Children's Book Aims to Help Children, Parents Cope With Tragedy

By Christina Dreyfus

The weekend after the horrific shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Stacia Bjarnason brought her rabbit, Pepper, to the Newtown Youth Academy, settled him in, and invited some children to visit.

“Rabbits are both curious and cautious,” said Dr. Bjarnason, a licensed clinical psychologist with Brownstone Psychological, LLC in Durham, CT. Pepper would come out, explore a little, and then come back to Bjarnason to check in, a natural reaction for a small creature feeling uncertain of the big world. 

Many of Newtown’s children were able to relate to Pepper and it led to fruitful discussions.

At one point during the weekend, some of the kids were working with drama therapy and things got “brittley loud” as Bjarnason described it. Several of the children experienced a startle response — hypervigilence from the shooting — and so did Pepper. Dr. Bjarnason and the children were able to talk about how Pepper heard an unexpected noise and his reaction. “It led the kids to say, ‘That happened to me,’ and ‘I didn’t know other people felt that way,’” said Bjarnason.

Dr. Bjarnason’s experience with the children of Sandy Hook led her to thinking it would be helpful if there were a way for children and parents to talk about the event and subsequent feelings without it being “official” therapy. Thus was born the kernel for Pepper’s Dragons, a children’s picture book written by Bjarnason and illustrated by her mother, Irene Ruth.

Originally conceptualized as a nature story, Bjarnason had the idea to include the dragons when a child said to her, “I don’t know which grown-ups are good and which grown-ups are bad. I don’t know what a bad grown-up looks like.” As is common in fairytales and popular children’s books, there are “good” dragons and “bad” dragons.

Pepper’s Dragons parallels what the children experienced that morning at Sandy Hook Elementary School, and some of the children Bjarnason worked with acted as editors as she developed the book. For instance, on one page the children found the dragon too scary, so Bjarnason asked her mother, illustrator Irene Ruth, to tone it down.

In the early stages, the book was simply printed out from Bjarnason’s computer, stapled, and used clinically to get children talking — most importantly to their parents. After seeing its usefulness, Bjarnason thought that the book could be used universally. “While therapy and counseling are helpful to many people, not everyone needs to see a therapist and not everyone is comfortable working with a therapist,” she said.

Irene Ruth became part of the project when Bjarnason approached her about creating the illustrations. Having studied at the University of Rhode Island and the Rhode Island School of Design, she had put aside a professional art career to focus on raising her children. When Bjarnason first talked to her mother about taking on the project, Ruth said her figures were 'too cartoony' and her daughter wouldn’t want them, but she sent a picture along anyway. Bjarnason loved it. “I’m her daughter so she understood what I wanted even when I hadn’t expressed it," she said.

Many people shared their talents, time and energy to bring this book to publication. Debra Nelson, Bjarnason’s partner at Brownstone Psychological, donated her photography skills to capture Ruth’s artwork for the book. A longtime amateur photographer, her black and white photos grace the walls of the historic building that houses their offices.

Glenn Schicker of NorCell, a paper company, took the book to work and asked if the company would help support its publication. NorCell in turn provided Peggy and Andy Clark, a graphic design and printing and manufacturing duo who were instrumental in getting the book printed as quickly as it was. 

Not too long afterwards, Bjarnason did a volunteer presentation on the topic of self-care for professionals at an interfaith conference titled “Journey to the Water’s Edge: Reflecting, Responding to, and Healing the Trauma” at The Mercy Center in Madison. She offered a copy to Meredith Jeffers, one of the conference organizers and a member of the United Churches of Christ, and Jeffers organized getting eighteen copies printed by Staples.

Before Bjarnason knew it, many donors and companies had come forward to support the printing of the book in true picture book format. Last week, the book made its official debut at a fundraiser for PaperSeed Foundation, a non-profit supported by CellMark Paper and one of the major supporters of Pepper’s Dragons.

The efforts and generosity of NorCell, PaperSeed Foundation, and many individuals made the printing of 1,500 high-quality books possible and, with help from the Newtown Public Library, every single one is being donated and offered to the families of those affected by the Sandy Hook tragedy, including first responders, Newtown community institutions such as libraries and schools, help workers such as those from Healing Hearts, as well as communities and schools in Oklahoma that were affected by the recent deadly tornadoes in May and early June.

Since the book’s publication, Bjarnason has been surprised by the attention she’s been receiving. An interview on NPR, people asking her to sign the book, an agent, and a trip to New York City have left her writing humorous takes on her Facebook page titled, “How not to be sophisticated,” with excerpts like “How not to be sophisticated, part two. Nice person at fundraiser: Are you the author? Me: No, I just wrote the book.”

Bjarnason’s big hope for Pepper’s Dragons is that parents read it aloud with their children and then ask, “Did you ever feel this way?” She hopes it gives kids and parents permission to talk about something that is, in its horror, so difficult to talk about. And it looks like her wish is coming true. One child said during a reading of the book, “I hear you, bunny.” And that one thing makes it all worthwhile.