Introduction to Dr. April Natural
The week of 9th to 13th December 2021 was a busy and significant one for the Lifeline Ukraine team. We invited one of the world's leading experts in suicide prevention through call centre operations, Dr. April Natural, to Kyiv to help us enhance our skills as we continue to learn from the best international practices.
Dr. Naturale has more than 30 years of experience in this field, and the time she spent helped the team further develop their ability to identify and address suicidal tendencies and much more. The "much more" part was about ensuring we included a self-care module in our training programme.
Yes, Lifeline Ukraine is here to provide care and comfort to callers. But to be able to do so, we must also have self-confidence.
Training for the team
This training was extremely vital and took place as we marked two months since we commenced our operations. As one of the consultants on the team told me before the start of the training: "Now we know which questions to ask " and "we have experience of the different situations we can seek help with", and we were often impressed by how Dr. Naturale was able to quickly and calmly provide comprehensive answers to some of the questions we posed to her.
Without a doubt, Lifeline Ukraine is in a better position to help those who are calling us now, and April is now part of the history of this organisation; her lessons will remain with us for many years and will literally help us save many more lives as we continue our mission. At the same time, we are personally better prepared to deal with the stresses and challenges associated with our work.
