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"Between control and freedom" - a Psychological Assessment of Participants in the Diabetes Camp for the D-PATH project, Przemyśl, August 2022




I. CHILDREN GROUP :

 

1. Children aged 7 to 11 participated in the workshops. Participants were motivated to tasks, willing to take action, creatively and constructively cooperated. The duration of the workshops and the proposed topics and exercises turned out to be adequate to their ability to perceive and maintain attention.

2. What do children associate diabetes with: needles, pain, measuring sugar, candy, something bad itself, supervision, knowledge, diet.

3. The children performed activities related to measuring or regulating sugar in a natural and trouble-free way.

4. For children's participants, diabetes is a burdensome, but relatively "obvious or normal" element of life.

5. A problematic phenomenon that accompanies some children is the overprotective attitude of parents/guardians.

6. The attitude of children towards the disease depends to a large extent on the attitude of their parents. What to do when working with children: Empower and teach: • responsibility for your health • self-care principles 12 • providing knowledge about illness and health in an age-appropriate manner • task-oriented and not emotional attitude • putting development goals in the center, with the disease as an aspect of life and not its meaning.


II. YOUTH GROUP :


1. People aged 12 to 17 took part in the workshops. Participants showed an attitude of openness, curiosity, adhered to norms and rules, showed initiative, cooperated at a good level, were open in self-presentation, reflective, treated each other with respect.

2. The participants were engaged in discussing the medical, theoretical aspects of diabetes. An important topic for them. Understanding the physiological mechanisms is part of restoring control over their lives.

3. Participants, as negative effects of diabetes, indicated: responsibility (as a burden), night waking up, overprotective parents, stress, pinched fingers (pain).

4. The youth group is a very important group worth taking care of. The tumultuous period of adolescence, causing many tensions, is reinforced by the difficulty and suffering resulting from the disease. Adolescents are aware of their health and the risks of diabetes, and at the same time they are not fully mature in terms of defence mechanisms that allow them to cope better. The developing sense of value, control and agency is significantly weakened by the state of anxiety, threat and frustration. Therefore, supportive, educational and therapeutic activities should be addressed with particular care to teenagers. It is worth paying attention to the following issues: self-esteem, weakening of stigmatization, increasing the sense of control and agency, modelling adequate responsibility, increasing the sense of belonging and security. At the same time, other aspects of young people's lives and resources resulting from their development, which can be a source of value, satisfaction and happiness, should be strengthened.


III. GROUP OF ADULTS

 

1. Adults have accepted their illness to varying degrees.

2. An important aspect of their participation in the project was the opportunity to feel part of a larger group (I am not alone, others understand me, I can talk openly about my illness, my fears, my suffering and limitations, I am normal).

3. Participants often talked about the feeling of loneliness, helplessness, relying only on themselves (a common motive in experiencing is not believing that other people can help us).

4. It was important for the participants to share their own experience and listen to others' accounts of coping with the disease.

5. A valuable element of the workshop was the opportunity for participants to express their emotions and the experience of direct contact with another person.

Conclusions

1. Organizing the D-CAMP is necessary and important, it meets many fundamental and important needs of the participants.

2. It is worth considering organizing classes for parents of children with diabetes.

3. The youth and children's group is susceptible to shaping a constructive attitude towards the disease - acceptance. This is the time when these children can be taught to deal with negative aspects, because the child's attitude is mainly modelled by the attitude of adults.

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