April 2020

Brett Loftis has a passion for protecting the most vulnerable children that is apparent from the moment he says hello. As the Chief Executive Officer of Crossnore School & Children’s Home, Brett leads an organization that is dedicated to growing healthy futures for children and families.

You are extraordinary. Writing this post feels like I have come full circle. In April of 2019, Alfred White reached out to me on ACEs Connection. Shortly after, we spoke at length about the plans he had to create a place of healing and hope in Federal Way and King County, Washington, specifically for individuals with a history of trauma and who were now impacted with symptoms such as addiction and homelessness. I recall sharing with Alfred that there was such a need for this in that...

By Blake Farmer, Kaiser Health News, April 6, 2020 The new coronavirus doesn’t discriminate. But physicians in public health and on the front lines said they already can see the emergence of familiar patterns of racial and economic bias in the response to the pandemic. In one analysis, it appears doctors may be less likely to refer African Americans for testing when they show up for care with signs of infection. The biotech data firm Rubix Life Sciences, based in Lawrence, Massachusetts,...

By Louis Freedberg, EdSource, April 10, 2020 This “spring break” is like no other for California. Even as public schools are making a big push to ramp up their “distance learning” curriculum, millions of students, along with their teachers, are out on spring break this week. A worrisome question is whether spring break at this crucial time will slow the implementation of distance learning, or whether it has given teachers much-needed breathing space to gear up for a more intensive online...

By Jan Hoffman, The New York Times, March 26, 2020 On March 13, a dozen people gathered at a Cleveland outpatient clinic for their daily therapy group. They represented a patchwork of addictions: to alcohol, crack cocaine, methamphetamine, marijuana, heroin. They were freshly out of jail, out of marriages, out of work. The newest member had enrolled just a week earlier. The three-hour morning session that Friday, reinforced with continually brewing coffee and snacks everyone brought to share...

By Jonathan Kanter and Katherine Manbeck, Business Insider, April 8, 2020 Isolation, social distancing, and extreme changes in daily life are hard now, but the United States also needs to be prepared for what may be an epidemic of clinical depression because of COVID-19. We are clinical psychological scientists at the University of Washington's Center for the Science of Social Connection . We study human relationships, how to improve them, and how to help people with clinical depression,...

By Luke Smillie and Nick Haslam, The Conversation, April 8, 2020 The coronavirus pandemic has caused tens of thousands of deaths around the world and pushed major economies into a tailspin. Beyond those impacts, almost all of us will face psychological challenges – trying to maintain a responsible social distancing regimen without sliding into psychological isolation and loneliness . At least we’re all in the same boat, and misery loves company, right? Actually, we’re not all in the same...

The Trauma Resources Institute (TRI), a nonprofit organization devoted to cultivating trauma-informed and resiliency-focused individuals and communities throughout the world, is offering parents and other caregivers a series of Community Resiliency Model-based parenting webinars to help enhance resiliency during these challenging times. This webinar series is a four-module online parenting program which will help you learn the skills of the Community Resiliency Model®. Each module will be...

It's been 3 months now since Annie and I have been dating and things are going really well. Yet, cooler heads have prevailed and the both of us are pragmatic enough to know that it's still just 3 months. Prior to the Covid 19 pandemic, the both of us were making plans to travel together in May. Needless to say, that idea sunk like a rock to the bottom of the ocean, the moment #socialdistancing hit all our feeds overnight.

In lieu of all the adversity and constant change in our world, we know that there is HOPE and there is science to back it! The Charlotte Resilience Project would like to share that science with you! For today ONLY, we are offering virtual access to the Resilience film. Simply follow the steps below: 1. Visit www.charlotteresilienceproject.com 2. Click "Watch the Film" tab 3. Complete the form to access the film 4. Join us for a post-film discussion at 6 p.m. today via ZOOM.

By Chris Mooney, Brady Dennis, and Sarah Kaplan, The Washington Post, April 8, 2020 Two weeks after her husband died alone in an intensive care unit in Fort Myers, Florida, Nicole Buchanan is quarantined at the home they shared with their 12-year-old daughter, wrestling not only with grief but with why and how the coronavirus could steal someone so young and healthy. "My husband didn't have diabetes, he didn't have asthma, he didn't have high cholesterol. He didn't have anything," Buchanan...

By Aditi Srivastav Brussells, April 10, 2020, The Post and Courier Columbia, SC My first memorable experience moving to Columbia was the 1,000-year flood. The National Guard was camped out for days in my neighborhood, and we couldn’t find a hot cup of coffee anywhere around town. Knowing very few people at the time, I felt depressed, isolated and most of all anxious for things to go back to normal. During that time, the #ColumbiaStrong hashtag emerged, which became more of a symbol of...