Open House
My initial learnings from housing Ukrainian refugees and how we all need to give each other space after a difficult journey. Whether it is the universally experienced past few years of a pandemic, your own personal struggles, or fleeing imminent danger; if you look to your left and to your right you will see someone who may be clinging on to their last bit of hope.
When I chose to house refugees the arrival from that point was almost immediate. Yet there were no supporting materials and given the hastiness of the planning, I had just enough time to prepare a warm meal and a clean room. Through auxiliary studies in psychology on coping, trauma, and with a Certificate in Psychological First Aid, I have the necessary background knowledge to assist in times of crisis. I am aware of behaviors which can be indicative of mental shock and the affiliated survival tactics. However this incident is unlike any scenario outlined in those texts. As with people coming out of a long period of coping in the pandemic or a long journey from a war zone and finding themselves in a place of openness; you cannot flip a switch and be at full capacity again. And I naively planned for guests. I expected tired guests, I thought to handle them like delicate guests, like an elderly relative who could settle in, rest up, move past jet lag, and participate in the present needs after a day or so; but that was wildly inaccurate.
Perhaps this all seems obvious. I am writing this to bring awareness to the fact that many of us working through these issues at the moment are doing it without guidance or oversight. There have been no brochures provided on best practices, though I’m sure there is enough brain power out there to put this together. And without it we have people working with the shared goal of pushing beyond survival with the only tools being their own past experiences. This is where the language barrier is the most unanticipated challenge. Not because of the lack of ability to communicate in a smooth fashion, but because of the clear drive to connect and the accompanying inability to do so. This is where I am struggling the most. My nurturing side feels like a failure if everyone is not at ease. We’re essentially strangers, so there is an element of politeness and protection even as we share routines from waking to dinner. There is a formal undertone that feels out of place when aiming for a comfortable environment, but of course we are not robots. How can humans being humane be so complicated?
I’m reminded of a quote that I heard recently, to paraphrase it says “when someone catches up to you, do not keep going, give them a chance to rest”. So that is what we have been doing. And it’s slow. And we are still tiptoeing. The necessities are not the physical practicalities and this has challenged the facilitator part of my brain wanting to find the proper organizations and information and put a process in place. It has taken our guests a few days to move their personal items into their room. This was the most difficult for me to stand aside for as it was a clear indication of an insecurity in the situation. The normal processing time does not apply here.
This is not a time for project managers and timelines. Information and patience have proven to be the best resources as we move through the day and hope for something beyond survival. It’s not a situation that I’d like to see repeated for anyone. It still feels surreal. For these reasons I won’t make some overarching sweeping statement on a grand learning that can be broadly tacked on to the casual day to day of life or the office or your relationship. This is not that. This is the evidence that you can study humanity, but still not understand how to help it.
