You may have noticed there’s something different in the chat window now.  Or you might’ve just noticed the message we put in the pre-chat survey, I suppose.  Either way, we wanted to let you know that we upgraded our chat server and that means a few changes from how things were before.  And we thought it’d be fair to tell you the differences:

Most things are the same.  We of course see your name, and can still read what you put in the pre-chat survey.  We still get an IP and it’s still just as useless to us without any outside help.

The whole “visitor typing”/”operator typing” thing is different.  Two big differences: First, and this is important, we can see what you type before you hit enter.  Obviously if you were planning on sending the message anyhow that makes no difference, and I know that might be freaky as hell to some of you, but that’s just the way it works unfortunately.  I kinda wish we could turn it off, but we can’t.  Secondly, there’s no longer a “operator typing” message at all.  I know, it sucks.  We’ll try to answer faster to make up for it, but the “upgrade” seems to not have any way of enabling it. =/

The chat window is ugly.  We know, we’ll probably jazz it up in the next couple of weeks.  We were in a rush.  Don’t judge us. =P

Edit: There’s a naggy “this demo powered by Sightmax” message.  We’re working on fixing that… It should be settled by tomorrow.  We weren’t just planning on using a demo the whole time… I promise we’re not THAT cheap.

That’s about it.  If you have any extra difficulties (especially ones you didn’t have before), please don’t hesitate to let us know.  You can email any comments, questions and rage to our email:

 Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.

- Sir Winston Churchill

(Click here for Part I)

So as promised, this time we’ll go over the other two bits of feedback that we hear more often than any other, along with some of how we heard it and decided to discuss it amongst ourselves, all in the goal of helping our volunteers to get better at what they do.

Feedback #3. Respond more quickly and ask more questions

Sometimes we do get swamped, and you may end up waiting 20, 30, 60 minutes for a chat… that definitely happens, and we try to get good coverage on the lines so that it happens as rarely as possible.  Once in a chat, though, we get that response time is important… In fact, it’s probably more important to be fast than to have the perfect answer.

What’s more, talking online is a strange animal and speed can help to counterbalance that.  All the verbal cues and body language are gone and sometimes it’s hard to know what people are thinking or how they’re feeling.  We often get hung up on not always been able to understand the chatters we talk to but truth be told it’s just as important for what we express.  Although it’s not always easy to do, we do think it’s important to answer quickly, in a way that conveys “No, I’m totally listening, you have every bit of my attention” without saying it (which would probably sound pretty lame).

So why is the questions thing together?  Because in the end I think it’s all about the same thing: attentiveness.  Respect and patience are super important, of course, but how much effort you’re putting into connecting with someone isn’t always easy to express over an online chat, so sometimes you have to be creative about how you put energy in.

Feedback #4. Be less robotic/repetitive/scripted

Okay okay, you got us.  There is kind of a script.  But I’m not sure it’s what you think.

When what we say sounds a little wooden, it’s not because we were told to only talk one way, or that there are give canned lines and they’re the only ones we’re allowed to use.  It’s because much like some of you are in the process of learning the best way to express yourselves and your feelings (particularly verbally), a lot of us are in the process of learning how to listen, how to really understand people, and how to make sure we’re really getting you.

So example.  In therapy, you might’ve learned in therapy to express yourself with a really plastic phrase like, “When you criticize the way I rake leaves, it makes me feel like you don’t like me as a person“.  It sounds a little silly, of course, and that’s not the way you’d want to talk every day to your friend/partner/parent/sibling, but when you’ve always had trouble telling them how you feel, sometimes you try the scripted stuff as a stepping stone, to learn by doing.  And eventually, then, you can learn to use the same principles, but have it actually sound like you. (“Shit, I get that you want me to rake properly but calling me an idiot is just pissing me off… is that really what you trying to do?“)

Likewise, we’re trying to learn how to listen, and it’ll come out all crooked and stiff sometimes because frankly it’s not always easy to do!  But we’re working on it, on trying to take ourselves less seriously and on trying to still be as sincere as possible… it takes some practice, but we’re working on it!

 
So thanks for your patience, all of you out there, and thanks for your feedback.  It’s listening to stuff like that that’ll help us get better and better (even if it takes time!) and we’ll do our best to keep paying attention.  Likewise, thanks to our volunteers… I know we’re throwing a big party for you, but we really do appreciate the time you put in.

If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.

