Jacqueline España: When I started working
with survivors of torture I was only 19 years
old so I was a youth myself which was really
incredible, it was a really incredible way
to grow and to learn, but it also took--I
had to check myself, it took a certain amount
of--I needed a lot of support.
When I was pursuing my Bachelor's degree in
Social Work I started working with survivors
of torture.
I got this amazing internship and I was working
with mostly African immigrants as a counselor.
I helped them connect with educational resources
if they needed some thing like English classes
or just with any goal setting that they needed
we would work together and build a relationship
to you know find what they needed.
Laurene Dominguez: I am the coordinator of
the S.A.F.E.
Place here at San Francisco State.
I came into this field because I wanted the
world to be a better place.
You know I wanted you know at a very basic
level I wanted people to be able to be in
a place where they could reach their fullest
potential.
What I realize is that dealing with crisis
and trauma work that is probably one of the
biggest barriers that prevents people from
reaching that potential.
David Inocencio: The Beat Within is a couple
of things, it is a wonderful program that
has been around for 17 years.
We go and do writing workshops inside juvenile
and from the workshops in juvenile we produce
these amazing publications that bring together
the community of young people who find themselves
in detention.
What I once did was of as more you know I
think in outside more in the trenches work
it in the community with the young people
with not just in juvenile but if there was
working with young people at Hunter's Point
or Visitation Valley or the Mission or Tenderloin
I was--I was really hands on as an advocate.
Creating To Beat Within I am no longer you
know I'm where necessary for me to be in the
trenches in that same capacity and feeling
the way of and that's what I felt was the
way that if the young--I am working with this
young person in the community I feel most
responsible for him or her to succeed and
make it.
Laurene Dominguez: Any time you are kind of
engaging with other people I feel like you
are at risk of if I carry this trauma or compassion
fatigue, there are a lot of you know terms
out there for it, you are basically bearing
witness to what they are being traumatized
by.
Jacqueline España: My first day of actually
seeing clients I remember looking in their
files because somebody else would do an initial
intake interview and then I would see them,
so there was this one file full of information
and it just you know was pretty detailed as
far as what trauma each person had been through,
I just after seeing the first one it was just
too much for me, it was just like I started
crying, I went to the bathroom I thought you
know like who am I to be to with this person,
you know, what am I going to do for them,
this is so intense.
Laurene Dominguez: Burn out in this field
is really high.
So this self care piece is really critical.
You know somebody leaves the room and it's
just like you feel like you've kind of just
picked up everything they brought in.
David Inocencio: We're dealing with a lot
of young people who have dealt with a lot
of violence in their lives and are dealing
with death and they are dealing with you know
abuse and just a lot of tragedy you know,
have seen someone die in their arms or seeing
someone beat their mother to death or a best
friend that's no longer there had died at
14, 15 years old.
I took the work very, very serious until I
told you earlier by the time I was 30 years
old I had a couple of ulcers, so they would
just beat me up.
Jacqueline España: This is just what I used
to take notes like one I did interviews with
the little kids in Kenya on our scholarship
program because nobody had just like a basic
assessment so that's kind of when I found
that a lot of them were struggling with abuse.
We went from school to school, we worked with
principals to help them have them help us
launch a poster contest with the kids.
They produced some pretty graphic posters,
it was pretty upsetting to see these images
but clearly really important for the kids
to express that.
Laurene Dominguez: I think its important that
you definitely if you are using the medium
that is your own, like if you are an artist
and you paint a lot and you utilize that in
your work I think its really important that
you create a space where you can really be
creative and its remains something that's
important to you because I felt less stressed
because I am actually doing the breathing
work and meditation with the clients at the
same time and it's a way of being able to
do my own self care.
Jacqueline España: When I first started going
to yoga I didn't really know what was happening
but I would want to cry a lot in this one
pose and its called Pigeon pose where half
king pigeon you basically fold your entire
body on to itself with one knee bent and its
really beautiful because your face is kind
of hidden from the world so you can feel really
protected and it was in those moments that
you know sometimes just all these thoughts
would bubble up and they would come out and
I would release them and I would tear up and
start crying and I didn't really know if that
was okay until one teacher said you know by
the way if you are feeling a lot of emotions
right now let them out which was very important
to unwind just sort of let myself feel what
I was feeling.
Laurene Dominguez: Part of it is not being
so hard on yourself is a form of self care
you know and being able to really assess what
you can incorporate and what you're already
doing that's you know helping you know in
terms of like you know eating three times
a day or making sure you go out at lunch and
you actually breathe air and don't stay in
office like all of those things are different
forms of kind of doing self care.
David Inocencio: One thing that is definitely
been my greatest outlet is collecting records,
I mean if I can escape and dig in records
for hours.
I also enjoy writing and writing not to write
for blog or write for the beat or write for
my life story but just get thoughts off my
chest because I mean that's what I am telling
the kids to do in juvenile instead of carrying
that pain I usually get it down on paper and
I feel a lot better.
Jacqueline España: Something else that I
think can be really powerful is keeping what
is called a visual diary.
Everything went into this book like everything
I was feeling and thinking, I would even like
little pieces of wood or even dead butterflies
like it was just a free for all dump of my
brain and what I was experiencing.
Most importantly it's a release and it's a
way to know what you are thinking.
Laurene Dominguez: People have to take inventory
of just their own life and how they carry
stress and kind of where they are at in their
level of stress and then figuring out realistically
like how can they incorporate things to how
deflate some of that but making it realistic
is really critical.
David Inocencio: The kind of mentoring that
I was given I saw it working and because that
had inspired me to continue to improve on
my skills as an advocate as a mentor as an
elderly teacher.
Jacqueline España: I am definitely going
to keep doing this work because I feel really
motivated by the people that I worked with,
so the privilege of building connections with
survivors is motivating me to do what I can
and to play any role that I can to further
their mission which is really gratifying for
me.
