specific racial or ethnic groups. It is important that certified peer specialists support members of communities impacted by this category of trauma in the context of their individual and collective culture. • Racial trauma or race-based traumatic stress is trauma that results from race- related experiences that involve discrimination, prejudice, racism. Posttraumatic slave syndrome is a consequence of the multigenerational oppression of Africans and their descendants resulting from centuries of slavery. • Vicarious trauma is trauma that appears when an individual experiences trauma- related symptoms in response to helping others who have experienced traumatic events. Certified peer specialists may be impacted by this category of trauma. If this happens to you, validate the impact of the trauma on the peer and recognize the impact it has you. Address the distress you are experiencing. Recognize that the trauma shared does not belong to you. Practice self-care and community care to avoid compassion fatigue or burnout. • Collective trauma is trauma that refers to a traumatic event that shared is by a group of people. It may involve a small group, like a family, or it may involve an entire society. Examples of a collective trauma include famines, mass shootings, a natural disaster, a pandemic, a plane crash, and war. People do not necessarily need to have experienced the event first-hand to be changed by it. Watching the events unfold on the news can be traumatic, for example. It is important to note that trauma is a personal experience. There is still a lot more to be learned about why people are impacted by traumatic events. Certified peer specialists should avoid comparing people’s experiences and responses to trauma.
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