- Tony Robbins

A couple of weeks from now, our centre is going to hold its annual Volunteer Appreciation Night and generally the tradition here on the blog is to just spend one entry thanking them and gushing about them.  I’ll get to that eventually, but for today I was thinking it might be interesting for folks to hear a little bit of what gets taught to try to make volunteers better… especially on YIBC’s chat, where things are the most important.  Part of what they learn is technical stuff, of course (“kick the computer right here if it starts to chug”) but a lot of it is talking about how to put yourself in the shoes of some of the thousands of voices we hear every year.  And that’s not easy, because everyone’s pretty different.

We’ve talked about the feedback we get before, and probably one of the most instructive things we’ve learned is that a huge chunk of the feedback falls into 4 categories, that in turn remind us of 4 huge things that we try to keep in mind when we talk to people.  This week we’ll go over the first two which kinda go together, and in the next entry we’ll go over the rest.

Feedback #1. Give actual advice

This is a big one, actually… a good chunk of our chatters want advice in some way, shape or form.  The question, then, often boils down to “what do you mean by advice?”  We took a shot at this in our “So how does this chat thing work anyhow” series, but let’s go a little further:

Problem-solving is hard.  No, really… I’m not just whining… It’s hard stuff.  Some problems are easy to solve for sure, but we don’t really get a lot of softballs, not surprisingly.  And a big thing that we try to do is make sure that if you’re going to make a decision based on our conversation, that it’s your decision, not one that we made for you.  Frankly, anyone who’s old enough to be talking to us is probably old enough to be deciding some things for themselves, and responsible enough to collect the benefits (or eat the consequences!) of those decisions.

That said, we get that you may not have been through this before… how the heck are you supposed to know what to do the first time you break up with someone you really care about?…  Or you get sexually harassed by your boss at your very first job? (“How would I know?! I’ve never been a teen mom before!“)  In situations like that, hopefully we can talk out what you’d like to see happen, what sort of people you do (and don’t) want to know about it, and maybe even go over all the different options, even the ones people sometimes think of as illegitimate (or illegal, or unhealthy, or whatever).

Feedback #2. Don’t rush to solutions

This was one of the more surprising ones.  For each “just give me some straight advice!” comments, we also got ones that said, “there are no solutions to my problem, lay off” or “I really just want to be listened to, not fixed“.  In fact, sometimes it feels like we may have well just been told, “stop giving me advice, damnit!”

The first half to this is being patient and listening.  I’d like to think we generally try to do that, but the honest truth is that the folks that answer the chat?… they generally just want to help.  And sometimes, when you want to help, you rush to fix things… but it usually pays to chill for a sec and listen really carefully first, so that you can understand where the other person is coming from.  Call them keeners if you want, but in the end, we try to remind ourselves that actually getting to talk, to tell your story, to be heard (*points up at the slogan*) is really, really important all on its own.

The other half to this is what we generally call acceptance, this general idea that we’ll do what we can to meet you where you are, acknowledge that the decision is YOURS and that sometimes situations can suck (even from our point of view!) without needing to be solved or fixed immediately.  The trick is not mistaking this for resignation, or thinking that the situation is hopeless or unsolvable… just remembering that we’re all human, that while we can sometimes get some really awesome stuff done in a half-hour chat, some things are bigger and we may have to settle with just taking a little chip at it, or just getting a better look at it.

Good?  Bad?  Right on target?  Off the mark?  Let us know in the comments below, and we’ll be back next time with #3 and #4!

Don’t have sex, because you will get pregnant and die! Don’t have sex in the missionary position, don’t have sex standing up, just don’t do it, OK, promise? OK, now everybody take some rubbers.

- Coach Carr (from Mean Girls)

Late last year, Time Magazine published an article talking about Holland, where the teen birth rates and HIV transmission rates were a tiny fraction of what they are in the U.S., and discussed whether there was something to learn from them and the way they talk (and teach) about sex.  While both countries talk about sex organs, STIs and pregnancy, dutch kids can also expect to be talking in class about relationships, prostitution, the significance of “your first time”, and the seriousness of sex in relation to consent. Meanwhile, on this side of the Atlantic, not many people are used to having such open conversations about sex, even between friends or with family.

And maybe it has to do with the fact that often when the subject of sex or drugs comes up over here, the “education” about it seems to be based around the things that you don’t want… or maybe even that you fear.  STIs… unwanted pregnancy… addiction… alcohol poisoning… All the parts of sex and drugs that you should be afraid of or avoid, rather than being able to talk honestly about what sex is, why people do it, how do they do it and with whom.  Those may sound like daring topics, but unless we want the conversations about sex to get stuck at “JUST SAY NO” like the conversations like drugs have, they’re topics we probably want to take on. (we actually wrote a whole other entry about this last February)

The reason I mention porn is because for a while there, the media was all over this idea that “zomg our kids are learning about sex through porn”, from blogs to newspapers, to probably the most controversial and widely debated TED Talk presentation ever.  At some point someone realized that sometimes kids get a hold of porn and that in the absence of proper education around sex, sexuality and sexual relationships, that they might get the sense that facials, group sex and bondage are actually the norm.  But I guess the first question is “So is that really the sense you got?”

