Fighting the Fire for Freedom | home
back to Treatment Plan
Session 1 | Session 2 | Session 3 | Session 4 | Session 5 | Session 6 | Session 7 | Session 8 | References
Session 2
Group Session 2: Communication and Stress Management
How are you doing today?
Continue to work on group cohesion
Continue to work on group trust
Talk about event from a cognitive perspective
Roles: Understanding sources of stress
Writing about incident as homework assignment
The second session will open with the Facilitator asking the group members how they are doing today. The Facilitator will then go over the homework assignment from the last session and ask who wants to discuss their assignment first, and then proceed. The facilitator will lead into today's main topic of communication and stress management. Discuss the process of communication, which is the process of sharing message from sender to receiver. Effective communication is the idea that the message was received in the manner it was intended by the sender. After the communcation discussion, the facilitator will discuss stress management. The group will discuss the three stages of stress:
Stage 1 - recognition of stress
Stage 2 - body's stage of repairing damage caused by stress
Stage 3 - exhaustion if stress continues and a stress disorder will result.
Facilitator will discuss that all events are neutral, but the perception that the people have determines how they will react. An example to illustrate situation may be bronco riding. Some people may have a stressful reaction if they had to ride, while others may be extremely excited. The difference is what they tell themselves about the event. The group will then talk about their personal stress signs and symptoms. Discuss how they have managed stressful situations in the past, excluding September 11th incident. Conduct an exercise regarding roles: "Understanding Sources of Stress" The exercise will be begin with the counselor providing a situation that will have the group members think of various ways to resolve the situation. An example would be that you were told that you are being transferred to another station or that the station was going to lose one slot and the slot is yours. What or how would you cope with that unexpected situation? Homework assignment will be to write about the incident from their point of view in a cognitive manner in at least ten sentences.