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Finally it begins; the talk of the struggle in Napa County has transitioned to the walk (or the march) , and thanks to Ashley Ochoa and Jenny Waken, voices of Napa County residents are being heard! I was so excited to be a part of this march, to see the lit up and excited faces of so many who came together with the same passion for change, and the same drive to fight (safely) for a difference that's long over-due! The challenge of having a dual diagnosis can be a detrimental reality ending...

If I had diagrammed my family when my children were young, well most any age really, had I been really honest I’d have made myself smaller than anyone else. What I learned through my own ACA/codependency recovery, was that if I kept doing that, I was not in fact serving my children nor myself nor my husband. Trauma has the effect of shrinking us, we get hurt and we withdraw, we get scared and we shut down, we become emotionally constricted, we’re less present and less spontaneous. Recovery...

“I love you,” I say to my daughter. “Of course you do,” she says, I’m awesome.” She was twelve. The mother in me smiled. The girl I was shook her head inside and wondered h ow would it have been to feel both loved and lovable while a child? I do not know. I will never know. It does not matter how wonderful my present. It does not matter who I will become. I can’t change the past. The past is a country I never want my daughter to travel near or in. I am an exile, from my past, my child self.

For more of this article by German Lopez , please click here .

The hospital where I was recently treated for a blood clot, showing the facade as it was when I was a four-year old child being treated for burns _____________________________________________________ For over a decade I was a family therapist. Before that, an educator. In the past 20 years have dedicated myself to writing curriculum and designing trainings for Lakeside Global Institute primarily around the subject of trauma. I was honored when Bruce Perry invited me to be a fellow with the...

It's been two decades since the groundbreaking ACEs Study and we now face epidemic rates of childhood trauma and maltreatment. Everything we have done has led us to a very distressing status quo with millions of families in peril. We have have an excellent opportunity to do things differently. We can look at family systems and then expand our vision to include community systems of care and safety. We can ensure that every child and parent has access to behavioral health care, parent...

Thanks to the national spotlight from this 60 Minutes segment , the trauma informed care movement has gained critical momentum. Like many human services and other trauma informed agencies, SaintA is being asked, “So, what’s next?” while simultaneously continuing to work on the “Right now.” We all know the statistics: Right now, nearly three-fourths (67%) of Americans have had at least one Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE). Right now, about 25% have three or more ACEs. * And, right now, we...

Making a friend is hard work. Keeping one is even harder, especially for young children. A novel study published in the Journal of Family Psychology sheds light on why childhood friendships fall apart and is the first to demonstrate that parents are an important source of these breakups. Looking at data from 1,523 children (766 boys) from grades one to six, researchers from Florida Atlantic University and the University of Jyvaskyla in Finland conducted a survival analysis to identify the...

In Russia, cities are collapsing—whole buildings sagging and crumbling, roads twisting and bulging through the tundra. In Greenland, forest fires edge ever closer to towns perched on once-icy landscapes, and some towns are running out of water. And in Alaska, entire villages are being relocated because the land upon which they’re built is no long trustworthy. All across the North, the very ground is changing , and the buildings and roads built upon the thawing permafrost are shifting and...

Myaamionki Nakamooni (“Miami Land Song”) tawaana siipiiwa aciwa trees, rivers, hills myaamionkiši iiyaayaani I am going to the Miami lands myaamionkiši iiyaayaani I am going to the Miami lands mihtohseeniaki niihkaanaki people, friends myaamionkiši iiyaayaani I am going to the Miami lands myaamionkiši iiyaayaani, iiyaayaani I am going to the Miami lands, I go For indigenous people, language and song are everything. Since language is mostly an oral tradition for tribes, songs and stories...

Policy doesn’t have to be written with a capital letter. When networks participating in Mobilizing Action for Resilient Communities (MARC) aimed to move the needle on policy—a course of action codified by an agency, business or governmental body—they focused on both “big P” state and federal legislative changes and “small p” movements in local schools, neighborhood organizations and police departments. In a MARC webinar last fall, leaders from the Illinois and Albany networks described their...

When you hug another human being you connect with her deeply, your focus is on yourself and the other person. You need to be totally present to do it effectively.  When you mindfully hug another person you are conveying to him/her that you are there totally.