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Coping Strategies

The following are some suggestions for dealing with the psychological and emotional impact of these terrorist events:

• Try to understand at least the principal details about what happened and evaluate the chances that it could happen again.
• Gather facts before reacting.
• Try to maintain a normal routine. Unless public safety officials have issued warnings or closed buildings, continue in your normal daily activities. Remember that the goal of terrorism is to make you fearful. Rather than being intimidated, follow the advice of professional public safety officials.
• Follow your usual routine of physical activity and exercise. Eat well and try to get rest, even if your sleep is not as restful as usual.
• Avoid self-medication such as alcohol, caffeine, or other drugs.
• Draw on known sources of comfort that have sustained you and helped you in difficult times in the past.
• Share your concerns and worries by talking with a friend, family member, or clergy. Reach out to each other while taking care of yourself.
• If you wish to participate in community recovery activities, volunteer or donate to a known disaster response agency with a clear mission. Spontaneous, unorganized volunteers at a disaster site only add to the confusion.
  • Spend more time with them and be comfortable with their temporarily slipping back into behaviors from an earlier age.
  • Talk with them about what has happened and do your best to answer their questions. No one can totally answer the question of “why” this has happened or why people do “bad” things. Help them to be aware of the positive response of people to the disaster-of the people all over the world who are responding to the crisis in a helpful way.
  • Your children may be fearful about the safety of buildings or airplanes. Remind them that what happened is a very rare event, and not something that happens every day. Security at buildings and airports is higher than ever. Do everything possible to reasonably reassure your children about safety.
  • Reassure your children that you care about them, that you understand their feelings and concerns, and that you are there for them. Physical affection is comforting, especially to young children.
  • Try to limit the amount of television coverage both you and your children watch, especially children under the age of four. We know clearly from past disasters that media images can traumatize people, especially children. Encourage them to talk with you about their thoughts and feelings about what they have seen. Consider having them draw pictures, or for older children, write in their journal about some of their feelings.
  • Try to keep a regular schedule of activities such as eating, playing, studying, and going to bed to help restore a sense of security and normalcy. Emotions and problems with concentrating may interfere with studying for awhile.
  • Talk to your children’s teachers, day-care providers, and babysitters about your child’s response to the event and about what they doing to assist children.
  • While children may be angry about what happened, caution them not to speak or act with prejudice against people of ethnic or religious groups that they think may have been involved. Justice for the people who made the attack must be done with dignity and within the structure of the law.
  • Teenagers may want to volunteer or donate to community recovery activities and should be encouraged to do so.
  • If you find that your reactions to the terrorist events of September 11 are disrupting your daily functions, such as job performance or relationships, it may be helpful to attend a community support group or debriefing group, or to talk with a mental health professional. For children, prolonged or extreme withdrawal, emotional outbursts, serious problems at school, or other signs of intense anxiety or emotion are signs that it may be helpful to talk to a mental health professional. Contact your local mental health agency for assistance.