Take Care!

Just heard a PSA put out by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. In it, a man praises you, the hurricane relief worker, for your acts of bravery in the aftermath of the storm. However, the point of the radio spot is to give hurricane relief workers an outlet to release pent up emotions. An 800 numer is given and listeners are encouraged to call because, as the spot states, “sometimes the biggest act of bravery is taking care of yourself.” Wow.

This is something I really haven’t thought of. Maybe it’s because I am not a hurricane relief worker. Okay, that IS probably it. What kind of emotional distress does a hurricane relief worker go through when finding rotting corpses in a home? How does he/she manage those feelings? Well, obviously the Dept. of Health and Human Services sees a need for these services. In the immediate aftermath of Katrina, the world was rallying to help. Now that that explosion of support has gone by the wayside, how do workers continue to do the work that still needs to be done? I don’t know. But, now, at least there’s a resource for them.

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