Speaker 1: Good morning, Peepsen. Welcome to WIKA F Daily with Meet
Speaker 1: your Girl Danielle Moody. Prerecording from the Home Bunker. Folks,
Speaker 1: you know, I often share with you my background as
Speaker 1: a former educator, and I say former meaning that obviously
Speaker 1: I'm no longer in a classroom, but I like to
Speaker 1: think that I educate and teach in a different way. However,
Speaker 1: my time working in education and working in education policy
Speaker 1: had a really deep impact on my life, as did
Speaker 1: my own education, which is what has me so concerned
Speaker 1: on a regular basis about the mental health and well
Speaker 1: being of America's youth. I think that we are not
Speaker 1: really paying attention to the not so silent crisis that
Speaker 1: is happening with America's young people. I've written about this
Speaker 1: at the Daily Beast and in other venues that there
Speaker 1: was a crisis before the pandemic took place. There was
Speaker 1: a rise in anxiety and depression among our youth. And
Speaker 1: why is that? Oh, I don't know. Could it be
Speaker 1: because we're sending them to school and they don't know
Speaker 1: whether or not they're going to end up dead or
Speaker 1: be able to make it home. This is not hyperbole.
Speaker 1: We know that schoolmass shootings are just the norm in
Speaker 1: the United States, right that we tell our kids that
Speaker 1: we can keep them safe, but we don't really. We
Speaker 1: send them to school instead with bulletproof backpacks. Instead, we
Speaker 1: teach them active shooter drills. In today's episode, I'm joined
Speaker 1: by Michael Klinkner, who is a clinical social worker in Arizona,
Speaker 1: and we're going to get into and you're going to
Speaker 1: hear our conversation about the state of mental health in
Speaker 1: this country, particularly as it pertains to our youth, and
Speaker 1: our LGBTQ youth specifically, who are not statistics. They are
Speaker 1: human beings whose experiences are being weaponized to put forward
Speaker 1: a political agenda on the far rapid right, where hate
Speaker 1: reigns supreme. And Michael and I will talk about the
Speaker 1: ways in which even if you are not a parent,
Speaker 1: but are a caregiver or a teacher, or a guidance
Speaker 1: counselor a youth advisor working you know, a religious facility,
Speaker 1: that if you are present in a child's life, some
Speaker 1: of the ways that you can engage in conversation to
Speaker 1: get to the there there, how they are feeling, what
Speaker 1: they are thinking, how are they moving through their day
Speaker 1: to day. It's mass shootings. One day, it's climate change,
Speaker 1: the next, after that, it's a global health pandemic. After
Speaker 1: that it's arise in political violence. It's literally one thing
Speaker 1: after the other. And on top of that, we're saying, oh,
Speaker 1: and then go ahead and go and learn. And then
Speaker 1: in the middle of your school day will disrupt you
Speaker 1: for an active shooter drill that we won't tell you
Speaker 1: is real or it's not. And then your court zone
Speaker 1: levels shoot up, and we expect you to after the drill,
Speaker 1: sit down and take up as if nothing happened. It's wild,
Speaker 1: the expectations that we have for youth today. And so
Speaker 1: I get into a conversation with Michael Klickner, the clinical
Speaker 1: social worker, and you know, hopefully this conversation, this episode
Speaker 1: will provide you with some tools and tactics to be
Speaker 1: able to help the young people that are in your life.
