March 2021

By Leah Asmelash, CNN, March 1, 2021 Black women are the mules of the world, Zora Neale Hurston wrote in 1937. More than 80 years later, Hurston's words in "Their Eyes Were Watching God" still ring true, but one filmmaker is on a journey to both expose that truth and alleviate it. Oge Egbuonu's new documentary, "(In)visible Portraits," is what she calls a love letter to Black women, and a reeducation for everyone else. The 90-minute feature, set to premiere on Oprah Winfrey's OWN on March 2,...

By Jim Daley, Scientific American, March 1, 2021 Since Black Lives Matter protests gained national prominence following the 2014 police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., the movement has spread to hundreds of cities and towns across the U.S. Now a new study shows police homicides have significantly decreased in most cities where such protests occurred. Black Lives Matter (BLM) began when Oakland, Calif.–based activist Alicia Garza posted a message of protest on Facebook after George...

By Margarita Alegría, STAT, February 9, 2021 Gonzales is a small city in central California populated mostly by Latino immigrant families and farmworkers. Like other places, it has felt the weight of the coronavirus pandemic. When Covid-19 hit, the city’s youth council conducted an online mental health survey of middle and high schoolers. The students received an overwhelming response that revealed high levels of anxiety symptoms and stress among their peers. The findings were a wake-up call...

By Lindsay Braman, February 15, 2021 By now, most counselors, pediatricians, teachers, and other people who work with children know about ACES: The “Adverse Childhood Experiences” scale. ACE’s predict , based on measuring the number of traumatic or adverse events experienced, which kids are likely to struggle developmentally and emotionally as they mature. (You can take the ACES quiz here ). New results from a survey based on a study of 6188 adults at Johns Hopkins shows that there are 7...

By Melissa Reid, Seventh-day Adventist Church, February 26, 2021 On Thursday, February 25, 2021, the U.S. House of Representatives once again passed the LGBT anti-discrimination bill “The Equality Act” (H.R. 5). While the Seventh-day Adventist Church firmly believes that everyone is created in the image of God and should be treated with dignity, compassion, and respect, the Church remains concerned that the Equality Act as drafted would further erode the religious liberty of faith...

By Jessica Grose, The New York Times, February 24, 2021 I don’t know how else to put it, but lately it seems like my brain is broken. I’m not functioning with the mental quickness I’m used to. I find myself struggling to locate words I want to use, like “vigilant” (it took me a full day to remember it). Sometimes when I’m especially tired in the evenings, I will trail off midsentence, and when my husband asks a follow-up question I will have completely lost my train of thought — it drives...

By Cory Turner, Christine Herman, Rhitu Chatterjee, National Public Radio, January 18, 2021 A bag of Doritos, that's all Princess wanted. Her mom calls her Princess, but her real name is Lindsey. She's 17 and lives with her mom, Sandra, a nurse, outside of Atlanta. On May 17, 2020, a Sunday, Lindsey decided she didn't want breakfast; she wanted Doritos. So she left home and walked to Family Dollar, taking her pants off on the way, while her mom followed on the phone with police. Lindsey has...

Join Alfred White, founder and owner of The League of Extraordinary People, on Sunday nights for real talk about health and wellness for the BIPOC Community! Learn about how to heal from trauma, adversity, and chronic stress. Alfred will be going LIVE on the TLOEP Facebook page ! Here is the link to the Facebook and Instagram . On March 7th, Alfred will introduce viewers to TLOEP and our guiding principles. On March 14th, Alfred will lead viewers in an exploration of The Set Up: Living with...

Plans to integrate practices and policies based on the science of adverse childhood experiences in North Carolina’s 4,000-person,100-county statewide judiciary were announced today. Jon David, district attorney for North Carolina’s 15th District, and District Court Judge Quintin McGee of the same district revealed plans to work with North Carolina Chief Justice Paul Newby and Administrative Office of the Courts Director Andrew Heath to create a statewide commission focusing on the science of...

As discussed last week in Part One of this two-part article, children who have been victims of psycho-emotional abuse within their dysfunctional family system may exist in a near-constant state of anxiety or even terror as they struggle on a daily basis just to survive and be who they think they need to be in order to have their basic needs met by their primary caretakers (typically the parents).

Join us at EmpowerSurvivors Each week on our program "Conversations with Evey & Elizabeth " we will introduce a special guest or conversation starters and discuss issues of interest for survivors of childhood sexual abuse and trauma. This Monday, March 8, 2021, at 6 PM CST – 7:30 PM CST we invite you to join us once again for comfortable conversations on uncomfortable topics. Register in advance for this meeting:...

Empathy requires understanding. Understanding requires listening. Listening requires TIME, patience, and our presence. ---------------- We have all, likely, at some point read or heard the brilliant saying that "Trauma is not what happen's to you, but what happens INSIDE of you", by Dr. Gabor Mate, and other brilliant trauma aware advocates and researchers. But what I love most about Dr. Peter Levine's version, is the addition of "in the absence of an empathetic witness", because it reminds...