Many children are just energetic and have not reached the level of disorder. If you really want to choose an agency, I give all parents two most practical criteria for judgment: First, look at the qualifications of the interventionist. They must have certificates as registered psychologists or registered system supervisors, or have professional certifications related to Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA). Those who say they "started working after half a month of training" will just turn around and leave. ； Secondly, check whether there is cooperation with the referral department of the child psychiatry department of a public tertiary hospital. If you really encounter a pathological condition that requires medication, you can be transferred to the hospital immediately, and you will not insist on saying "we have enough classes" and delay the child's treatment.

I have been doing this for almost 6 years. What impressed me the most was not the "complete recovery" or the rapid improvement of grades. It was the little boy with ADHD before. When he first came here, he would throw the toys in the sandbox all over the floor every time and hit anyone who stopped him. After nearly half a year of intervention, the last time he came to class, the toy car he threw bounced at my feet. He was stunned for a moment, ran over to pick it up, and even reached out to touch my feet and said, "Teacher, did it hurt you?" I'll blow it for you." At that moment, I felt that what we were doing was not "correction", it was just helping the child slowly make up for the small piece of his heart that had not grown well.

To be honest, there is no absolutely unified intervention standard in the entire industry. After all, each child’s growth environment, personality, and problems are different. A method that is suitable for one child may not be useful for another child. A good intervention center never "treats" children, but provides a platform for both children and parents, so that adults know how to deal with children's weirdness and children know how to express their joys, angers, sorrows and joys clearly. That's enough.