Being a little nerdy, I like Venn Diagrams… So if you wrote one with two circles, one for “things that happen in porn” and another for “things that happen in real-life sex“, what would go in each circle?  What would go in the overlap?  And do you think everyone would agree with you?  But the important thing isn’t knowing which goes in each, but having the opportunity to discuss why you would or wouldn’t want things in your “real-life sex” circle (or your porn circle too, I suppose)… or talk about “what people think” versus what reality might actually be.

Now imagine if that were the kind of content that went into your sex ed class.  Could I convince you to go?

It’d certainly be simpler than googling “sex education about porn”… needless to say that turned up about fifty bazillion results I wasn’t allowed to see on the centre’s computers.  And hopefully this entry won’t get this site banned from your school computers.

TN bill will prevent teachers from using the word “gay” in class. In response, I’m lending them my name: “It’s okay to be Takei.”

- George Takei (@GeorgeTakei)

Hey NHL, how’s it going?

I just wanted to say that I’m kind of impressed with you lately.  I mean, I’ve always been a hockey fan, but I’m actually not talking about the on-ice stuff, but the really outspoken off-ice support and advocacy for things that I think are really important.

Last year, we wrote about Do It For Daron, an awareness campaign backed by the Ottawa Senators encouraging people to talk about teen suicide.  And yeah, we had some, er, constructive criticism, but we still thought it was great.

A couple of months ago, we talked about In One Voice and the Vancouver Canucks stepping up to have those tough conversations about mental health and suicide.

And it looks like you done it again… Flyers’ scout Patrick Burke and his co-founders put together You Can Play, an effort to have athletes, fans and organizations step up to create a healthy, welcoming atmosphere for LGBT players so that everyone can have a fair shot of playing, the way they should.  Concretely, they’re trying to challenge the way locker rooms and spectator stands have created a culture that is sometimes openly homophobic, or “casually” so, by using homophobic slurs without realizing that they may be hurtful, like “That’s so gay” when they mean “That’s stupid.” or “Don’t be a fag” instead of “don’t be an asshole.”

The ads have come up already during games (you can also see them YouTube here and here) with the clear message that “if you can play, you can play.”  I don’t necessarily expect gay NHL’ers to come flying out of the woodwork, but I just appreciate that it’s not only players that are committing themselves to positive messages like these, but the organizations as well… And that’s pretty cool.

Thanks for that.  Good luck in the playoffs.

YIBC

Let him know that you know best
Cause after all you do know best
Try to slip past his defense
Without granting innocence
Lay down a list of what is wrong
The things you’ve told him all along
And pray to God he hears you
And pray to God he hears you

- How to Save a Life, by The Fray

Okay, Glee, we need to talk.  I know we’ve already mentioned some of the things we liked about you a couple of years ago, and to your credit, you’re still one of the best places on TV to see characters and stories that both honor and speak to the struggles of being young and gay, without it being a token effort or embarrassing stereotypes… so much so that you’ve been honoured by the GLAAD Media Awards as Outstanding Comedy Series twice (so far!).  ‘Course, don’t get me started on how you handle race… But that’s not what this is about.

This week, the show took on suicide, probably one of our favorite topics (we can’t shut up about it), with a nice nod to cyberbullying and even a rare speck of gay-on-gay bullying.  Then, Mr. Schue did what you’d want a caring teacher/adult to do: he got the kids together so that they could talk about it… and after sharing his own struggle with suicide as a teenager with them, what he asked them wasn’t about how hard this was for them right now, or how they were worried about Karofski (or blaming themselves for things they had done to him), or whether they were thinking about suicide at all, but rather to name something they’re looking forwards to.

I get that this is supposed to be the clever contrast to two seasons ago, when they went around the same circle and told him what they were before Glee, and how much they’d changed over the year.  But just like with what we had to say about It Gets Better: It’s okay and even *important* to give people the space to talk honestly about suicide, instead of always wanting to talk about the positive and trying to push them to optimism.  If you can listen, care and take the time to help someone who’s suffering through that to feel a little less alone in the world, the optimism will come… even though we sometimes lose faith in it or are too afraid to be disappointed again, I think there’s always a part of us that wants it.  But listening comes first.

