Glen Korstrom
Northern News Services

NNSL (Jun 15/98) - There are two keys when helping children overcome a cycle of abuse -- listening closely and respecting feelings.

Marilyn Gruben is trying to promote that message during her stint as Tuktoyaktuk's new child-care advocate.

First she gets to know the kids, who can range in age up to 18 years. Then she pulls out a book complete with pictures of faces with emotions: happy, sad, mad and so on.

"The important thing is to get kids to talk about their feelings. To encourage them. To hug them. To cry with them," she says.

Gruben gives older kids a journal as a therapeutic tool to keep track of feelings.

Part of her job is talking with mothers, too. "I let them know how the kids are feeling and that (the kids) really don't want to hurt anymore."

Gruben opposes corporal punishment. If punishment is necessary because reasoning isn't working, she encourages parents to deny television privileges or other activities children enjoy.

But most of all, she encourages affection and love.

Gruben is not alone in her approach. Norman Wells counsellor Dennis Farley uses play therapy to encourage interaction with his young clients.

Farley uses toys such as dolls or fire trucks to let children tell stories. He then questions the child about feelings of the props and the child projects inner feelings on the inanimate objects.

"When you see Mum beaten regularly by Dad, whom you love, as a kid, and you have to hide in the closet or under the bed because you're frightened -- it's hard to respect Mum after that," says Trish Hughes-Wieczorek, who co-ordinates Iqaluit's Baffin Region Aqvvik Society, which runs the Qimaavik women's shelter.

"Often kids are angry at the mother for being a victim."

Because a longer stay in an abusive home could lead to a deeper lifelong emotional scar, the woman must first "figure out how to find a way to protect herself and her family," Hughes-Wieczorek says.