The house collapsed, stones fell, and the heart was filled with terror. The house that had been a shelter became ruins and rubble, and the sounds of children screaming echoed everywhere, and here are tears washing away the blood, children dying, and others becoming orphans… Where is humanity in all of this?
Human greed and selfishness, their greed and lack of humanity, their crossing of all borders and their devastating conflicts, is the deadly war that spreads its devastating repercussions on children, who constitute the most affected group in many ways. In addition to the psychological and physical symptoms, these children develop health and mental problems as a result of the war.
What we do not see and cannot be erased without treatment and follow-up is the psychological impact that the child carries in his heart, feelings, and body.
Perhaps the most prominent psychological problem is post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which causes the child to relive the same experience over and over again in his mind, such as fear of loud sounds, which makes him stay away from the place that reminds him of scenes of war and terrorism, and also automatically stay away from people associated with that condition. We see these children. They suffer from changes in their daily needs, such as eating and sleeping, and fluctuations in their mood and behavior are also observed.
The results are clear; Killing, maiming, or recruiting children to fight, rape, and other forms of violence. After wars end, time takes care of overcoming or forgetting the problems. But what we do not see and cannot be erased without treatment and follow-up is the psychological impact that the child carries in his heart, feelings, and body. It is the psychological destruction that Unfortunately, in our Arab world, it is not given attention, but it is the basis for containing problems that will affect an entire generation in the future. Psychological trauma is not healed by time, but – on the contrary – it makes it stable and nourishes it. Reactions vary according to the child’s personal experience, perhaps the most prominent of which are fear, and a feeling of loss and helplessness. .
War turns the child into another person, who changes as a result of fear and chaos.
Detecting these conditions is the most important step in the treatment process. The most important obstacle to discovering and diagnosing these conditions in children is their inability to express what they are going through. From here comes the importance of containing these conditions and helping them overcome and heal. Attention must be paid to the psychological or pathological symptoms that appear when The child, such as difficulty breathing, anxiety, change in behavior or hostility, change in eating habits, change in the quality of sleep, headaches, or real or imaginary physical pain as a result of torture and scenes of violence that he saw, and the boy often expresses his true feelings through playing and re-enacting war scenes and also Through drawing, you see him displaying many psychological symptoms such as depression, a chronic need for affection, psychological and emotional dependency, constant anxiety, extreme tension, isolation from society, and other serious psychological problems such as psychosis, without forgetting the social and educational remnants of war.
These children are still too young to understand what is happening, and they do not have the necessary tools to defend themselves. If they are not killed or captured, they are either exposed to torture and barbarism, or forced to enter the conflict under duress and without a choice.
There are several ways to express the connections between children and war; Children of war, children in war, children victims of war and children witnesses of war.
War turns a child into another person, changing as a result of fear and chaos. Brief moments erase the features of childhood, innocence and dreams, and replace the feeling of safety, stability and love with sadness and loss of hope for a bright tomorrow, from a child in love with life to an elderly person who has forcibly abandoned his ambitions, to a person who has become afraid of life. Himself, he is afraid to dream or think.
* Sherine Youssef is a clinical psychologist and psychotherapist.
**The opinions expressed in the article do not necessarily express the viewpoint of CNN Economics.
2023-10-27 08:42:41
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