Speaker 1: That conversation is coming up next. Hey there, I want
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Speaker 1: every Tuesday wherever you at your podcasts, folks. I am
Speaker 1: very happy to welcome to woka F Daily for the
Speaker 1: first time, licensed clinical social worker Michael Klinkner, who I'm
Speaker 1: excited to be in conversation with you, Michael, because for
Speaker 1: the last couple of years on this show, I have
Speaker 1: made it a point to talk about the mental health
Speaker 1: my concern about the mental health of young people in
Speaker 1: this country as we are learning to navigate a new normal,
Speaker 1: or in many cases, a new abnormal. We have been
Speaker 1: impacted by multiple crises, impacted by multiple traumas that began
Speaker 1: but did not end with COVID nineteen, going into quarantine,
Speaker 1: and learning to exist in a remote setting both in
Speaker 1: school and in work, from dealing with the fear and
Speaker 1: anxiety around climate change and young that being a very
Speaker 1: big issue for young people, So I wanted to get
Speaker 1: your thoughts. I mean, and on top of that, mass
Speaker 1: shootings and school shootings, you know, at the end of
Speaker 1: last school year, the headlines were about the loss of
Speaker 1: nineteen children's lives right in Texas after following the You've
Speaker 1: aldi shooting. So I want to get your thoughts on
Speaker 1: what you think about how young people are doing, what
Speaker 1: you were hearing from young people themselves, and what we
Speaker 1: should be paying attention to or what we're not paying
Speaker 1: attention to. Danielle, thanks for having me on. I certainly
Speaker 1: appreciate it. Let me start with sort of like overall
Speaker 1: general state of affairs with kids here is the anxiety
Speaker 1: is high for a lot of different reasons, but the
Speaker 1: amount of kids where like we'll have an intake and
Speaker 1: on the form, the parents will fill out that the
Speaker 1: kid has had trouble since lockdown or since COVID or
Speaker 1: since the pandemic and and they haven't ever gotten back
Speaker 1: on their feet since. I just I was doing an
Speaker 1: intake with a young man yesterday who was like honor
Speaker 1: student all the way through US eighth grade. COVID hit
Speaker 1: school went crazy and he hasn't He hasn't been able
Speaker 1: to get back into school since. And so there's confounding factors.
Speaker 1: But when someone is having some like anxiety or like
Speaker 1: a moderately dysfunctional at home, or like things are kind
Speaker 1: of like they're okay, but they're not, or like things
Speaker 1: are just starting to like we're just starting to teeter.
Speaker 1: And then the pandemic where for us here in Arizona,
Speaker 1: it was especially tricky because there were some schools that
Speaker 1: went back very quickly, some schools that never left, some
Speaker 1: schools that immediately went virtual, some schools that went back
Speaker 1: and forth, and so there were all these experiences, and
Speaker 1: the kids have described they feel behind because lots of
Speaker 1: them lost a full year between hybrid we're just going
Speaker 1: straight to online, and so they feel like they're behind everybody.
Speaker 1: They're not, of course, because everyone else also had the
Speaker 1: same exactperience in the country, like all the other kids
Speaker 1: their age had the same exact set of problems. But
Speaker 1: it doesn't seem that way to them. It just seems
Speaker 1: like they're comparing to where other kids would have been
Speaker 1: or should have been at, you know, their sophomore year
Speaker 1: of high school three years ago, and what that was like.
Speaker 1: Also with state standards and teaching, with some stuff is systematized,
Speaker 1: so by the end of eighth grade, there are these
Speaker 1: things that you have to be able to know and
Speaker 1: get tested on, and by the end of freshman year,
Speaker 1: there are these things that you'll get tested on and
Speaker 1: if you don't know them, you don't get to move
Speaker 1: forward or you have to repeat classes or repeat grades.
Speaker 1: I'll see it a lot of really high achieving kids
Speaker 1: too that are AP classes or honors classes, especially with
Speaker 1: the AP because there is that standardized test and they're
Speaker 1: taking it too in order to achieve college credit and
Speaker 1: get a higher GPA. They feel like they're behind in
Speaker 1: those because those AP classes are standardized across the country,
Speaker 1: and they feel like there's stuff that they didn't pick
Speaker 1: up that they're they're a cohort or their contemporaries in
Speaker 1: different states or different part of this they'd picked up.
