How to Help Kids Deal with Their Feelings After Trauma Like Hurricane Milton
What You Will Learn:

What is Trauma
Understanding Emotions: Learning About Feelings
What is The Feeling Wheel
Steps to Use the Feeling Wheel
Why The Feeling Wheel Matters
Coping Strategies for Parents    
How to Help Kids Deal with Their Feelings After Trauma 

What is Trauma
Trauma is when something happens that makes us feel upset, scared, or shocked and can stay with us for a long time. It can be a big event, like a hurricane, or a minor one, like your child’s favourite toy breaking. Trauma can also feel like grief because both involve loss. However, trauma also brings intense feelings of fear or helplessness, not just sadness. Whether it’s a loss or a scary experience, both trauma and grief can affect how you feel and act.
Understanding Emotions: Learning About Feelings: 
Learning about feelings is essential for emotional intelligence and helps you cope with trauma. Many people use simple words to describe their emotions, like "happy," "sad," or "mad." However, these general terms don’t capture the full range of our feelings. This is where tools like the feeling wheel can be beneficial. 
An emotion is a quick reaction your body has to something that happens, like feeling scared when you hear a loud noise and causes a physical response such as a racing heart or sweaty palms. An emotion happens before you think about it. 
A feeling happens after you start thinking about that emotion, like feeling nervous or worried after the fear fades. Emotions are instant and physical, while feelings are more about how you understand and think about what you feel.
Last week, I had an experience that required me to dig deeper into my feelings. I initially thought I was hurt by something that had happened, but I knew that wasn’t what I felt. 
I used the feeling wheel to help me identify other feelings and discovered I was feeling disappointment and discouragement, not hurt. I looked up the definition of disappointment, which is when your hopes or expectations are unmet, leading to unhappiness or discouragement. It can also arise from someone or something not meeting your anticipated quality or satisfaction. That was what I felt: disappointment and discouragement. By using the feeling wheel, I gained clarity on my emotions, which brings me to the importance of this tool in helping you identify and understand your feelings more accurately.
What is The Feeling Wheel
The feeling wheel is a visual tool for identifying and categorizing emotions. Categorizing emotions means organizing them into different groups or types based on similarities and differences. Categorizing emotions helps you understand your feelings by breaking down complex emotions into more specific ones. 
For example, instead of just saying you feel...

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