Teens - Witnessing Domestic Violence

FEELINGS

Feelings are very important.  They can help us understand what is happening inside of us, and what we might want to do about it.

Some feelings are comfortable and nice.  We might feel excited, happy, proud, lovable, or hopeful.  Some feelings are uncomfortable or painful.  We can also feel angry, sad, disappointed or ashamed.  All people have feelings:  Men and women, boys and girls.

Here are some examples:

          -Steve called his friend a name because he was angry at him.

          -Because she was disappointed about not getting to stay overnight with a friend, Mary picked a fight with her little brother and pushed him down.

          -Nat was jealous of Mark’s new bike, so he threw a rock and damaged it.

          -Karen was lonely when her best friend Kim spent time with another girl.  She called her up, yelled at her, and told her she was a lousy friend.

We can’t let ourselves hurt other people when we have an uncomfortable feeling.  You certainly wouldn’t want to get hurt just because someone was mad at you or upset about something.

We have to make healthy choices about how to express our feelings and choices that we don’t hurt others.

It’s important to listen to our feelings and think about what they are telling us.  It’s also important to stop and decide how to act.  This may sound hard to do, but it gets easier the more you practice.  And each time you avoid hurting someone else, you’ll feel good about yourself.

Let’s think about choices we could make to express different feelings in healthy ways.  What could each of the children in the example do differently?