Author Archive

I am scheduled to present at the OAESA (Ohio Association of Elementary School Administrators) Professional Conference in Columbus, Ohio, on Thursday June 13, 2019. I will be speaking on the topic of “Impact of School Culture on Students’ Mental Health” which will be based on my first book.

I am excited about this presentation because I will be speaking to a group of school administrators such as principals and assistant principals who are typically responsible for establishing the culture in a school. In my book titled “A Life Interrupted – the story of my battle with bullying and obsessive compulsive disorder” I describe how a negative school culture contributed to a devastating mental illness that I had to deal with for many years.

When I was going through elementary and middle schools, most principals and vice principals did not do a lot to prevent bullying that I had to put up with. Many of them believed that children should be allowed to deal with this by themselves. In my view it is wrong to expect children to take care of this by themselves. School officials need to accept this responsibility to maintain a positive environment for all children.

There were also some principals and vice principals who believed that “boys will be boys” and things like bullying are ok. Then there were others who promised to do something about this, but did not do anything to back up their promises. I hope that I can deliver the message that none of these approaches are appropriate. All school administrators must take the responsibility seriously and work hard to maintain a positive bully-free environment.

It is important to remember that prevention of child sexual abuse is an ongoing effort until the children become adults and are able to take care of themselves. Adults around children, especially family members, caregivers and friends, have a key role.

Whenever I speak about prevention of child sexual abuse based on my second book, I try to emphasize on the following:

• We must always try to get involved and prevent possible sexual abuse, even if it seems personally difficult and inconvenient to do so (what every ordinary citizen can and should do to protect vulnerable children in the community)
• Always keep an eye open for troubling behavior by young children
• Risks unique to single mothers
• What kinds of things can contribute to child sexual abuse
• Background checks on individuals who might be in close contact with the children, and how to do background checks
• What different facilities are available to public for informational purposes
• Taking the difficult step of informing parents (and other biological relatives) of critical information at the risk of losing friendships
• What can a person do when he/she is not a close biological relative, but detects a situation where children are in possible danger
• How can one get other adults involved who might be able to help in these situations? Working in a team involving whoever might be able to help can be very useful
• What options do you have when you suspect that some sentencing guidelines are being violated
• What is the role of Child Protection Services and how can they help

I am excited about a presentation I am scheduled to make in Palo Alto, CA, about long-term psychological impact of bullying. I will be speaking on June 7 to a group of summer camp staff at the City of Palo Alto. It is encouraging to note that the city is focusing on this issue.

A lot of bullying is still going on around the country and a lot of victims are still suffering. And there are many individuals around who still believe that this is not a big issue. That is why it’s good to see some organizers are taking this matter seriously.

I do believe that there is a significant amount of effort being put in these days by many adults around the country to try to prevent bullying. This training organized by the city of Palo Alto is another excellent example. I am hoping that I will be able to deliver the message that bullying can have significant long-term psychological impact.

I also like the fact that the city of Palo Alto is putting this training together because they must believe that bullying could be an issue with kids coming in for the summer camps. They are recognizing that bullying does not happen just in schools, it can also happen in other situations like summer camps. They want to make sure that every child attending the camps should be allowed to enjoy the summer camp experience instead of wanting to leave the camp because of being bullied. I am impressed with this effort by the city of Palo Alto and hope that others will follow.

Bullying and harassment in the workplace can be quite harmful to the companies as well. That is why many Human Resources Departments across the country are making sure to establish appropriate processes and procedures to minimize incidents of maltreatment of employees.

These companies recognize the importance of developing and maintaining a professional environment that does not tolerate bullying and/or harassment. They also realize that appropriate training needs to be provided to supervisors and managers so they are able to perform their duties without relying on bullying or harassment of employees. If the company places a priority on this, then the HR Department can implement appropriate processes and procedures to make sure a professional bully-free environment is maintained.

There is also another reason why many companies direct their HR Departments to focus on this. That has to do with avoiding unnecessary lawsuits. If some employees are being bullied and harassed, and if some of them decide to maintain records as to how they had requested the company to do something about this and nothing had been done, then some of these employees might decide to bring a lawsuit. This can be financially damaging for the company.

But looking at this positively, why wouldn’t a company want all their employees to be happy at their workplace and enjoy a high level of job satisfaction. Happy employees typically perform better which in turn helps the companies achieve or exceed their goals.

Adults who take care of children must understand that prevention of child sexual abuse is an on-going activity – it does not end with taking care of one specific issue or another. One needs to have the mindset of keeping an eye open for red flags at all times.

It is not like inoculation or vaccination to prevent a medical illness – you take a shot and you are protected for a number of years. Unfortunately, prevention of child sexual abuse does not work that way. It is an on-going activity until the children are able to take care of themselves, which may not happen until they are adults.

