In a few weeks you will be coming to a place called “CPRIwhere the Brake Shop is located.

You might be asking, “Why do I have to go, and what’s going to happen?!” In case  this is all a little confusing for you (or maybe even a little scary), we want to answer some questions that kids and teens often have – that way, maybe you feel better before you even get here! You can read these questions and answers yourself or (even better) have someone read this with you in case something doesn’t make sense and you need to ask someone else. Plus, you and your family should watch the 13-minute “Welcome To Brake Shop!” DVD that came with this package.

If all your questions aren’t answered here, don’t worry! You can ask us more questions when you meet us. Once all your questions are answered, we need you to sign the “Service Contract” at the end along with your guardian and a witness, then send the last page back to us.

What is the brake shop, anyway?

Just like people take their cars go to a garage or to a ‘shop’ if their car isn’t very good at stopping, kids and teens can come to the CPRI Brake Shop when, for some reason, they aren’t very good at stopping certain things about themselves either!

We all need brakes in our heads to stop doing different things, to stop thinking different things, and to stop looking at or listening to or feeling different things. Maybe life isn’t going so well for you because your body wants to keep doing strange things or making strange noises. Maybe you can’t stop your attention from wandering all over the place, or maybe the worries in your head just won’t go away.

If these or other things are happening to you, all it means is that you have “leaky brakes”. It doesn’t mean you are bad or stupid – just like it isn’t the car’s fault if it can’t stop well either! Both you and the car just need your brakes serviced – that’s all!

Not everyone in the world knows people can have leaky brakes though. We bet that you sometimes get into trouble when you are supposed to stop something and you can’t! We bet sometimes the other kids and adults around you might even think you aren’t using your brakes on purpose! They might just tell you to “try harder” when you are really already trying your very hardest! That isn’t fair. We know leaky brakes aren’t about being bad  or not trying hard enough, and so we want to help.

What is going to happen when I come?

When cars first pull into a garage, the first step is for mechanics to give them an ‘All-Points Check’. They want to look at everything on the car to make sure that they catch anything that’s causing problems.

On your first day here you might have an ‘All-Points Check’ too, except we’ll be checking you out instead of your car! One of our doctors will need to ask you a lot of questions so we can figure out everything that’s causing you problems! That means there are a lot of things we are supposed to talk about and check out. Someone will explain which leaky brakes you have, create a Service Plan that’s just right for you, and give you some neat stuff to take home. You can also borrow some books to read or DVD’s to watch too if you want. None of it will hurt, and some of it could even be fun!

Do I just come this one day, or will there be other days I come back to the Brake Shop?

It depends. We’ll decide whether or not you and your family need more from us after this first day. If you do, then we’ll all decide together what those things will be.

Many people bring their cars into a brake shop because they want a brake adjustment – they don’t want the ‘leaky brakes’ causing them so many problems anymore! Maybe you, your family, or your school are hoping for a “Brake Adjustment” too…

Maybe you’re hoping for a “Brake Job” – you just want to be able to stop better and be more like everyone else!  We can help with that.

Maybe you’re hoping for some “Driver Training” – you kind of like who and how you are but you need some help learning how to live with leaky brakes without getting in trouble so much!  We can help with that too.

Maybe you’re hoping people will stop thinking you are trying to be bad – you want your family or people at school to “learn more about leaky brakes” so they understand you better.  Guess what – we can even help with that!

Do I have to do any of this?

Nope! But we know lots and lots of kids and teens who have come to the Brake Shop before who are now really glad they did!!

Coming to the Brake Shop means you and your family can learn skills to understand and support your leaky brakes; this work can help make brakes a little less leaky, and can eliminate some of the problems that were happening before.

Coming in means you will likely miss some school and parents will likely miss some work. Time must be set aside in the family for everyone to practice these new skills we’ll be teaching so things can improve.

Sometimes kids, teens, or parents may feel overwhelmed & anxious at everything there is to learn and practice, or guilty they weren’t doing these things before. But don’t worry – no one expected you or your parents to know these things before.  Plus, you have your whole life to learn and practice!

If you don’t want to come in, this means we won’t talk to people about your ‘leaky brakes’ and you won’t have to come back for any Brake Adjustments. You can change your mind whenever you want, plus you can still use the Brake Shop website, borrow books & films from  the Brake Shop library (within the Family Resource Centre here at CPRI), and go to our courses, presentations, or assemblies.

But here’s the thing: if no one knows about your leaky brakes, and nothing changes, this might mean that you just keep on getting in trouble or being misunderstood!

If you decide to come to the Brake Shop and then change your mind later, that’s OK too. You’re allowed to do that whenever you want.

If I DO decide to come into Brake Shop, who all is going to know about it?

If you decide to let us help, Brake Shop Service Technicians will know all about you. Sometimes we have students working with us who might learn a bit about you too.

We’ll also want to talk to a bunch of people like your parents, your teachers, and other doctors or people helping you. We’ll also write reports that we’ll want to send to these people. We’ll only do this if you and your family sign a form saying that it’s OK, or if a judge in a courtroom tells us to.  We would get  in a LOT of trouble if we broke that promise!!

Sometimes we might want to use some information about you, along with information about a lot of other people, to answer research questions. Any of the information we use for research would be anonymous – this means no one knows it is YOUR information.

The only times we would have to tell something about you without your family’s permission is if it will protect someone from being  hurt really badly. If we thought someone was abusing you we would tell so that those things wouldn’t happen anymore. If we thought you were going to hurt yourself really badly, we would also tell so that you would be protected from yourself. Finally, we would have to tell if we thought you were going to hurt someone else really badly.