How Center For Dialysis Care Euclid Thrives during the Covid Crisis through Creating Art

Art Therapy, Mandalas and Covid 19

CDC asked the Creative Art Therapists to stay on as part of the front line staff during this pandemic.  CDC knows art helps and I am grateful to have been asked to stay on and work with our patients, families and staff during this difficult time.  

First, the challenge…..How do we make art with patients while working within the parameters we are being asked to follow for everyone's health and safety.   Art therapists at CDC have always worked chair side.  We now need to stay six feet away.  The second challenge we are facing is the greater due diligence needed for cleaning art materials. Now with the Covid virus, cleaning materials has taken on momentous proportions.  Last but not least, the masks and shields hinder communication and hearing.      

What does this Therapist do when circumstances change?  I fall back to creating mandalas.  Using the mandala as an art intervention helps the maker slow down.  The artist can stop and take a breath to see what is next.  Making art within a circle helps bring our outside focus inward.  The maker can relax.  It helps them stay in the present moment by focusing on the task rather than worrying about the future or the past. 

When creating a mandala the individual has choices.  The designs can be very simple or very detailed.  A mandala can be colorful or very little color can be used.  They can even be black and white.  The art materials used for creating them can be controllable and/or fluid.     

A 12 inch diameter cardboard circle was chosen as the host for the designs. The size renders them portable and stiff enough to be easily transported in a patient’s CDC bag.  Once a patient received their mandala they were asked to bring them back and forth from home to dialysis and then home again.  This solved the problem of anyone besides the patient touching it. Also the cardboard circles are stiff enough to be use directly on a patient's lap.  

To draw the designs on the circles I chose to use a permanent black Sharpie marker.   In drawing the mandala design in black lines I am able to mirror the format used in the adult coloring books that burst onto the scene several years ago.  These coloring books have become very familiar and many people are comfortable using them.  I hoped this familiarity would draw more patients into the project.  The use of the permanent black marker keeps the lines from disappearing or bleeding if colored over.         

For coloring in the mandalas I decided patients could choose either washable markers, crayons or colored pencils.  These materials are pretty well known by everyone and easily cleaned. Familiarity of art materials adds another level of comfort to the creative process.  The plan was to drop off a set of materials to the patient while they were on dialysis treatment.  Before they finished treatment I would pick them up and clean them.              

We began the mandala project during the early onset of the pandemic. I was still working chair side which allowed the patient and me to create their mandala design together.      As the pandemic exploded around us it became apparent that the patients needed their own materials.  Many patients had no art materials thus they were unable to work at home.  A quantity of crayons, markers and some colored pencils were acquired.  Their distribution has permitted each participant to receive a bag of ten different colored markers.     

To solve the six foot distant problem I began drawing designs on the cardboard circles in the office.  When I got four or five different designs done I would take the circles into the units.   I checked in with everyone even those not participating.  Everyone was asked if they wished to participate and if the answer was yes they were given the opportunity to choose one of the mandalas I had drawn.  When I ran out of mandalas I returned to the office and began drawing another set to take to the units.    

 About this time the staff became interested.  It seemed that the designs drawn on the circles already made it safe for them to engage.  They also saw how much the patients were enjoying  the work they were doing with the mandalas. 

If someone did not like my designs I would find out what they would like me to draw.  One patient asked for Pennsylvania Dutch designs. Several of the staff began asking for cartoon characters, their favorites being the Minions and Sponge Bob.  Between the staff and the patients, requests for flowers, elephants, dogs, butterflies and landscapes have surfaced. 

Several men asked me what we were doing.  Some even wondered if it was paint by numbers.   Because it was not, I showed them how to begin to choose colors to add to the mandala.  I've even given out blank circles so that they could create their own.   

 Patients and staff are taking the mandalas home for their kids, grandkids, daughters, wives and even husbands.  One patient stated “I am not picking this out for myself, it is for my wife. She likes these”.  

Another patient, one whom I had tried for years to engage in making art, decided to try a mandala.  She came back and said “Well you finally got me to work” adding “There is nothing for me to do at home.  I can not go out and shop.”  She is on her fifth mandala. 

 Another patient shared that she has not been able to sleep.  She said she got up and worked on her mandala in the middle of the night.  When asked what happened when she did that she smiled and shared “I fell asleep.”

Initially I thought I would wait until the pandemic slowed down before I began collecting the mandalas.  The patients have been eager to share their work and I really wanted to see what they have been doing.  So last week I began collecting them.  Every mandala will be placed in a plastic tub and quarantined for three to four days.  After being quarantined I will begin to hang them in the lobby as an art show.  I think it will be called Euclid Thrives During Difficult Times By Making Mandalas.

Will all the mandalas return?  I doubt it.  At this point the momentum and energy continues to build as people keep asking for another mandala.  I now have drawn over 300 mandalas and more than 60 bags of markers have been passed out.  My thought is to keep drawing mandalas as long as I have circles and markers or until patient’s and staff’s interest wanes. 

What started as a mustard seed planted several weeks ago continues to grow in scope.  CDC  has given us a place to plant our seeds.   Every mandala I drew represents a seed.  Each participant's engagement with a mandala has given the seed life, energy and color.  As we bring these all mandalas together our CDC garden will spring forth into many wonderful, colorful, blossoms and blooms.  Together our blossoming garden reflects our unity, resilience and thriving as we ride out this storm. 

barbara greenwood

I am an art therapist and artist living in Euclid. I work for the Centers For Dialysis Care Inc. Have lived in Euclid for about 25 years. I do have a private practice as well as have sold and shown my own art work throughout the United States.  I have been with the Centers For Dialysis Care for 15 years as an art therapist.  

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Volume 11, Issue 6, Posted 11:49 AM, 06.07.2020