THE CHALLENGE:

Many young Somalis, have experienced severe trauma and loss. Somalia’s nearly 30 years of violence has left youth with untreated PTSD and other mental health issues as well lack of social support due to the fracturing of families and communities by and on-going violence. As a result, Somali youth face multiple challenges, including:

• Untreated mental health symptoms that interfere with the development of healthy connections and achieving life goals
• Lack strong Community connection and social support that is necessary for healthy development
• Lack of necessary skills to set and work towards life goals
• Distrust of community and national leaders due to broken promises and inability to protect youth from violence

These effectsperpetuateunhealthful, dangerous life choices that contribute to ongoing violence and instability.The lack of skilled mental health workers and resources

WHAT WE’RE DOING ABOUT IT:

We provide psychosocial care to youth with a strong component of community awareness and engagement in order to support positive, healthy life patterns and a connection to community that aids in rehabilitation and provides an escape from a cycle of violence. We provide the following services:

1. One-to-one individual psychosocial counseling and community engagement in the rehabilitation and reintegration of youth

• We build psycho-social frameworks of support for the individual and engage with community leaders to create structured activities that develop community support for youth, understanding and mutual trust.
• We employ one-on-one professional and peer-supported counseling in daily and weekly sessions that enables traumatized young people to identify and avoid situations that perpetuateviolence and failure.
• We educate and integrate the community into the effort through activities that sensitive community members to the needs of war-affected youth and eliminate fear and distrust.

2. Psychosocial Capacity Building

• We build the capacity of institutions and organizations to deliver appropriate psychosocial care;
• We develop context-sensitive psychosocial curricula, assessments and intervention tools;
• We build the capacity, knowledge and skills of localmental health workers so they can function independently.

3. Training for non-governmental organizations

• For NGO’s Iftiin Foundation offers training for mental health staff and on-going professional development.

Iftiin also provides curriculum and assessment tools for agencies seeking to implement cognitive behavior therapy interventions for war-affected youth. Our psychosocial interventions are developed and led by Saida Abdi, a leading Somali-American mental health expert. The proven Narrative Cognitive Behavior Therapy (NCBT) curriculum for war-affected Somali youth developed by Saida Abdi can be downloaded here. Please contact us for more information on binging staff training and the entire package of NCBT tools and resources to your organization.