Cyber Bullying and Low Self-Esteem: A Social Nightmare
By Dr. Victoria Yancey, TFT-DX, TFT-ADV
Young people around the globe are taking their own lives because of cyber bullying. Teen suicides have occurred within the past ten years in Missouri, Florida, New York, Vermont, Massachusetts, Canada, United Kingdom, Italy and numerous other cities and towns.
Cyber bullying has created a social nightmare and has caused far too many teens to hang themselves, jump from bridges or find other ways to harm themselves. The number of suicides continues to grow with the easy access to and the increasing number of social media sites available to teens.
Cyber bullying is using digital technology to harass, embarrass, threaten, torment, humiliate or to make another person feel uncomfortable or scared. A study was conducted in 2010 by Cyber bullying research. It involved approximately 2,000 randomly selected middle school students from school districts in the United States.
The study revealed that of the students 20% reported seriously thinking about attempting suicide. Those figures include 19.7% females and 20.9% males. The results also showed that 19% reported actually attempting suicide with 17.9% females and 20.2% males. In addition, it is suggested that cyber bullying can cause emotional scarring, since it involves threats and humiliation.
Cyber bullying victims were almost twice as likely to have attempted suicide compared to youth who had not experienced cyber bullying.
In October 2013 a 40 year old woman, with Hashimoto’s disease, had a thyroid cancer operation, and one parathyroid was removed, and one transplanted. After the operation she suffered an attack of Extreme Tetany caused by hypocalcaemia (low calcium in her body).
Her muscles froze, she had trouble breathing. She could not move, and went into severe panic. She continues to have daily mini anxiety attacks lest she forgets to take her calcium replacement pills.
She was very weepy and crying all the time.
I did one round of the basic trauma algorithm, the SUD went down a bit, but she had trouble keeping track of numbers because of her emotional state (crying). I treated a reversal and still it was hard to get clear information from her, so I did second reversal and added nose, chin, index, finger and pinky just to cover it all.
She reported that she was so relaxed she couldn’t think of it (the trauma and anxiety) any more but when she was able (to think on it) she saw it as a picture of something happening to another person. She couldn’t understand what was happening to her. She needed to rest so I explained a bit how it works so that she wouldn’t dismiss it as me doing something to her.
Then we tapped at the ‘picture’ that was left, and in the middle of the algorithm she says “that’s it, it’s gone!” So I did the nine gamut to lock it in and that was all!!!
“Each year the International Day of Peace is observed around the world on 21 September. The General Assembly has declared this as a day devoted to strengthening the ideals of peace, both within and among all nations and peoples.” The United Nations website
What better way to honor and celebrate this international day of peace than by sharing the TFT trauma relief technique with others? We now have instructions in 15 languages. If you know anyone who is suffering from the effects of trauma, or anyone who is working with people who are, please direct them to this site.
We invite you to also share the following trailer to the TFT Foundation’s film, “From Trauma to Peace,” which is scheduled for release at the end of this month. The film is a powerful demonstration of how effective TFT is in promoting peace.
In memory of those who suffered from the 9/11 tragedy–and in the effort to relieve their suffering and that of the many others who are traumatized by violence–we are reposting Ms. Bahr-Groth’s story of visiting New York five days after the event to help survivors with TFT. For another profound 9/11 TFT story, click here.
On Sunday, September 16, 2001, Kay and Jan, two women I trained in TFT, and I left our seemingly safe little town of Stamford, Connecticut and drove toward New York City. Unable to simply watch the horror of the World Trade Center disaster and its aftermath days before we decided to make our way into the city and find a way to help those in need. Armed with 2,000 copies of the Thought Field Therapy trauma/anxiety algorithm, a simple paper sign reading “Free, Trauma Relief”, a few bottles of water and a little folding table we began our somber journey.
It was one of those lovely late summer days with a perfectly clear blue sky and bright sun. We decided to put the top down on my convertible hoping the sunlight would lighten our spirits. The beauty of the day made it seem more incredible that such horror could have occurred.
