Save the Date for our 2021 Conference!

Our annual Vancouver Neufeld Conference is moving to a 100% ONLINE event in 2021! We're delighted to expand our local gathering of parents, educators and helping professionals to our global community for three days of keynotes, breakout sessions, dialogues and panels brought to you by over twenty presenters. Mark your calendar: April 15-18, 2021. Registration will open in the New Year.

NEW EDITORIAL

ADOLESCENT ANGST

THEN AND NOW

BY TAMARA STRIJACK

I sit here listening to the lyrics of a song my daughter wrote when she was 15, and it brings me right back:

I’m floating away, seems my mind just won’t stay in my brain.

It’s all just a haze and the ghosts overtake me, no escape … no escape.

I’m going in circles … what happened to “everything’s okay?”

I’m stumbling through it all,

I’ll get there some day.

Circles … stumbling … no escape.

I think back to my own writing and the angst that filled the pages of my journal at that age. Here are some re-discovered excerpts, just to give you a little window:

Help!!

I am being overtaken,

my mind is being invaded …

It has gone far beyond not understanding,

I am in the depths of despair …

Looking for a clearing,

an escape,

a fire exit,

a bathtub plug.

Anything to drain the undesired pandemonium

from my consciousness …

What is it about the uncomfortable space between? No longer a child, and yet yearning for the innocence and simplicity of childhood. Not yet an adult, and yet glimpsing the seeming freedoms of adulthood that are just out of reach. Not there yet. And not able to hold on.

...TO READ THE REST OF TAMARA'S EDITORIAL (and to see her poem captured as it was originally written, dramatic flair and all) CLICK HERE →

Tamara will be speaking on the topic of adolescence and emotional health in our upcoming Saturday Seminar on November 21st (see below).

LIVESTREAM EVENT

PRESERVING EMOTIONAL HEALTH IN ADOLESCENCE

PRESENTED BY TAMARA STRIJACK

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 2020

9 AM TO 4 PM PACIFIC | $90 PER PERSON

Adolescence is a unique time - no longer a child, but not yet an adult. And navigating this time seems to be more difficult these days - with the impact of social media, bullying, depression, higher rates of suicide, and increasing diagnoses of disorders. Making sense of what is going on during this time can shed light on what is needed to restore emotional health. How do we make room for all that is stirred within them on this journey from childhood to adulthood and compensate for stuckness, especially when we can often feel stuck ourselves in dealing with them? How do we make it safe to process their inner world and the often wounding world they find themselves in?

In this seminar, we will explore the developmental changes, the emotional drives and the body’s natural defense system that is designed to protect from too much wounding, as well as the natural ways through to emotional health. And most importantly, we will look at our vital role as caring adults in our adolescents’ lives - whether coming as an educator, counsellor, parent or mentor.

Recordings are accessible for 30 days for all registrants.

Registration closes on Thursday, November 19th @ 4:00 pm Pacific.