Blog

The immensity of Los Angeles County’s foster care visitation challenge is hard to fathom. When a child is removed from the custody of his or her family due to abuse and neglect, a key part of the reunification process is ensuring that child can visit with his or her parent. But in L.A., which is larger and more populous than most states, scheduling those visits takes the county’s child welfare system 2 million hours every year. The Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) is hoping...

The singer-songwriter Dar Williams’ music is a revelation—The New Yorker has described her as "one of America’s very best singer-songwriters”—and so, it turns out, is her writing about cities. In her fantastic new book, What I Found in a Thousand Towns , Williams provides an insightful flâneuse’s take on what makes for a thriving community (full disclosure: I liked the book so much I blurbed it). She draws on her travels to cities and towns across America to set out the ingredients of a...

Hilton Kelley has been sounding off on Facebook Live the past few days about families who evacuated their homes to escape Hurricane Harvey and are now getting eviction notices. The families live in Port Arthur, Texas, the small Gulf Coast city about 90 miles east of Houston, but are currently scattered across Louisiana and Texas. Kelley himself had to evacuate—his fourth time doing so in the last 15 years due to hurricane flooding—but was able to make it back to his home last week. He’s now...

Three years after the Affordable Care Act’s coverage expansion took effect, the number of Americans without health insurance fell to 28.1 million in 2016, down from 29 million in 2015, according to a federal report released Tuesday. The latest numbers from the U.S. Census Bureau showed the nation’s uninsured rate dropped to 8.8 percent. It had been 9.1 percent in 2015. Both the overall number of uninsured and the percentage are record lows. The latest figures from the Census Bureau...

More than a year ago, Yuba County, in Northern California, opened a 20-unit homeless shelter for temporary stays , and to date the 14Forward transitional housing program has helped nearly 100 people who were previously unsheltered. The ages of residents living in the 8-by-14-foot homes range from 18 to 82, many of whom were part of 2014’s rising homeless population among three unsafe Yuba River bottom encampments. The 14Forward program is the culmination of about 30 local government agencies...

When people in America are forced to live in fear because of their immigration status, their health and the health of our nation suffers. The specter of deportation has harmful effects on the health of families and children. Research shows that immigrant families often forgo needed medical care and social services because they fear interactions with public agencies. In addition, the toxic stress associated with fear of deportation has been demonstrated to have harmful effects on an...

Kwasi Seitu, 62, says he doesn't have post-traumatic stress disorder. Instead, he says, he has suffered from constant traumatic stress since he was a kid. Nearly 50 years after he experienced what he says was regular police brutality as a teen, talking about the abuse that sometimes included chokeholds makes Seitu emotional. He would be walking down the street, he explains, minding his own business and cops would roll up and demand to see identification. "Any resistance means they’re putting...

The imprisonment of a family member can have significant and long-lasting emotional and practical consequences for those who remain on the outside. Stigma and isolation often ensures these families remain hidden from statutory services, and withdrawn from community support, increasing their vulnerability. Increasing awareness is vital to ensuring these families receive the support they need to overcome the potential impact on their mental health, financial stability and social wellbeing.

We have talked a lot about how childhood trauma impacts emotional regulation and can leave us oscillating between anger and numbness (hyper- and hypo-arousal). But what are the other symptoms of trauma? In our newest infographic, we look at some of the other ways childhood trauma can leave its mark. This is by no means an exhaustive list. As ever, at Echo we don’t like to leave you with only the bad news. Check back next month for some of the characteristics and strengths of post-traumatic...

Fantastic motivational speech by Mr. Steve Harvey

Medication Assisted Treatment (M.A.T.) for opioid addiction is being vigorously touted and expanded across the country in response to the opioid crisis. The Substance Abuse Disorder treatment system is taking a page from the bio-medical model of disease that asserts that addictions are life-long, incurable brain disorders that require long-term (with no exit strategy) treatment with medications (Buprenorphine, Methadone, Naltrexone) Similar to the current bio-psychiatric, decontextualized...

Learning to work with Complex Trauma is the next big wave of mental health treatment. With research based on the ACEs Study setting the stage for a new diagnosis in the next DSM revision, you will want to be prepared and have advanced training in developmental and complex trauma. Based on the book Healing Developmental Trauma , the NeuroAffective Relational Model ™ is a powerful approach for addressing attachment, relational and developmental trauma. The NARM™ Practitioner Training is coming...