I just received confirmation that I will be speaking at the WVCA (West Virginia Counseling Association) conference in Daniels, WV, Nov 10-11, 2016. I am excited because I will get a chance to speak in two separate sessions, based on each of my books. The first session will be on “Long lasting psychological impact of bullying” which is based on my book titled “A life interrupted – the story of my battle with bullying and obsessive compulsive disorder”. The topic for the second session will be “Prevention of child sexual abuse – the role of a counselor” which will be based on my second book titled “Father Figure – my mission to prevent child sexual abuse”.
In the first session I will try to emphasize the fact that prolonged bullying can lead to devastating mental disorders that can ruin the victim’s life for many years beyond high school. I do this by describing my life story that focuses on how bullying can trigger a mental health disorder and how it can manifest itself within the disease. Counselors find it interesting and revealing to note the longer term impacts of an unsafe school environment.
In my second session I will try to emphasize the challenges we face in our society when it comes to our efforts in trying to prevent child sexual abuse. I focus on the issues I have described in the true account story in my book, but in addition I also focus on the role counselors can play in detecting a possibly abusive scenario and intervening accordingly.