But thanks, Glee, for talking about suicide.  Thanks for showing an adult who actually wants to talk about it and giving him the heart to reach out to the kids he cares about.  Thanks, Daniel Radcliffe and The Trevor Project, for having the sense to make sure that if this hit a chord with people that they’d immediately know who they could talk to.

And if anyone out there couldn’t think of something they’re looking forward to, know that it’s still okay to talk, there are still people that still want to hear what you’re feeling:

• CHAT NOW with us by clicking the giant green button up top, we’re open noon to 1am every day.
• In Canada, click here for your closest crisis centre
• In the US, call 1-800-273-TALK to get connected to the closest one in your area
• For support for LGBTQ youth struggling with suicide, The Trevor Project runs both a 24/7 chat and hotline.
• Elsewhere in the world, check our After Hours page or Befrienders for a local service.

Whitney Houston passed away last week, a musical icon known recently just as much for the drama around her than her stunning voice but make no mistake… before Adele, before Beyonce, before Celine, before Mariah (but still after Diana Ross!), there was Whitney.  And Whitney was no stranger to self-confidence, so we figured we’d talk about that… and the song that leaves no doubt as to what she thought of herself: The Greatest Love of All.

I believe the children are our future
Teach them well and let them lead the way
Show them all the beauty they possess inside
Give them a sense of pride to make it easier
Let the children’s laughter remind us how we used to be

Everybody’s searching for a hero
People need someone to look up to
I never found anyone who fulfilled my needs
A lonely place to be
So I learned to depend on me

We’ve certainly taken on the subject of self-image before, as well as role models, and here we dig into the tough part: We’ve all had moments where it’s been harder to believe in ourselves, and in those moments, I’d imagine many of us turned to other people for strength, for support, for inspiration.  It’s hard to reach inwards for that strength in that moment when it’s actually your inner strength that’s faltering.

I decided long ago, never to walk in anyone’s shadows
If I fail, if I succeed
At least I’ll live as I believe
No matter what they take from me
They can’t take away my dignity

Months ago, I sat at the table with a psychiatrist from out east, who told me of a recent study where they asked teenagers who they would turn to when they needed help.  Most people would guess “friends”, right?  He said the most popular answer was “no one.”

We wait for it to go away on its own… or we figure it’s not worth it… or we just write off that anything can be done.  And while it may have worked for her, the reality is that without that great pillar of self-esteem to lean on, you just get left out to dry, feeling completely alone.

Because the greatest love of all
Is happening to me
I found the greatest love of all
Inside of me
The greatest love of all
Is easy to achieve
Learning to love yourself
It is the greatest love of all

“Easy to achieve”?  Ha, maybe when you’re crazy talented, but even then… no matter how big you are, someone out there is probably going to hate on you, heck probably because you’re big!  And it’s hard to feel good about yourself when someone’s hating on your parade.  I guess then you have to remember the things you like about yourself.

So to that end, homework time:

Take a small card, say like an index card, and write 3 positive statements that are true about yourself, or that you want to aim for, like “I really like my hair, even when it’s not behaving” or “My goal is to be a songwriter and get signed” or “I don’t have to freak out over what she says”.  If you’re not sure it’s positive, ask someone whose opinion you trust.  If you like what you wrote, try keeping it with you in your pocket/purse, or stick it to your mirror.  Maybe try to add to it every week or month, if you can.  (just one idea shamelessly stolen from the Real Me Experience)

We may not love ourself as much as your song says, Whitney, but give us time… We’re learning.

RAINN, the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, is an American national anti-sexual assault organization, that operates a variety of National Sexual Assault Hotlines, on the phone and by online chat.

RAINN’s services include:

• National Sexual Assault Hotline – 1-800-656-HOPE (in USA) – A national network of member centres providing free, confidential advice, 24/7.
• National Sexual Assault Online Hotline – online.rainn.org – A live, anonymous & confidential online hotline, answered by trained volunteers. (learn more)
• Information on sexual assault, and what can be done about it
• A directory of national and international resources – A listing of rape crisis centres for the whole world, as well as crisis centres and crisis counselling for the US.