Speaker 1: And so there's all this additionally anxiety that they've been
Speaker 1: now carrying for years and there it's just kind of
Speaker 1: like the it's it's coming home the roost, if you will,
Speaker 1: where there's a lot of kids that are just legitimately
Speaker 1: at their breaking point. We have a really good recent
Speaker 1: experience out here too with the gun stuff. Is that
Speaker 1: at so it's homecoming time for us out here and
Speaker 1: we're in Arizona. There was a recent homecoming where there
Speaker 1: wasn't a gun. But at the dance, somebody yelled gun
Speaker 1: and those kids went just plane, went running and they
Speaker 1: didn't come back. They unfortunately knew what to do. But
Speaker 1: what happened is somebody just said that word. Nobody bothered
Speaker 1: to check, nobody like, nobody did anything. They just know
Speaker 1: that word means get the heck out of where you are,
Speaker 1: go hide, call parents. And so that's just what happened,
Speaker 1: and that that is so sad and so scary. It was.
Speaker 1: So they didn't have homecoming in twenty twenty twenty. Maybe
Speaker 1: maybe not. They had homecoming in twenty twenty one. In
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two, they didn't because they thought somebody had
Speaker 1: a gun. What the heck. That is the state of
Speaker 1: affairs for kids and teens in my part of the
Speaker 1: country today, and I know another part of the country's too.
Speaker 1: I just have those you know, easily accessible those times
Speaker 1: for those kids. I will get Also, lots of lots
Speaker 1: of kids will talk about lockdown drills, what that's like
Speaker 1: for them, how that feels to them as they're just
Speaker 1: sitting there and they're not supposed to know whether it's
Speaker 1: a jewel or not. And for them, if they don't
Speaker 1: know what's a drill, and they're just sitting there what
Speaker 1: that's like when they lose it, when they lose a
Speaker 1: period of time for class work or those sort of things.
Speaker 1: So scary, that is just plain scary in the context
Speaker 1: of two scary years for right kids who are under
Speaker 1: resourced because they're supposed to be on how to deal
Speaker 1: with anxiety. My goodness, you know, just the image that
Speaker 1: you that you provided of just the word gun being
Speaker 1: yelled out sends kids running for cover, running for their lives.
Speaker 1: And also, I haven't thought about the drills, the lockdown
Speaker 1: drills in schools of active the active shooter drills, and
Speaker 1: the fact that they're not supposed to know that they
Speaker 1: are drills. And so again the anxiety. So after this
Speaker 1: said drill, for however long it takes, then you're just
Speaker 1: supposed to go back to collass as normal. Meanwhile, your
Speaker 1: cortisone levels are at like are there through the roof?
Speaker 1: And so what do you think, Michael, that we in
Speaker 1: society are getting wrong about our assumption around how resilient
Speaker 1: kids truly are, because that's a thing that is thrown
Speaker 1: out a lot. Right, kids are resilient, kids adapt but
Speaker 1: what we're asking them to adapt to is living under
Speaker 1: duress and in trauma. And so, what do you think
Speaker 1: that we are getting wrong? As we are identifying now
Speaker 1: potentially the long term effects of not only again living
Speaker 1: in a global health pandemic, but all the gun violence pandemic,
Speaker 1: all of these other pandemics that haven't had necessarily the
Speaker 1: same this same attention in that way. So it's hard
Speaker 1: for me to say that it's getting done wrong because
Speaker 1: we don't know what right is, and so we are
Speaker 1: literally making this up as we go along. There's no
Speaker 1: one has a frame of reference at any time between them.
Speaker 1: There is stuff in the air that could kill you
Speaker 1: or kill the ones that are close to you. That
Speaker 1: it's just literally just in the air. Who knows, let alone.
Speaker 1: You add in the gun violence, you add in the
Speaker 1: extra pressures, you add in the political climate which is
Speaker 1: inherently interwoven with the with the COVID stuff and with
Speaker 1: the gun things. And depending on where your parents are,
Speaker 1: they'll have a very strong opinion about those lockdown drills
Speaker 1: and what they're for and what they should be like.
