Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and the impact on adult health and well being [radio interview]

For some kids, especially those in rural areas, and probably in urban areas but I don't have experience with urban areas, reaching out into the community as a kid promoting your own resilience is not possible because to do so relies on parents allowing the kid to reach out - and engage in other activities.  Also, I am a little worried that telling kids to reach out into the community themselves to develop their own resilience if their family is not capable of being that supportive adult,  tells kids who have no caring adult and kids who have no guide to guide themselves to  "do it all on their own".  Some of these kids have been doing everything on their own since infancy.   This is real problem for those with severe attachment issues which is likely if no family member is capable of being that caring adult- and lack of resilience and disorganized attachment is a likely outcome without a caring parent.     This suggestion also fails to recognize the damage caused by the need for early infant attachment to a caring adult.  Kids who are unattached will be vulnerable to predation especially if they were to try to reach out on their own and are also likely very socially incompetent to do so.  

In my clinic (when I was in it), I model serve and return interaction between parent and newborn during the hospital stay at the infant's birth and at all the subsequent visits up to at least 6 months. I think this is really important for pediatricians to do, especially with young patients or mom's who were in child welfare, mother's with post-pardem depression, or parents in poverty with stressors.  

When we had our first rural ACEs meeting to form trauma informed schools and community, the principle of the middle school stated that she was terribly worried about those families that were basically isolated, with parents who were isolating their kids. Some of these kids had no parent's show up for the development of their childs individual educational plan.  If your child needed an IEP, wouldn't you show up? These are kids who go to school and back home and there is nothing in-between-- these kids are really isolated, they cannot go out to develop their own resilience and understanding this is really  important. 

Kids cannot do resilience alone.  I don't want them to grow up feeling like failures when they experienced over-whelming adversity.  Also though I am incredibly positive about building adult resilience -- sometimes resilience is overwhelmed by overwhelming adversity   I just don't want some to feel if they aren't as "successful" as others that they have "resiliency deficiency disorder" and are a failure. Coming from a shame-based childhood, feeling like a resiliency failure only creates more shame.  

I did like your program.  I listened to it all. It is good work we are all doing here. However, resilience in childhood depends on the caring of one capable adult in that child's life and children aren't made for or developmentally capable of- though they often find themselves in the role-  providing for all parental and then their own  needs. Doing this, which some are forced to do, produces  psycho-pathology.  There is no resilience deficiency disorder here, simply an environment that is in no way conducive to resilience.  

Early attachment is critical for resilience and psychological well being.  This can only occur when we work with parents.  

Thanks for the great program.  I really enjoyed it.   Tina

Thank you for posting this Jane. I plan on doing more radioshows on ACEs and look forward to getting the word out about the trauma informed work that is going on around the country. 

I'm so appreciative of Aces connection.