I think a lot about my daughter's mother on Mother's Day as well how much being a mother has taught me about love and attachment. When I first became an adoptive parent, I read everything I could about adoption and attachment. That process...
By Andrea Blanch and David Shern Two weeks ago, Liberia was officially declared “Ebola free.” Liberia was ground zero of the Ebola epidemic, with confirmed cases in all 15 counties and almost 5,000 Ebola-related deaths. ...
In the first assessment of public opinion since obesity was formally classified as a disease, a new study from the Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity at the University of Connecticut has found that a majority of Americans support the designation. "Given that two-thirds of Americans have overweight or obesity , the disease classification potentially affects a substantial portion of the population," says Rebecca Puhl, the study's co-author,...
For medical practices, having more unique doctors on staff and having doctors see more patients doesn't necessarily lead to improved patient outcomes—and in fact, may have the opposite effect, according to a brief report in the June issue of...
Three months ago, a TED talk I gave was posted on the Internet , and the emails, calls, and letters began pouring in — from across the country and around the world. Women and men from Texas and Louisiana, Australia and the Czech...
When I was 29 years old, my mother died. It was completely unexpected; she was only 61. In an instant, decades of plans disappeared. Going through birth with her calm presence beside me. Her spoiling my children with stuff they shouldn't have....
U.S. public schools and the neighborhoods in which they’re located are inextricably tied together. Growing up in economically segregated, low-income neighborhoods comes with a host of disadvantages, one of which is that local schools tend...
A new study has found that a belief in “pure evil” influences our feelings about capital punishment. For the study, Dr. Donald Saucier, an associate professor of psychological sciences at Kansas State University, looked at how...
You look so…well rested,” a woman recently told a friend of mine, upon learning that she had a four-month old. “It was like I didn’t have the right to look well rested—I wasn’t being appropriately...
For years, Franky Price terrified his teachers. As a third-grader, he pantomimed killing other students by sliding his finger across his throat. In fourth grade, he swore at anyone who angered him. The worst moment came one month into fifth...
When I heard this vignette, I realized the full potential of the documentary Paper Tigers to change how people think about childhood adversity and mobilize them to demand trauma-informed practices and policies—in schools, in healthcare and...
Change for children in child protection services will not occur until more of us know the depth and scope of child abuse in our communities. To make this happen, KARA reports on child abuse around the nation. Share our reporting with...
The 2015 issue of Focal Point , a publication of Pathways to Positive Futures , features 11 articles on critical topics about trauma-informed care and its growing relevance in research, official policy, practice methods, and organizational...
Friday marks the 48th anniversary of In re Gault , a landmark Supreme Court ruling in 1967 that juveniles had the right to all the same protections under the law that adult offenders did, like being notified of the charges against them,...
There’s a lyric in Eminem’s “Rock Bottom”, off The Slim Shady LP, that sticks out: “Live half a life and throw the rest away.” You can read it as a description of depression and its impact, how a...