Speaker 1: And they have very strong opinions about how the COVID
Speaker 1: stuff was and is currently handled. And so you add
Speaker 1: in for a year and a half, two years, we
Speaker 1: taught them to be afraid of the air. The whole
Speaker 1: time they've continued to be exposed to. You never know
Speaker 1: what's going to happen at school, so we need to
Speaker 1: we need to prep for it because hey, you might
Speaker 1: die today, and then they go home to a politically
Speaker 1: charged climate. About what that means, no frame or reference
Speaker 1: for it, There isn't any way, We don't know what
Speaker 1: to do. And then Danielle, you add in social media
Speaker 1: and what that means and what they're seeing on TikTok,
Speaker 1: what they're getting their friends are snapping them, and like
Speaker 1: what they're picking up through through Instagram or any of
Speaker 1: those things that we don't know. Nobody knows, And so
Speaker 1: what this means in five years, who on earth knows?
Speaker 1: You know, we didn't know what we knew back in
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen about what twenty twenty one and twenty two
Speaker 1: we're going to be like. So that part's really hard,
Speaker 1: and we're just starting the research to try to figure
Speaker 1: out even like the micro effects in the MESO effects,
Speaker 1: let alone the big long term macro effects. We don't know.
Speaker 1: But what I do know is because we don't know
Speaker 1: what we're doing and we're not sure parents just aren't
Speaker 1: doing anything in that part is always not the right answer,
Speaker 1: and so it is very easy as a parent to
Speaker 1: say like, hey, how's your day at school and the
Speaker 1: kid says, oh, yeah, we had a lockdown drill and
Speaker 1: to just blow it off instead of the oh, especially
Speaker 1: for like younger kids and like early to middle elementary school, Oh,
Speaker 1: what was that like for you? Or how is that?
Speaker 1: Or what do you guys do? Or like what does
Speaker 1: your teacher say? Or how they handle bathroom like any
Speaker 1: of that kind of stuff, and then just drill into it.
Speaker 1: What's the emotional impact for them? Or because like not
Speaker 1: ever ready kid wants to talk or not every kid
Speaker 1: is great at that, Hey, how does this impact the
Speaker 1: other kids in the classroom? Does anybody have a hard time?
Speaker 1: Or does anybody kind of like does anybody cry? Does
Speaker 1: anybody freak out? Does anybody like try to be a clown?
Speaker 1: Things like that, because then you get to talk to
Speaker 1: your kid about the Oh, why do you think they're
Speaker 1: having such a hard time? Or why do you think
Speaker 1: they got so scared? Or what do you think? What
Speaker 1: do you think it's like for everybody else in the
Speaker 1: classroom then two. So then you can talk about the
Speaker 1: impact of those drills, you can talk about the impact
Speaker 1: of the pandemic, or you can talk about that, but
Speaker 1: the kid doesn't have to talk about themselves. And then
Speaker 1: whatever emotions are coming up. I'm always encouraging adults, parents,
Speaker 1: to just validate whatever is going on for that kid.
Speaker 1: You don't have to agree with it. It doesn't have
Speaker 1: to make sense. You can actually think the exact opposite.
