Tagged With "Adoptive Foster Parents Can Teach"
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Harvard Infographic on ACEs and Toxic Stress
This was just posted by Harvard. I thought all of us could use access to it, for use in our schools and the settings we work in. The full image is on the attached PDF.
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Healing ACEs
I am writing you this post as a past president of the Michigan Association of School Psychologists and adoptive father of two foster children with special needs. My wife, Barbara, and I have written two books concerning educating and raising abused and abandoned children. Because these books will be helpful to both parents and teachers I am posting this letter to education and parenting pages. They are: Some Way Home – A Memoir in a Myth and Crossing Infinity – Healing Our Children Ourselves...
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Healing Developmental Trauma
Last week I posted an article about the Harvard study on happiness, which found that strong social connections are the primary driver of happiness. No surprise there. What struck me, however, is how these findings relate to ACEs. I had just finished reading Healing Developmental Trauma: How Early Trauma Affects Self-Regulation, Self-Image, and the Capacity for Relationship , which addresses this very issue. From the back cover: “Although it may seem that people suffer from an endless number...
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Healing From Childhood Trauma — AVAIYA University online course, July 29 - Aug. 6
AVAIYA University is hosting a free online class, Healing From Childhood Trauma, July 29 - August 6, that features 18 physicians, therapists, psychologists & more who share life-changing strategies to heal from childhood trauma. Featured in the course are Dr. Dan Siegel on "Trauma & Mindfulness", Dr. Jamie Marich on "Healing the Wounds of Childhood Trauma", and Ann Kelley and Sue Marriott on "U nderstanding Unresolved Attachment to Heal From Loss & Trauma." I'm doing a session on...
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Healing in place: Game on to flip the COVID19 threat into a positive experience for our children
As I was considering the children sheltering-in-place this morning and reflecting on lessons from my own childhood, I wondered: Can we heal-in-place too? I was born after the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, another collective trauma affecting everyone. Yet, it was nevertheless passed on to me by the adults in my life in the form of constant reminders that the U.S. could be blown into bits any second. When I started school, there were constant “hide under the chair” earthquake drills I took to be...
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Healing Is Possible
I devoted half of my book, Childhood Disrupted , to science-based interventions on how individuals can heal from the effects of ACEs. Here are some of the basics. H ere are some really important healing steps we can all take – which the science shows can help reverse the changes to our brains and DNA that might have occurred, growing up with ACES Writing to heal. Research shows individuals who write about emotional upheavals and stressful experiences for 20 minutes each day, over a period of...
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Healing through Trauma through Writing & Peer Support (www.grassgetsgreener.com)
I was interviewed by Melissa Wilson for The Grass Gets Greener podcast. She's interviewed over 100 survivors and I was honored to speak about developmental trauma, PTSD and the healing process - and even a little about ACEs and this group. It's a little bit embarrassing to share here because I have not exactly been speedy when it comes to healing. The process, which started in my early 20's, had been slow and isolating. However, I know I'm not unique and in general, there's still too little...
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Health Care's Role in Meeting Patients' Needs [rwjf.org]
By the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, July 11, 2019. Purpose The purpose of this call for proposals is to identify grantees who can lead an effort to provide: Part I: Clear Principles that set a high standard for the health care sector to provide equitable care that fully addresses people’s physical, emotional, and social needs; and Part II: Guidance for implementing care delivery that is fully responsive to patients’ goals, needs, and life circumstances, using maternal morbidity and...
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Health Care System Fails Many Transgender Americans (npr.org)
In the basement of Casa Ruby in Washington, D.C., transgender men and women in their late teens and 20s, mostly brown or black, shared snacks, watched TV, chatted or played games on their phones. Many of them, said Corado, are part of the 31 percent. That's 31 percent of transgender Americans who lack regular access to health care. The finding comes from a new poll by NPR, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Corado pointed to one crucial word...
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Health Starts at Home
Hello, I thought I would post a little bit about the Health Starts at Home project we have began in West Virginia and some of the tools we are providing to parents. Our project is in a federally qualified health center and is aimed at screening for ACEs in children and prenatal patients. We are hoping to capture patients and children who have experienced 4 or more ACEs and provide information, education and resources to alleviate the effects of the toxic stress ACEs cause. In terms of...
