(Nasalifya sits on an arm chair facing the camera)
- Hi, my name is Nasalifya Namwinga. I am a clinical psychologist and PhD student.
(A title card appears on screen, over the top of the shot of Nasalifya speaking. It reads: Ask an expert: Supporting teens to cope with distressing world events)
- Your young person may be having a really difficult time to cope, and that's normal, but you might also be having a really difficult time coping because you're both having a normal response to an abnormal situation. So it's important to keep in mind to be kind to yourself and do the things that you need to make sure you're supported. 
(A text graphic appears at the bottom of the screen. It reads: How can I support my teen to cope with distressing events and bad world news?)
- As parents and carers, we model how young people are going to respond. So the first thing that we need to do is make sure that we put our oxygen mask on and then help the person next to us. So what do we do? We model three different things. We firstly model that our emotions are okay and are valid the way you're feeling is normal. 
(Text appears on the side of the screen that reads: 1. Validate your own emotions)
The second thing that you need to do is make sure that you model seeking the supports that you need to be okay. 
(Text appears on the side of the screen that reads: 2. Show it's okay to seek support)
And then the third step can be then sitting with the young person to sit with their emotions and help them get the supports that they might need. 
(Text appears on the side of the screen that reads: 3. Create a safe space for your teen to share their emotions)
- I think as a parent, the scary reality is that we cannot protect young people from everything. 
(A text graphic appears at the bottom of the screen. It reads: How do I protect my teen from seeing graphic content online?)
- And sometimes their engagement with what the content of the things that are going on in the world actually makes them better global citizens. The key thing is about being able to have conversations with them about what they're seeing and what they're experiencing and their emotional response to those pieces of content
(Text appears on the side of the screen with suggested questions for teens. It reads: 1. What are you seeing? 2. What are you experiencing? 3. How is it making you feel?)
- And be able to identify what is good content and helpful content and what isn't. The second thing is about creating a safe space so that they can share with us when they do see distressing content so that we can, as a family, as a unit, be able to process some of that content together. It is really important for young people to be able to tell us what they're seeing online. Some of the content that is available to us online now can be quite disturbing and graphic and can lead to us having a strong emotional response. 
(Text appears on the side of the screen that reads: Understand the 'why')
- The other part of it is being able to understand the why your young person is so interested in this topic and keeps consuming content around this topic. Their why might be really different. 
(Text appears on the side of the screen that reads: Connecting with peers. Feeling helpless.)
- It might be that this is how they're connecting with their peers, or it might be because of some feelings of guilt that they're holding around not being able to do much around this issue. My advice is twofold when it comes to that. 
(A text graphic appears at the bottom of the screen. It reads: How can I help my teen engage with this issue in a safe way?)
- The first is around setting up a plan as a family of how you educate yourself about the issue so that you can bring the young person in as a family expert on the issue so that they can share their knowledge about this issue within the family. 
(Text appears on the side of the screen that reads: 1. Position your teen as a 'family expert' on this issue)
- And then the second is around making a plan for advocacy, if that's what you choose to do as a family. 
(Text appears on the side of the screen that reads: 2. Make a family advocacy plan)
- That might look like reaching out to local support groups, local advocacy groups, looking online and seeing what people are asking to do, what petitions. 
(Text appears on the side of the screen that reads: Connect with local advocacy groups. Search online for ways to support the cause.)
- So then that means that the young person doesn't feel like they're carrying the weight of this issue by themselves within the family.
(A text graphic appears at the bottom of the screen. It reads: What can I do if my teen and I aren't seeing eye to eye on this issue?)
- Because of generational differences, because of age difference, we will have different responses to young people, but both responses are valid. So firstly, we need to validate our own response because as a parent, if you're seeing content about children, your response to that might be very personal from a parent's perspective. But it's actually important to come together and discuss what those responses are, because they're not competing responses; they're actually complementary. You're sharing from your perspective and from your lived experience and they're sharing from theirs. And that can be a beautiful place to actually find a common ground.
(A graphic end card appears on screen. It has a dark purple background and light purple text that reads WHEN LIFE DOESN'T GO AS PLANNED. The ReachOut logo appears under the text. It reads REACHOUT and the O in OUT has three small dots, like a speech bubble that appears when someone is writing a text. White text appears below the logo that reads REACHOUT.COM.)
- END -