Speaker 1: And so if you know, if I'm a gen xer
Speaker 1: and so, but it was the generation before mine where
Speaker 1: they were still doing like nuclear drills where had to
Speaker 1: call unto your desk because you know, rush on my bone,
Speaker 1: and so that wasn't my generation was one before, but
Speaker 1: so like but for that generation, and like at at
Speaker 1: the older end of mine, we have a little bit
Speaker 1: of a frame of reference to what that's like. And
Speaker 1: when ours was cut like for them, it wasn't. The
Speaker 1: red scare felt imminent, but not like this, And so
Speaker 1: it's easy for people to dismiss the well, it's not
Speaker 1: so hard, it's not that big a deal, or like
Speaker 1: I feel like I would be okay with it. It It
Speaker 1: wouldn't be that hard. I would just sit on my
Speaker 1: phone and probably play a game. And so it's easy
Speaker 1: to dismiss what your kid is going through. Always validate
Speaker 1: even if you don't have to agree. It doesn't have
Speaker 1: to make sense. They might be overreacting, that might be true,
Speaker 1: that's okay. They are still honestly feeling what they're feeling
Speaker 1: and they need to communicate that to the people they
Speaker 1: love and love them, and so in those situations, it
Speaker 1: is always the right answer to validate what they have
Speaker 1: going on and to ask some open ended questions about
Speaker 1: why they're feeling the way they're feeling, or why do
Speaker 1: they think their peers or friends are feeling the way
Speaker 1: they're feeling, as a sort of like side doorway, and
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Speaker 1: You know, one of the things that I did recently
Speaker 1: is I wrote a piece for The Daily Beasts about kids,
Speaker 1: but in particular LGBTQ youth and the fact that suicide
Speaker 1: has once again and begun to skyrocket, not just for um,
Speaker 1: for straight uh CIS kids, but for queer kids, which
Speaker 1: has always been on the higher end of the of
Speaker 1: the mainstream. And you know, you bring up the political climate,
Speaker 1: which obviously I talk about on a daily basis on
Speaker 1: this show. But when we often you hear about these
Speaker 1: don't say gay bills or these anti trans bills, we
Speaker 1: don't think about the children that are behind those bills,
Speaker 1: the ones who are now going into a school climate
Speaker 1: that is not only riddled with anxiety about training for
Speaker 1: you know, a lockdown and a mass shooter. But is
Speaker 1: my teacher going to out me? Is my you know,
Speaker 1: administration going to discriminate me? And then if I if
Speaker 1: they do, I have no recourse. So I wanted to
Speaker 1: get your thoughts on, in particular, how this current climate
Speaker 1: is impacting LGBTQ kids in particular, you know, either anecdotally
Speaker 1: or just you know, based on you know, based on
Speaker 1: your own work, because I also think that that's a
Speaker 1: carve out that we're not again providing enough attention to
Speaker 1: my experience is it's so different school by school and
Speaker 1: family by family, And so there are some amazing schools
Speaker 1: out here that do systematically do a great job where
Speaker 1: teachers will email the kids and and will ask questions
Speaker 1: like what do you want me to call you? What
Speaker 1: do you want your pronounce to be? What name do
Speaker 1: you want to make sure that I'm saying in class?
Speaker 1: And then if I have a meeting with your teachers,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, with your parents, what name do I call
Speaker 1: you there? Super aware thinking through all the possible angles
Speaker 1: like what if I have to email your mom? What
Speaker 1: name do I call you in that? Versus what do
Speaker 1: I call you in class? Versus any of those sort
Speaker 1: of things, and so though they're trying really hard, and
Speaker 1: of course we all screw that up wildly. We always
Speaker 1: like we're gonna when there's a lot of kids, we're
Speaker 1: gonna forget it pronoun we just asked for grace and
Speaker 1: try to not mess it up next time. And so
Speaker 1: and then families who will sometimes be great about it
Speaker 1: and amazing about it, and so it's them out here.
Speaker 1: There's very there's a couple of like conservative religious bases
Speaker 1: that have some strong opinions about about those things. And
Speaker 1: so for lots of kids, that's confusing because that's around
Speaker 1: them too, and they'll hear those things. And so there's
Speaker 1: some parents though that will be religiously conservative, but we'll
Speaker 1: have questions like, all right, so this is my kid,
Speaker 1: and so like, I know what my church is saying,
Speaker 1: but I I'm gonna love my kid like And they're
Speaker 1: clearly not making some choice because if they could, they wouldn't.
