CPI and other things..

[funinsun]

Hi all!

I have just recently joined the psychiatric nursing field and am very excited about it.. To be specific a children's psychiatric hospital. I have been orientating for the last few days and am admittedly overwhelmed by the experience. I am going to be with the younger children for a while now.. The facility uses "CPI" to train us and it is a good system I believe, it basically teaches you how to recongnize the levels of a person's anxiety and techniques on how to diffuse it before it reaches the crisis level. I have always wanted to do psych nursing and am excited about the concept, but I find that I am getting truly exhausted just orientating let alone working.. I feel intimidated more than anything, and I am dealing with children! Any advice on working with children/adolescents and how to keep your anxiety under control? I feel that if I make a mistake or if I accidentally ever got impatient with them (not physically or anything) that they would remember it and I would seem so horrible and ineffective to them forever..:uhoh21:

[adjowakim]

most importantly.... always be yourself. always treat them with respect no matter what names they call your or what they may throw at you. never ever act like you are on a power trip or they will never respect you. i earned a lot of respect from some of the most behaviorally challenged kids using just these rules, although it did take time. try to find the root cause of a behavior. kids do a lot of strange and aggressive things because they are scared and/or just testing your strength. try to always follow through with what you say. when you set limits, stick with them! dont wishywash, they will manipulate you. try to always remain neutral and calm in any situation. you know that you can do this well when outsiders say to you " i never know what youre thinking" "doesnt that bother you?" good luck! if you can stick with it, this is a very rewarding population to work with!

[elkpark]

I've always found (20 years in the field) that it's v. important that the staff be consistent/united in their approach to each child/adolescent client. Better to all be consistent in implementing a bad plan than to have different staff taking different approaches with the kids! If you have concerns about an individual kid's treatment plan or the milieu rules, discuss them in treatment team; don't just decide to do what you think is better. The kids are expert at splitting staff to begin with -- no reason to help them out with that! :)