As Ann Leach adjusts to the life changes brought by a world health crisis, she reflects on another major crisis that also impacted her life immeasurably – Joplin’s deadly 2011 EF-5 tornado, its anniversary being just two days ago.
Leach’s home was destroyed in the tornado. As she picked up the pieces of her life to begin anew, she managed her trauma by making daily entries in an art journal. She came to realize the power of creative expression in healing.
She began incorporating art — specifically simple sketches or doodling as she calls it — into her work as a life coach and group facilitator. She uses it to help people map out goals or to sketch out thoughts they may be unable to express verbally. Such doodling can calm the mind and emotions, as well as the heart rate, she says.
Now, she’s using her doodling program to help youngsters traumatized by natural disasters worldwide.
She started the program after bringing together art professionals to brainstorm on how doodling could be used to help children and families.
At about the same time, wildfires were decimating Australia, burning more than 25 million acres, destroying an estimated 3,000 homes, and killing 33 people. It struck Leach that doodling could be used to help with the trauma related to such natural disasters.
“We know that art helped kids and their families after the tornado and I thought, ‘okay, maybe there’s something there,’” she says.
It was the beginning of Doodle Pals.
As she deliberated on formation of the program, she turned to Colin Smith, a Niceville, Florida, 12-year-old who she had developed a doodling relationship with. She had met him through a friend of hers, his great-grandmother, and they bonded through a mutual love of doodling, sharing their creations and doodling journals across the miles.
She had always urged Colin to use his doodling to help others, so it was a natural to invite him to work with her on the Doodle Pals program. His age would help in connecting with children who participate in the program. He jumped on board, and he’s already prepared some doodles to kick off the program. Some are general doodles and others address feelings connected with loss and feelings, he says, noting that while he has never experienced a natural disaster himself, he is acquainted with feelings of loss through his father’s military deployment.
“It’s an outlet to connect with one another and address emotions,” the sixth grader says of Doodle Pal. “It’s a fun outlet and allows kids to be kids.”
Under the program, Leach will recruit young participants through online connections to art centers and education and children’s programs in disaster-stricken areas throughout the world. She and Smith will prepare a series of doodles for the children to color and then mail back to them. The kids will also be able to post their doodles and stories of survival through a private Facebook community.
Leach considers Doodle Pals to be a pay-it-forward program in that participating children will extend their doodles to youngsters effected by future natural disasters. It’s a reminder to themselves and others that they aren’t alone in their experiences, their feelings, or their trauma, she says.
“I think it speaks to the power of community and support by having them work together and see what they want to say to the next group (of participants),” she says.
The program will focus first on youngsters in Australia, who will then share doodles with children impacted by the EF-4 tornado that struck in early March in Nashville, Tennessee, killing two dozen people.
Funding for the program is being provided by Ozark Center, a local behavioral health program, where Leach works as a part-time counselor. It will pay for the costs of envelopes and mailing of doodles.
Leach will also be applying the Doodle Pals program in her work at Ozark Center. It will be part of her participation in the Playmakers program of the Kids Foundation of Life is Good apparel company.
Through evidence-based data, the Life is Good foundation has recognized that childhood trauma is the single greatest public health threat facing children. Based on the contention that every child is just one “playmaker” away from becoming a healthy adult, the foundation developed the Playmakers program to promote positive relationships between traumatized children and their care professionals.
Leach is using the Playmaker program to enforce in youngsters that life is good, and they can share their gratitude by doodling one good thing that happens to them each day.
“Optimism is always at the foundation and when your life is falling apart, you have to find the good and doodling is a way to express it,” says Leach. “Putting a pen to paper is golden.”
