What to Ask and Not Ask Students When Returning from Summer, Fall, Winter, or Spring Break

                               

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    Avoid asking students, "What did you do during the holiday break?" Not everyone has positive break experiences. Some people may have experienced trauma recently or during past years. So, summer or the holidays might be a trigger also known as trauma activation for them. Holiday or seasonal traumas can be any trauma. To elaborate, some holiday or seasonal traumas include but are not limited to:

• Spending it with abusive family members or partners
• Spending it alone
• Death of a loved one
• Missing people at their tables for the first time that year due to death, estrangement, divorce, separation, missing person cases, or child custody battles
• House fires
• Homelessness
• Illness
• Car accidents

    So, special occasions may cause them to live in fear that something bad will happen again or bring back negative memories. School, work, and/or elsewhere may be their safe place(s) instead of home.

What to Do Instead

    Conversations about what people did during break can be great for socializing and should absolutely be encouraged instead of forced or required. Some people may benefit from venting about their negative experiences to get it off their chests. Other people who experienced similar difficult events recently or in previous years may also benefit from listening to people who are willing to share. This can help to know that they are not alone. However, it is important to avoid forcing or requiring these conversations to avoid trauma activation for people who may not be in the headspace to discuss their negative experiences.

Alternative Questions

   Ask neutrally inclusive questions and provide choices of discussion topics about break experiences. All of these questions are Trauma-Informed Care and Education and Culturally Responsive Teaching (CRT) practices.

1. Instead of requiring people to discuss their break experiences, say, "Who would like to share their break experiences?"

    "Passes" and one-on-one conversations can be encouraged as well if people do not feel comfortable sharing their experiences in groups or at all.

2. Instead of saying, "What did you do during break?", say, "What would you like to share about your break?"

    This alternative question gives both participants who want to share their positive and difficult experiences the opportunities to do so and decide what and what not to share. These moments are especially appreciated by young children who are still in the early stages of building self-advocacy skills.

3. Instead of saying, "What food did you eat on (Insert Name of Holiday)?", "What is your favorite (Insert Name of Holiday/Season) food?", or "What gifts did you receive?", say, "What is one positive thing that you saw or did during break?" or "What is one thing that you are grateful for this season?"

    Not all families celebrate the same holidays nor eat the same foods for cultural purposes. Food can be a triggering discussion topic for people who suffer from hunger, abuse, or neglect, have eating disorders (ED), or use feeding tubes. They may have eaten very little food or no food at all. People with food sensory sensitivities as part of autism or eating restrictions as part of Polyendocrine Metabolic Ovarian Syndrome (PMOS), chronic or terminal illnesses may also feel insecure talking about their food limits. Alternative foods they ate that may sound atypical during certain special occasions to certain judgmental people as well, which is important to act on for the purpose of bullying prevention. Asking about one positive thing that they did during break gives people who want to talk about food or alternative topics to do so.

    People who want to share their experiences about any gift receiving and giving should absolutely be given the opportunity to discuss these small moments since they are especially important to little minds; however, it is important to acknowledge that not everyone receives gifts for many different reasons besides cultural purposes. Some people may not have received gifts due to living in abusive/neglectful households with or without mental illness, being in toxic relationships, or they silently already escaped or are silently planning their escape from these situations with these unhealthy dynamics. Some parents even kick their children in the LGBTQ+ community out of their homes due to a lack of acceptance when they come out to their families. Some children's families may not have been able to afford gifts this year due to low socioeconomic status, needing to pay expensive medical bills, financial instability while single parenting, job loss, homelessness, escaping domestic violence, or losing everything in a house fire or robbery.

Supportive Follow-Up Questions and Statements

    Use supportive follow-up questions and statements after people have been encouraged to talk about break.

    Instead of saying, "It is time to move on" when someone opens up about traumatic experiences during break, say, "That sounds rough. I will do as much as possible to support you moving forward." Validate people's hardships and feelings while guiding them to move forward. It is important to say, "Move forward" instead of "Move on" because most trauma survivors usually do not move on. Instead, they can be encouraged to move forward by not letting what happened control their lives completely.

    Instead of saying, "What was the least positive part of break?", say, "I will do as much as possible to support you after break." Reassuring people that you will support them as much as possible and making that happen post-break is important instead of asking what you can do to help them and about their least good parts of break. This approach shows support for people who may have experienced trauma during break or struggle with transitions. Long breaks can cause a mix of emotions and homesickness for people who struggle during the first week back to school or work. Being observant and attentive towards these people's needs can be very helpful. Give them an extra smile, welcome them upon their return, and check in with them throughout the day. Provide them with extra tasks to do as positive distractions, such as handing out or collecting important stuff for people and taking small "baby" steps (not the same as babying them).

    Instead of saying, "What was the best thing that you did during break?", say, "What is one post-break goal that you have for yourself?" Returning back to school, work, etc. may the best thing for some people if these environments are their safe space(s). Goal setting is a great life skill to teach people of all ages to promote self-growth. Promoting goal setting post-break provides people with the opportunity to have a fresh start.

I was in an emotionally and psychologically abusive relationship for one year and a half. A narcissistic third party ended our relationship abruptly at the beginning of summer 2023. I am still healing and permanently estranged from both people. I was traumatized and took 5 months to accept the fact that he betrayed me and was indeed toxic due to his own upbringing. My parents say that I "dodged a bullet" meaning that the toxic relationship ended with good timing. I grieved as if someone had died because the relationship died. I also had survivor's guilt about the ableism that I witnessed him experience in his home life as well. I spent the majority of my summer fixated and emotionally exhausted about what happened. This trauma messed up my mental and physical health for a prolonged period, especially my circadian rhythm when I tried to sleep at night. I also felt too embarrassed to tell anyone outside of my immediate family about my trauma. When I returned back to school for the first day of my senior year of college in fall 2023, what I did over the summer was the last thing that I wanted to talk about. So, I dreaded being asked this question. I also knew that I did not owe anyone an explanation. I was required to attend an orientation for my Field Experience in Special Education internship on my first day of school. Coincidentally, my professors who were leading the orientation instructed my classmates and I to answer one of the following two questions displayed on the board: "What is one thing that you did this summer?" or "What is one thing that you are looking forward to this school year?" This moment was exactly what I needed. Everyone else except me answered "What is one thing that you did this summer?" The already not-so-nice people in my graduating class glared at me for my nonconforming decision alongside validation from my professors. I cried about this shortly after orientation because I was already on edge; however, crying it out once I found a safe space to do so helped rather than bottling up my emotions. I reminded myself that I did what was best for myself and followed the directions. I often remind myself and my students that trauma alongside healing is a personal experience. Trauma and healing look different for every person who experiences it. Not everyone feels comfortable or safe to open up about their trauma and healing journeys. Healing is like surgery because it takes time and does not happen immediately. While all trauma survivors are capable of making progress in their healing journeys and moving forward, we never fully heal. What happened will always stay with us because we will never be able to unsee what we went through and did not deserve. Trauma survivors do not survive once. We reexperience and survive again every time we struggle with flashbacks, triggers, and other mental and physical trauma responses and can even become retraumatized. Every flashback, trigger, and trauma response is like reliving our trauma all over again. Survival mode is an ongoing battle that never escapes our brains, minds, and bodies. My favorite affirmation is, "Everyone is going through something that no one knows anything about. So, always be kind."

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