Story Transcript:
Dr. Lana Warren: I’m Dr. Lana Warren from Kennedy Krieger Institute. Today I’m joined by Emily Driscoll-Roe, a social worker with our Center for our Child and Family Traumatic Stress.
Emily Driscoll-Roe: Thank you for having me. I wanted to talk to you today about Ann Janet. She came to the center after witnessing her father have a massive heart attack. She developed anxiety and she started having nightmares of the event. In addition to seeing the trauma, she also has severe learning disabilities. She is a pretty shy girl. In class, teachers never realize her learning disabilities because she learned how to adapt. She wouldn’t raise her hand. She would just be very compliant and sweet and so her learning disabilities were missed by school.
Unfortunately, the kids picked up on something and would frequently call her “dummy” and bullied her. I see her sometimes in school and I remember when I first started doing that. She would love to see me and so she would see me in the hallway and she would get her lunch and we would talk while she ate lunch in a little office. This was the time when she was bullied pretty frequently and she was still struggling a lot in school academically, but a few months ago I was waiting for her in the hallway and I saw her coming down the hall with two other girls and she was giggling and laughing with them. She saw me and made eye contact with me and she gave me this look that was like “Oh! We have to meet today?” like she really didn’t want to do it. I loved it because it showed me that she has her voice and she’s learning how to be social and she didn’t feel like she needed to hide anymore. She was going to be okay.
Dr. Lana Warren: Inspiring moments is produced for WYPR by Kennedy Krieger Institute. I am Dr. Lana Warren.