Children come in contact with many adults during their developing years. One of the most important things a caregiver can do is to try and maintain a good communication pattern with the children. The more they talk, the greater is the possibility that they will talk about something that could be a red flag. And if a red flag is detected, then it is critical to follow through to make sure there are no risks to the children. Even if it seems to the caregiver that the children might be making things up, it is best to follow through and make sure. When it comes to prevention of child sexual abuse, we simply cannot leave any stones unturned.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder can be a devastating disease – based on my personal experience, it can take many years to recover. But it is important to remember that one can recover from this terrible disease and can take his or her life back, irrespective of whether it was triggered by bullying or by some other stressful events.

In my case, it was the sustained bullying during the school years that triggered OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) for me. For the first five years of my mental illness, my single greatest struggle and obstacle became simply telling someone what was going on. Before long, merely managing to function through an average day became the greatest challenge of all. At last, I was able to change my pessimistic perspective, willingly engage in cognitive behavioral therapy and begin to make significant progress with my illness. Eventually, I was able to derive a lasting positive impact after spending only 16 days in Rogers inpatient treatment facility – a positive impact that has lasted throughout the past several years of my life.

Today, I am thrilled to report that I have finally regained control over my once ever so incapacitating mental illness! Though my ordeal has now reached this much better point, there are millions of other people out there who continue to struggle hard with similar issues on a daily basis. I am here to tell those fellow sufferers that this does not have to be their long-term fate. Just as I took back control of my life, they too are capable of freeing themselves from the powerful clutches of this or similar mental health issues.

Some organizations promote workplace bullying by rewarding managers and supervisors who control their employees through continuous harassment. They incorrectly believe that those managers’ actions are working well in getting their employees to work harder. They don’t seem to care that many of their employees are seeking professional help to address mental health issues.

These organizations mistakenly believe that being tough (and somewhat abusive) to employees is the only way to manage the employees. They develop a culture where employees only have two options – either they put up with the harassment or just leave and go get a different job. And the management is okay with that culture – either you fit in or you go find another job. Sometimes it is not feasible for some employees to find another suitable job, and therefore, they decide to put up with the culture and in the process end up developing mental health issues.

One reason I wanted to write this book “How to stand up to workplace bullying and take on an unjust employer” is to let everyone know that fighting back is an option. There are things an employee can do to fight back against an oppressive company culture. If more employees decide to fight back, these organizations will eventually learn that all employees deserve a non-threatening non-abusive environment for the hard work they put in for the organization.

In order to be able to prevent child sexual abuse it is critically important that family members as well as our systems are able to develop and maintain a preventive mindset. This means that both family members and systems such as child protective services are able to focus on preventive measures that would minimize risks for children.

Here are a few examples of what a preventive mindset means for family members:

• Get to know the person well before allowing contact with the children
• Perform a thorough background check before allowing interactions with the children
• Supervise the interactions to make sure the children are not being exposed to inappropriate behavior
• Time is of the essence
• Keep in mind that service providers such as Child Protective Services are typically much more responsive if a concern is brought forward by a family member

In the true story I describe in my book “Father Figure – my mission to prevent child sexual abuse”, I felt that Child Protective Services did not react in a timely manner in a preventive situation likely because the concern was brought forward by me, a bystander family friend. I hope that CPS will try to make some changes so such concerns are acted upon with a greater sense of urgency.

Schools need to continue to focus on prevention of bullying, rather than just responding to incidents of bullying reported by the students or other bystanders. And to be able to prevent bullying, it is important to understand why bullies do the bullying, and then address those issues. Otherwise bullying will continue ruining lives of victims.

One of the most crucial things I wrote about in my book “A Life Interrupted – The Story of My Battle with Bullying and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder” is what I learned about why bullies mistreat other children. I had a very interesting encounter, in adult years, with the worst bully from my school years. I was pleasantly surprised that I was able to connect with him after so many years. This encounter told me a lot of about what all was going on in his life and I understood why he became a bully.

Basically he became a bully because of a lot of negative things were going on in his life that he had no control of. That prompted him to bully other kids and made him feel like he had some control. I honestly believe that if he had received appropriate support regarding the other negative things in his life, it is very likely that he would not have turned into a bully. This is why it is critical for school staff to keep a close eye on the bullies and work closely with their parents and provide the support they need so they won’t continue their mistreatment of other children.

Bullying and harassment in the workplace can have a significant impact on the victims in terms of emotional wellbeing. There are people who are having to seek treatment from licensed mental health professionals to be able to deal with their mental health issues cause by workplace bullying and harassment. This is something that needs to stop.

There are employees who are able to put up with the bullying and harassment and are able to not let it bother them significantly. They are able to ignore it and move on. They are able to stick it out during the work hours and then are able to enjoy the non-work hours without any issues. They are the lucky ones.

However, there are many other employees for whom it is not possible to ignore such irresponsible behavior at the workplace. It bothers them significantly and it eventually affects them during their non-work hours as well. When they go home, they are extremely stressed and are not able to enjoy any relaxing hours. They remain anxious for the next workday coming up within a few hours. This eventually can develop into significant mental health issues for them requiring professional help.

All of this can be avoided if the companies make sure that bullying and harassment at the workplace is simply not acceptable.