Teddy Bear Play Therapy

This was a very liberating experience. At first I was quite apprehensive about that activity; this was for two reasons. The first being I am an adult male walking around with a teddy bear. Second, I work for the Army, an organization that takes pride in individuals especially men being portrayed as tough. It was not as bad as I thought it would be, considering what I previously mentioned.

Once I explained to my coworkers that that it was part of grad school counseling assignment, everyone was very supportive. When I was deployed in Iraq I bought a teddy bear that was dressed in an Army uniform for my daughter. It has a feature that allows someone to record a brief message like a recordable greeting card. To activate the feature the user would press the record button on the left paw to record a message. Once user is satisfied with message simply press the record button again to end the recording. The right paw has a play button that allows the recipient to hear the recording by pressing play. The message is not permanent; a new message may be recorded over the last message.

I ended up using a service that allowed soldiers to record a video of themselves reading a book of their choice for the soldier’s child. I recently found the teddy bear and thought it would be perfect for the assignment. The name given to the teddy bear is Joe. I began the activity by sleeping with the bear the night before. I never had a stuffed animal as a child but this process did provoke some found childhood memories.

I work as a Helpdesk technician; it can be very challenging. This is especially true when customers want their issues resolved immediately and become belligerent. During that day Joe sat on my desk. I found myself occasionally putting the customer on mute and using Joe to project my frustration. It was actually quite therapeutic and helped me distress throughout the day. Later I apologized to Joe for yelling at him and gave him a little hug.