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Natalie* was excited to begin seeing her therapist. "I didn't go to see him because I was at a low ebb," she tells me. "It was the opposite. It was five years after beginning my transition, I finally had a semi-stable income and home life. I decided to invest in therapy and try to address some of my issues, which had been going back to my teens and before." Natalie was 26 years old when she started the sessions. For more than a decade she had suffered from a debilitating eating disorder that...

Among the 8 solutions offered for reducing health care costs in a February white paper by the Texas Medical Center Health Policy Institute is the recommendation to meaningfully address the impacts of adverse childhood experiences . Childhood trauma is correlated with poor health outcomes – including early death. Early interventions to mitigate its effects are critical. Many studies show that childhood adversity is correlated with adult morbidity and mortality. Adverse childhood experiences...

Hi everyone! I am interviewing men and women for the book I am writing, Conversations that Matter: Life Lessons Learned through Listening. The attached is a request for stories for my book - no video will be taken, simply conversation. I would be grateful if you could share the attached as much as you can! Thank you! Much love and gratitude, Leslie Leslie Peters RN

Life is hard. “In this world you WILL have trouble,” Jesus said. The ability to successfully face the hardships that will inevitably come to us will determine our level of satisfaction, joy, and peace. Resilience isn’t just a desirable trait, it’s absolutely essential. And, it turns out that scripture has a lot to say about this essential quality for successful living. There are many passages we could examine to illustrate the point, but the letter from James is one of my favorites. Eugene...

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker on Thursday called for a special session of the Legislature to pass a $100 million school safety plan. The package includes grants for schools to enhance building security, an increased focus on trauma-informed care, stricter reporting requirements for bullying incidents and threats of violence and efforts to increase coordination between schools and law enforcement. "No child, parent, or teacher should ever have to feel unsafe in school," Walker said in a...

The state Senate has approved a bill aimed at addressing the long-term health and social effects of severe childhood trauma. The legislation, S.261 , which now goes to the House, is designed to bolster the state’s support for children and families who have experienced “toxic stress.” Exposure to severe stress has been shown to alter brain chemistry and affect behavior. A major provision of the bill is the addition of a new “director of prevention and health improvement” to the Agency of...

On the same day news broke of White House plans to pursue the most severe punishments against opioid drug dealers — the death penalty — Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner announced new policies aimed at reducing the severity of sentences and ultimately driving down the city’s prison population. Krasner will now require prosecutors in his office to state on the record the costs and benefits of the sentences they recommend to the judge after securing a conviction. “A dollar spent on...

[Last Sunday "60 Minutes" aired a piece by Oprah Winfrey called, "Treating Childhood Trauma.”] The follow-up interview with Oprah on "60 Minutes Overtime" is very powerful. She says -- “This story has had more impact on me than practically anything that I have ever done.” Oprah says that working on this story caused “a revolution” in her own life. “This story was life-changing for me.” “What has been life-changing for me is the question, What happened to you?” “It has changed the way I see...

One of the bestselling children’s books in history is Dr. Seuss’ “Oh, The Places You’ll Go.” It will soon celebrate its 30th Anniversary. The 1990 classic includes this line: “You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose.” We love to challenge children and adults to say it out loud and repeat it over and over. This summer thousands of children will chant it in Camp HOPE America, our camp for children impacted by domestic violence.

NPR Ed has been reporting this month on the lives of transgender educators around the country. We surveyed 79 educators from the U.S. and Canada, and they had a lot to say – about their teaching, their identities and their roles in the lives of young people. We reported the survey findings here , and followed with this story about how educators are coming together to organize and to share their experiences in the classroom, and in their lives. We asked our survey respondents to send in a...

All that anybody really wants is happiness. We may spend every waking hour working hard at achieving the goals that we hope will make us happy. But does it really have the effect that we hope it will? I'm pretty certain we've all been there: you go to college to get a degree, thinking that a diploma will make you happy, and then you graduate and happiness still seems far off. And then you think, "O.K., if I manage to get this amazing job, that will make me happy for sure." [For more on this...

There is a toxin in Philadelphia that our children and families are being exposed to near constantly: trauma. Trauma lingers and isn’t just limited to a single incident, like a gunshot. Trauma manifests in hunger, housing instability, or living without utilities. It can include exposure to abuse, neglect, gun violence, police brutality, imprisonment, and domestic violence. And trauma can pass through generations as the result of historical violence, slavery, redlining, and mass...