Speaker 1: They wouldn't be choosing to get called the names or
Speaker 1: getting called right now, right, And so the parents will
Speaker 1: have work really hard under the idea of I have
Speaker 1: no idea what I'm doing. I've never thought I've had
Speaker 1: to deal this that they'll try to work through the
Speaker 1: associated grief and then just try to do it right,
Speaker 1: knowing that they don't know anything, and that's okay. That's
Speaker 1: that's as good as they're going to do, and they
Speaker 1: just get better at it, and they can can feel
Speaker 1: that they're loved. When those things are in place, when
Speaker 1: people are trying, even if they're even if they're getting
Speaker 1: all kinds are wrong, the kid will feel heard and
Speaker 1: understood and respected in love, and that's okay. And so
Speaker 1: things can can go badly, and so if if they're
Speaker 1: respected and love and understood at home, school can get
Speaker 1: a little wonky. But then they can go home and
Speaker 1: they'll have supports there and they can be resilient. The
Speaker 1: opposite can also be true. If the parents aren't doing
Speaker 1: a great job and the kid can go to a
Speaker 1: school where they feel heard and understood in love, they
Speaker 1: kid won't be resilient. We won't see big increases in
Speaker 1: that in the depression or in the anxiety, or in
Speaker 1: the suicidaley. Those are generally speaking, those are the protective
Speaker 1: factors that will help kids move through that. All that said,
Speaker 1: it's tough and sometimes impossible in depending on Arizona's quirky
Speaker 1: because we have some major, major urban areas and then
Speaker 1: we've got all kinds of rural And so what rural
Speaker 1: means as far as access to clubs like one intent
Speaker 1: or just a mentor or somebody who you can talk about, Like,
Speaker 1: I'm thirteen, I'm just getting it figured out. Is there
Speaker 1: anybody that's on the other side of this to let
Speaker 1: me know what it looks like, or just somebody that
Speaker 1: I can talk to. If you're in rural, No, that's
Speaker 1: not a thing. They're not necessarily available. You're just kind
Speaker 1: of on your own and good luck what you what
Speaker 1: your parents in school things. Also, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: the information that's going to come from social media about
Speaker 1: those things, and so in the absence of us teaching
Speaker 1: our kids what or how to think about certain things,
Speaker 1: they're going to make it up on their own. Now
Speaker 1: teenagers different that you're going to help them sort of
Speaker 1: like where you getting information from or like what are
Speaker 1: those sources? What do you think about all of that
Speaker 1: and help them, like open ended, navigate them to their
Speaker 1: own set of understandings, even if it's different than yours.
Speaker 1: Early junior high, elementary school, you're teaching them how to
Speaker 1: think about those things and kind of as a family
Speaker 1: what those values can and what they think they should be.
Speaker 1: You know, when I think about the way that you
Speaker 1: just broke that down in terms of you know, access
Speaker 1: versus no access, and and families being open versus a
Speaker 1: school being open and all of these things, I think
Speaker 1: about the fact that when young people have nowhere to go, right,
Speaker 1: they I go to social media, they go to books. Well,
Speaker 1: we've banned a lot of books, right and particularly in
Speaker 1: red states, right, like this is this is the thing
Speaker 1: that we're doing, and it's going school by school district
Speaker 1: and you know, and and state by state, um, denying
Speaker 1: access to information. And so can you talk can you
Speaker 1: speak a bit to creating that kind of bubble and
Speaker 1: how detrimental it can be, the deny file of accessive
Speaker 1: information to all young people as they're trying to figure
Speaker 1: out how to navigate this new world that they're in.
Speaker 1: That that gets really, honestly very tricky. And so that
Speaker 1: is as much as possible, that should always come down
Speaker 1: to parents as far as what do you what makes
Speaker 1: sense for your kids and how to like, how to
Speaker 1: disseminate that, how to think about those things whether or
Speaker 1: not you think your kid is ready to read or
Speaker 1: hear about things like that. Because also the determination by
Speaker 1: age is arbitrary. It doesn't matter. It's sort of like,
Speaker 1: you know, you're just spitting a wheel and come up
Speaker 1: with some age because it's going to be about maturity
Speaker 1: and it's going to be about life experience of that kid.