As we passed the George Washington Bridge, just minutes from midtown Manhattan, the truth of the disaster could be seen and smelled. The awful sight of the empty skyline shrouded in white smoke shocked me beyond words. I, of course, had seen the news day after day and knew that the World Trade Center no longer stood tall and majestic in the sky. Still, I heard the words in my mind over and over saying “It’s not there…… It’s not there.”….. The tears streamed down my face as the truth and reality of all I knew set in.
The acrid scent of the smoke filled our nostrils and reinforced the certainty that so many had died. While driving and trying to absorb the shock of the situation, I treated myself with the trauma algorithm, often fixing my reversal. I noticed Kay and Jan treating themselves as well. We drove for miles in silence looking at the skyline which is now and forever changed.
We drove to lower Manhattan and tried to get as close to Ground Zero as possible. We miraculously found a parking space just in front of the memorial sight at Union Square Park. It is a lovely little park naturally filled with flowers and trees and but now filled with photos, candles and posters of those who were missing.
Thousands of New Yorkers were walking through the park bringing flowers, praying and connecting with others. It was there, close to the makeshift memorials, that we began Continue reading “9/11 Trauma Relief in New York”
The TFT Foundation’s documentary, “From Trauma to Peace”, is in post-production and almost complete. I will post when the DVD is available. Our new trailer gives an inkling of the power of the stories told. Please share it to give people an idea of the real possibility for peace in this world.
As you may know Chile is a country where natural disasters happen every now and then. Thus most people are always willing to help and to assist those in needs when something happens, each one doing its best according to experience and knowledge.
In March we had a “minor” earthquake (7.0) in the northern region (Iquique, a port in the north of Chile) , which was not so harmful but left people in a state of unease and expectation to what might be coming next. On April 1 a much bigger earthquake (8.3) hit the same region at 8 pm. Fortunately most were already at home with their families , which was a very positive. The first reaction people have with these events is to desperately know if their relatives are ok.
It is also important to know that for many weeks there were important aftershocks which kept people under continuous stress . Some did not want to sleep in their homes for fear it would hit again at night, and many wanted to stay in the surrounding hills, as after earthquakes there is always the danger of a tsunami afterwards. The memory of what happened in March 2010 (earthquake plus sumani).
In these cases, the best way to help is to do it through a local organization. A group of TFT therapist were eager to help, so we got in contact with a mining company who was organizing psychological help for people affected by this earthquake. One of the volunteers was somebody who has done the Algorithm course and lives in Iquique.
The team traveled to Iquique twice for one week. Most of the times they worked with a whole group (algorithm for the trauma plus emotions), the only way to give help in larger number. And in some cases , they did individual sessions (using mostly diagnostics).
The work involved the trauma (s) of the situation, plus the anxiety of what the next one to come, as earthquake specialist were saying that not all of the pressure had been released , which means that there must be another one in a near future. This caused a lot of anxiety in all of the people treated, and mainly those who had to drive up to the mines, which means taking a winding road that may be very dangerous during an important earth movement. Thus we also had to address this anxiety and give them tools to do tapping on their own while driving up the road or whenever they felt uneasy or afraid.
While we were doing these interventions, we had another big disaster on April 23. In Valparaiso, a hilly town near the sea there was a huge fire that burned down 2.900 homes affecting 12.500 people, all of them of very low means of income. The fire was extinguished only after a week; the town was covered in smoke, the houses burned to ashes, people living in shelters, stray dogs and cats in need of food….
Local authorities asked to concentrate all help through organizations working in Valparaíso so as to limit the number of people coming to the city. In this case we worked through the School of Psychologist, who had the necessary contacts to go and work with the people, mainly in shelters.
In this case the traumas were not only the one of the fire but also that of losing all their belongings, all their “treasures” (pictures, family items, etc)., the uncertainty of the future (the local government is rebuilding those homes but that takes time), children who had lost their pets, whose school had burned down, plus the daily problems that rise when living in shelters with many other families.
As you can see, it is a multitraumatic situation. In this case, what we mostly did was train volunteers to work with the appropriate algorithm. This work is still being done; volunteers mainly work on week-ends. They have also been trained to teach parents algorithms to have tools to help their children. This empowers them and gives them tools they can use with others.
Once again, TFT has proved to be a wonderful tool to help people in need, help them get over their traumas, to do tapping with their children, to get back the energy to address their daily routines, help them have faith in the future.
