Confronting the psychological effects of gun violence and other traumas.
Gun violence is an urgent, complex and multifaceted social and public health problem. WHO stated that gun violence damage, “has a draining effect on basic health care and diverts much-needed resources from other health and social services.”
As one of the most traumatic transgressions against human beings (APA, 2014), gun violence has mushroomed in Toronto, claiming many young lives, leaving mothers, families, and communities crippled by demoralizing repercussions.
OOB has customized a community-based crisis response, with models of care, which provide ongoing support for victims and survivors of gun violence trauma; including funerals and burials.
With a mandate to provide competent grief and traumatic supports, education, and empowerment to grieving and non-grieving persons and communities Tend’n & Befriend’n is a subsidiary program from OOB, which confronts the traumatic psychological effects of gun violence and other traumas.
Tend’n processes provides:
- Crisis response with psychological support
- Pragmatic, personalized care with social outreach for mothers, siblings and extended family members.
- Emotional CPR (eCPR) is immediately provided to survivors.
- Emphasis on mothers’ psychological needs
- Assistance with souring financial costs for funerals and burials.
Procuring this financial feat minimizes added stressors that often compound and impede the initial grieving process.
Befriend’n works hand-in-hand with Tend’n with the following services:
- Mothers and families are encircled in a framework of care
- Physical, emotional, intellectual, mental and socio-economical supports.
- Connection with social supports during and after a crisis
- Post-crisis individual and group support
- Education and trauma-focused training
This toggled, ‘win-win’ situation, serves and befriends affected families, as OOB engage grievers of all ages in a cycle of competent, trans-cultural care.
Amid these urgent, recurring social and mental health crises, OOB continues to Tend & Befriend, providing strategies through ongoing post care for the collateral damage of people’s tender psychological wounds.
Although these are tragic situations, families feel comforted and supported during and after these traumatic occurrences. OOB has distinguished itself in research and service-provision through Tend’n & Befriend’n, which has the capacity for communal, provincial and global adaptation.