Speaker 1: And so the only people that can do that are parents.
Speaker 1: And so that idea that you're going to limit what
Speaker 1: they're going to be exposed to on a systematic level
Speaker 1: or on a state level or anything like that, it
Speaker 1: doesn't make any sense at all making informed decisions as
Speaker 1: a parent about what makes sense. Absolutely, And so you know,
Speaker 1: if the school is going to decide like, hey, we're
Speaker 1: going to take on a controversy, heads up, I want
Speaker 1: you to know, and here's the way they're going to
Speaker 1: do it, do it. That's great because then those kids
Speaker 1: get to go home and they can greatly disagree with
Speaker 1: what the teacher said, or they can really disagree with
Speaker 1: the teacher said, or they can help process through those
Speaker 1: things versus just not exposing the kid to it. Because
Speaker 1: here's the thing they're going to get exposed to it.
Speaker 1: That is what social media does they're going to be
Speaker 1: in front of that information potentially dysfunctionally from someone who
Speaker 1: shouldn't be talking about those things in taking strong positions.
Speaker 1: And then if the kid doesn't have information from their parents,
Speaker 1: are from their school because they're not exposed to it,
Speaker 1: it's new information. They're going to look at it on
Speaker 1: their TikTok, which means that it's going to show up
Speaker 1: on their FORU page, which now they're in an echo
Speaker 1: chamber based on the social media algorithms about what they're seeing.
Speaker 1: And for you, that may not be what you like
Speaker 1: that makes the most sense, and it might be okay,
Speaker 1: But then you get to talk through about all right,
Speaker 1: how are you thinking about that? Or like going on
Speaker 1: that way? Or you know, what do your friends think
Speaker 1: about those kind of things. That kind of stuff are
Speaker 1: great conversations to parents to have. But if you're not
Speaker 1: in there and you're not on top of it, and
Speaker 1: you don't know they're getting the information, they're doing something
Speaker 1: with it, good luck with what that is and who
Speaker 1: they're getting it from. Yeah, with you know, my last
Speaker 1: question for you, Michael, this has been so helpful and
Speaker 1: you have dropped so many gems for parents for caregivers
Speaker 1: and for teachers. But I want to give you the
Speaker 1: opportunity and I want to ask this question, which is what,
Speaker 1: how how? What are the best ways are? What are
Speaker 1: some tactics that people who are in the lives of
Speaker 1: young people can do to show that they are a
Speaker 1: safe space to, you know, to to ask, you know,
Speaker 1: what kind of questions can they ask to try and
Speaker 1: develop a relationship and an open, you know, space for
Speaker 1: communication for a young person that may be in need,
Speaker 1: that they see is in need but they're trying to
Speaker 1: reach them. First off, be genuine safe you can you
Speaker 1: can talk to the kid, whether it's like it's your
Speaker 1: child or someone else's and you're just like you're exposed
Speaker 1: to them or like you're a mentor to them. Be
Speaker 1: genuine about like the Hey, I can just tell you
Speaker 1: a little bit off and I don't know what's going on.
Speaker 1: I can't tell, but you're different than you used to be,
Speaker 1: and I just sort of see it, like you're not
Speaker 1: trying as hard at school, or like you're in bed
Speaker 1: a whole lot more things like that. Feel free to
Speaker 1: use the appropriate words like depression and anxiety and suicide
Speaker 1: and things like that. Talking about suicide or talking about
Speaker 1: depression isn't going to make your kid more likely to
Speaker 1: be depressed or more likely to attempt suicide. It's actually
Speaker 1: quite the opposite. If they're thinking that way and you
Speaker 1: can talk to them about it, then you've got a chance.
