In his work children and warpsychotherapist Hélène Romano, a specialist in the management of post-traumatic injuries in children, examines the psychological consequences of conflicts on the youngest, both for those who suffer disasters on the ground and for those who observe them through the small screen.
“When the child is faced with war, his whole world collapses. He is exposed to unintelligible situations and total dehumanization. It is with these words that the French author approaches with sensitivity a delicate and complex subject which depicts, on the one hand, innocent victims facing death and human brutality and, on the other, the macabre adult power games.
The conflicts ravaging the world do not discriminate. Hélène Romano recalls that, if from now on the child is recognized by the world of adults as a real person – a recent concept first developed in 1923 by the Hungarian psychiatrist Sándor Ferenczi -, this obviousness has not always gone without saying. scale of humanity. For a long time, children were seen more as objects that could be abused or exploited.
Even today, the existence and security of millions of them are daily threatened by wars, despite international treaties (Geneva Conventions, Declaration of the Rights of the Child, etc.) that are supposed to protect them. . Whether the conflicts take place in the heart of Europe or in the Middle East, in Asia or elsewhere, the author of When life hurts children (2018) draws attention to the extreme vulnerability of toddlers. According to data provided by international organizations such as the UN and UNICEF, more than two million children have been killed in wars or armed conflicts over the past ten years. Add to these staggering figures five million exiled children and eight million children disabled for life.
Since the war in Ukraine, the psychotherapist denounces a certain trivialization of the repercussions of armed conflicts on “little men in the making”, whom some think (or hope) are immune to barbarism, because they are too young. A serious error, notes the author, who mentions that the consequences of wars on their psychic growth are very real and above all well documented. “At the time when the neurocognitive, psychoaffective, relational and psychosocial development unfolds, when the learning of new knowledge is built, the traumatic event fractures the life line of the child”, she writes with accuracy.
The chapters address both post-traumatic disorders and the phenomenon of exile, but also the case of child soldiers or those radicalized. The author also talks about the repercussions of war on children in countries at peace. The pages on the child faced with images of war highlight the results of the latest studies on the youngest exposed to what Hélène Romano calls the “media wound”. The essay, made up of many children’s testimonies, opens up a multitude of windows and offers solutions aimed at both parents and professionals such as educators, doctors, teachers or child psychiatrists. As such, the author recommends accompanying the child in his traumatic experience and listening based on trust, a cathartic condition. sine qua non on the path to recovery.