Seems like everybody’s got a price
I wonder how they sleep at night
When the sale comes first and the truth comes second
Just stop for a minute and smile

- Price Tag, by Jessie J

Some of you may be too young to remember this, but back before Jonathan Torrens was J-Roc, and Kim D’Eon was an Entertainment Tonight reporter, they both starred on separate runs of a CBC show called Street Cents.  Street Cents was a show about media and consumer awareness, where they reviewed products, tested them against each other, and talked about the kinds of messages (both true and false, though generally false!) carried in marketing and commercials.  What’s more, the show was so committed to having a clean and uninfluenced perspective that they were a rare TV show to run with no commercial revenue, so ran for a full half-hour.  Finally, and perhaps most importantly, it was a show made for teens that didn’t talk down, condescend or get spiced up with “hip lingo” and other such bull.

The formula is actually so rare, especially given how teens are probably the single most sought after market demographic, that I think you’d be hard-pressed to find a show like it anywhere.  Ever.  The show ended back in 2006, but the real heart-breaker here is that this kind of thing isn’t just about money… it’s really about life.

Money is one of those things that is so massively important right now that even if you’re not really very materialistic, you’ll still generally need to worry about things like a job, rent, buying food & clothes, or even paying for the simple things you like to do, like watch a movie or get new music. (Yes, some people pay for music.) Now consider how important any single one of those things is, and think about how often anyone teaches you anything about it.  Does anyone ever really teach you how to get or keep a job?… how about how to leave one without burning that bridge?  Has anyone ever taught you how to make a budget?… or why you would even bother?  How much should you expect to pay for rent?… what would be a good reason or trade-off to pay more or less than that?  Ultimately, sure, these are money skills but they’re really life skills too.

Even more unfortunate is that it’s actually hard to know what to believe and who you can trust about this kind of thing.  Would you trust a web site sponsored by Visa (a multi-billion dollar company that profits largely from people being in debt) to tell you how you should manage your money?  Is it even possible to find someone who doesn’t have a vested interest in selling you something to get advice from?  All of a sudden, it becomes clearer how important it is to find a source that’s has a good reputation, isn’t being sponsored or paid for in some way by the things it’s critiquing, and is accessible.  Free would be nice, easy to get to would be great, interactive so that you’re actually talking about things with someone, rather than just reading or being lectured to would fantastic!

So how about school?

No, wait, seriously, come back, I’m not kidding!

What if your math teacher taught you how to calculate the terrifying truth about what happens when you get a credit card, then only make the minimum payment every month?

What if part of your social studies were to look at how advertising works, the brain science of why it works on you, and how to figure out the reality of things?

What if school career programs weren’t just for specific trades and careers, but also talked about some of the harsher realities out there, like how to get and then survive a crap job that you hate but absolutely need?

One way or the other, you’re probably going to have to learn these things, and I guess I’m wondering whether there’s a way we can keep from having to learn the hard way.

To have a look and laugh at what people were wearing twenty years ago, check out an episode of Street Cents they posted for the CBC’s 75th anniversary here.

We took our shot at talking about advertising, more in the context of body image, last summer with an entry on “Real Real Beauty”.

I think I’m afraid to be happy… because whenever I get too happy, something bad always happens.

- Charlie Brown

This week will announce the launch of the “new and improved” Mindcheck.ca, a youth-focused interactive site aimed to help youth to learn about mental health (like moods, stress, substance use and such) and themselves, with info, self-help tools, quizzes and such.  They’re people we know at BCMHAS so we thought it might be worth mentioning, especially given that it complements some of the info we’ve tried to include in our Youth Issues section.

Really, though, this is part of a bigger push to get people to learn more about mental health in general.  With “regular” health, nutrition and such, we generally figure that the more you know, the healthier you can keep yourself… knowing how to care for your body, learning to watch out for warning signs, checking in regularly with people, all good things, right?  So why not do it with mental health?

This has the added bonus of helping of fight stigma.  A lot of the shame that people feel about reaching out may be softened if we, as a society, knew more about mental health, if we realized that pretty much everyone struggles with these kinds of things every so often.  The same way education (and acceptance!) can help cut through the kind of ignorance that fuels stuff like racism, knowing more about mental health could go a long way to create more acceptance for people getting the kind of help they need, whether it’s just being able to talk about your feelings with your buddies without being called a wimp to understanding that just because someone’s seeing a therapist doesn’t make them an unstable basket case who’s not fit to do their job.

‘Course a little star power never hurts, so Tuesday night, the Vancouver Canucks will set aside some time to promote the site as well as kick off the In One Voice campaign: a pledge to support mental health, to learn more, to speak up and so that the struggles we all go through won’t have to hide in the silence.  Starting with a bunch of Canuck players who are posting videos talking, particularly, about their friend and teammate, Rick Rypien, who suffered with depression… Check it out, and if it resonates with you, check out Mindcheck’s page on it… I know they’re looking for submissions as well!