October 2023

By Laura Gallant, 10/5/23, https://positiveexperience.org/blog/ The HOPE National Resource Center has launched the HOPE-Informed Organizational Certification program. By becoming certified as a HOPE-Informed organization, you will be publicly recognized as an organization that is actively committed to practicing the HOPE framework and promoting equitable access to positive childhood experiences (PCEs) for the children, families, and communities you serve. The program provides the structure,...

Back to School with PACEs Connection: Creating Positive Childhood Environmental Experiences in the Classroom Every aspect of someone’s environment will impact how they live, learn, play, and grow. Those under the age of 18 in traditional learning models will spend the majority of their time in a school setting, where the environment itself lays the foundation for their development. Creating positive childhood experiences in schools and the classroom has a profound impact on students'...

The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory on the Healing Effects of Social Connection and Community https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/surgeon-general-social-connection-advisory.pdf

Hillary Clinton writes for the Atlantic Monthly this week: The Weaponization of Loneliness https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/08/hillary-clinton-essay-loneliness-epidemic/674921/?paymeter=hard-gate-email-test-1&referral=FB_PAID An excerpt: The rate of young adults who report suffering from loneliness went up every single year from 1976 to 2019. From 2003 to 2020, the average time that young people spent in person with friends declined by nearly 70 percent. Then the pandemic...

When Anne Sherry and I started recording our podcast interviews in May of 2021, launching Season 1 on September 17th, 2021, we didn't know what would people would think about how often we laughed about trauma. Kids almost burning down the whole house trying to make cinnamon toast while home alone after school? Insanely scary and yet, hilarious...why would parents set this situation up for their children?? When did this seem like a good idea? Kids coming up with elaborate schemes to watch...

Youth Voices Rising writer Jacqueline Robles. Courtesy of Robles. By Jacqueline Robles, The Imprint, September 26, 2023 The overrepresentation of Native American youth in foster care is a concerning and multifaceted issue prevalent in both the United States and Canada. This unsettling situation has disrupted many Native youth’s lives, resulting in a loss of family connections, cultural identity, and a sense of belonging. The root causes of this disproportionality can be traced back to...

By Janie Har, Photo: AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, Associated Press, October 2, 2023 An alternative mental health court program designed to fast-track people with untreated schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders into housing and medical care — potentially without their consent — kicked off in seven California counties, including San Francisco, on Monday. Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom created the new civil court process, called “CARE Court,” as part of a massive push to address the...

From Sierra Sun Times, Photo: Victoria Regen/Pixabay, Sierra Sun Times, October 2, 2023 To build a future worthy of our children’s highest aspirations, we must ensure they have the resources and support they need to thrive. This Child Health Day, we recommit to helping our children live healthy lives so they can reach their highest potential. Our most fundamental obligation to our children is to keep them safe. The devastating truth is that firearms are the leading cause of death for...

By Laura Newberry, Illustration: Patrick Hruby/Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, October 3, 2023 Every once in a while, I write a newsletter that evokes a lot of emotion in readers. I know that’s the case when I get a flood of emails from you all sharing your thoughts and experiences. Last week’s edition of Group Therapy, “ AA isn’t the only way to change your relationship to alcohol ,” was one of those newsletters. Readers sent us their stories of redemption and relapse, of bottoming...

By Michael Gerstein and Jena Brooker, Image: K1tyara/iStock via Getty Images, Grist, September 29, 2023 Wilma Price was sleeping in her basement bedroom in 2021 when she woke up to a cacophony of noise, including an alarm coming from her sump pump, a device meant to prevent basement flooding. As she sat up in bed she saw her freezer and its contents floating by on several inches of water. The bedroom of her home in Detroit’s Jefferson Chalmers neighborhood was quickly flooding with water...

Integrated Behavioral Care is the collaborative effort between a mental health provider and a primary care doctor within a division to provide both mental and physical care to clients (Krall, Christian & Curtis, 2012). Bringing counselors and health care providers through collaborative efforts to educate clients through the use of psychoeducation has the ability to do the following: assist clients with increasing their wisdom about their overall mental health and medical condition,...

What are the defining characteristics of good psychotherapy? Increasingly, the answers are filtered through the lens of incomplete research or, worse, via buzzwords popularized by wellness websites. Despite what many people are led to believe, “evidence-based” psychotherapeutic approaches have significant limitations for both clinicians and clients. On this episode of Transforming Trauma, Emily welcomes author, consultant, researcher, and clinical educator Jonathan Shedler, PhD, to discuss...