Speaker 1: If you don't talk to them about it, you don't
Speaker 1: have a chance. The other thing is like in the
Speaker 1: know that this is never just about like one single conversation.
Speaker 1: This is gonna be about twelve thousand conversations over the
Speaker 1: course of you know, definitely their childhood and throughout their lifetime,
Speaker 1: and so have you know, have the opening one that's
Speaker 1: going to be weird and awkward in case you haven't
Speaker 1: had it before, it's gonna be a little tough for
Speaker 1: those ones. I always advise parents or caregivers to do that.
Speaker 1: In the car, that's my favorite spot for those just
Speaker 1: because you can have the radio on. There's no awkward silence,
Speaker 1: there's no expectation of eye contact. You're both just looking
Speaker 1: through the front windshield and in case you can look
Speaker 1: over if you want to. If you're running errands together,
Speaker 1: you know, you park, you're run into target, you come
Speaker 1: back out, you can pick the conversation back up while
Speaker 1: you've sort of processed it while while you're in target,
Speaker 1: and then it just you know, And then also some
Speaker 1: other things might come up along the way, and so
Speaker 1: those are also you have a captured audience. They're not
Speaker 1: going to jump out of the car because you start
Speaker 1: talking about suicide. If they do, then you know, then
Speaker 1: you've got problems anyway. So but it's then those are
Speaker 1: good easy times, especially in the beginning, to bring these tough,
Speaker 1: tough topics up into and to treat it in a
Speaker 1: serious way and also admit what you don't know and
Speaker 1: ask questions, and you can say so like out here
Speaker 1: there's been a peak in suicide attempts and then kids
Speaker 1: as young as eight dying by suicide, and so out here.
Speaker 1: You can also use those news stories or use like
Speaker 1: like local news or even like not so local news
Speaker 1: as jumping off points to be I know this is happening, kiddo,
Speaker 1: Why do you think it's happening so much? What do
Speaker 1: you think is going on that way? Or explain to
Speaker 1: meet your point of view about like why, because I
Speaker 1: don't get it and I don't know why, and I
Speaker 1: don't know what you're going through. It's okay, to admit
Speaker 1: all those things and to admit that I don't how
Speaker 1: does TikTok affect all these things or how does like
Speaker 1: Instagram affect all this stuff? From your point of view?
Speaker 1: And that's you can do that with lots of age kids.
Speaker 1: That doesn't have to be like, you know, junior high
Speaker 1: or high school. You know, you're ten year old. You
Speaker 1: can have a reasonable conversation with about you know, hey,
Speaker 1: there's kids that are like attempting suicide, like in the
Speaker 1: local area, But do you think that's about or what
Speaker 1: do you think might get someone to that point? You
Speaker 1: can have that conversation with a ten year old. It
Speaker 1: will be a different conversation than you would have with
Speaker 1: a sixteen year old, But when you open the door
Speaker 1: repeatedly and talk about it, then they're going to feel
Speaker 1: invited to talk about that stuff, especially during the tough
Speaker 1: times when they need to the most. Oh, Michael, this
Speaker 1: has been so helpful. I so appreciate that. So appreciate
Speaker 1: your conversation and your advice to the wok F audience,
Speaker 1: because I think that where we are right now is
Speaker 1: a really perilous for young people, and I think that
Speaker 1: the more that we can as adults try our best
Speaker 1: to bridge, you know, to create a bridge and an
Speaker 1: open communication and respectful, authentic communication with young people, the
Speaker 1: likelihood of them being able to navigate this this time
Speaker 1: is better. So, Michael Klickner, thank you so much for
Speaker 1: making the time to join woke F. I really appreciate you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Danielle, I really enjoyed it. That is it
Speaker 1: for me today. Dear friends on woke f as always,
Speaker 1: power to the people and to all the people. Power,
Speaker 1: get woke and stay woke as fuck.