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This Chicago doctor stumbled on a hidden epidemic of fetal brain damage (PBS.org)
CHICAGO — The agitated mom had three kids in foster care and she wanted them back. But she didn’t understand how to parent. She’d never worked. She had a short fuse. She was slow and didn’t seem to learn from experience. Dr. Carl Bell studied the young woman. Flat cheeks. Thin upper lip. Folds at the corner of her eyes. It hit him like a thunderbolt: She had subtle features of fetal alcohol syndrome. Bell had seen thousands of patients like this over the past 40 years and been baffled by...
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Healthy Spaces December 2019 Webinars
Healthy Spaces: Promoting Healthy and Resilient Communities December 2019 Webinars Funding provided by the New Jersey Department of Children and Families The New Jersey Chapter, American Academy of Pediatrics (NJAAP) believes that all children deserve to feel safe and secure in their home, at school, and while at play. The Healthy Spaces program aims to address adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) through partnerships with pediatric/family healthcare teams, schools and communities.
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Helicopter vs. Free-Range Parenting: How The Child-Rearing Techniques Affect Kids' Adult Lives [MedicalDaily.com]
Parents often say that raising a child is one of the most rewarding and important roles you'll ever play. While there is no clear “best” way to raise a child, recent survey results from Kobe University in Japan have revealed the lasting effects that different rearing techniques can have on children’s personalities, wealth, and overall happiness after they’ve left the nest. For the project, the researchers surveyed 5,000 women and men about their relationships with their parents during...
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Helping A Child Whose Parent is Struggling with Addiction [npr.org]
By Kavitha Cardoza, National Public Radio, February 6, 2020 What can you do if you're a teacher, a neighbor, a churchgoer, a coach ... and you suspect a child is being impacted by a parent's addiction? Maybe you're thinking, "I'd love to help but it's not my business." Or "I want to reach out but I don't know much about addiction." Remember that episode of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood, where he tells children to "look for the helpers"? You can be that helper simply by being present for the...
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Helping children from going limbic (www.fatherhoodchannel.com)
Cissy's note: Excerpts from the most helpful article I have read so far about parenting during COVID-19 are below, from the Fatherhood Channel. It reminds me that my curiosity, interest, and ability to offer a safe space are most important even if my inclination is to want to know what to say and to do. It's an article that helped me exhale instead of feeling guilty - and that alone is a relief.
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Helping Children in Emergencies: Keep Your Child’s Developmental Stage and Temperament in Mind
By Karissa Luckett, RN, BSN, MSW Common reactions to stress will fade over time for most children. Let’s be honest: Your exploring, tactile toddler won’t suddenly start keeping their hands to themselves. Your continually forgetful preschooler won’t suddenly start hand-washing properly just because you’ve told them it’s important. Depending on their ages, stages and temperaments, some children will require more reassurance or more time to shift than others. This situation is unique, and so is...
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Helping Children Succeed—Without the Stress [TheAtlantic.com]
In the now-famous “marshmallow” experiments, researchers at Stanford tested preschoolers’ self-control and ability to delay gratification by sitting them in a room alone with a tempting treat and measuring how long they were able to wait. Years later, those kids who resisted temptation the longest also tended to have the highest academic achievement. In fact, their ability to delay eating the marshmallow was a better predictor of their future academic success than their IQ scores. Further...
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Helping Children Take a Mindful SEAT to Calm Down (mindful.org)
A simple mindful exercise to help older children manage feelings of overwhelm, stay in the present moment, and not get caught up in strong emotions and thoughts. Our thoughts are often racing off to the past and future, overwhelming us with emotions , or distracting us. But we can teach ourselves and our kids to check in to the present moment by getting in touch with our senses and emotions, thoughts and the actions that we want to take, and then learn how to manage that anxiety more...
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Helping Families Stay Regulated during a Pandemic
As our communities struggle to do what is needed to keep people safe and families work to find a new a “normal” while caring for and educating children at home full time – it can be a lot to handle. Child psychologist and trauma expert, Dr. Bruce Perry offered 8 tips for helping children stay regulated in this recent article from Psychology Today . Dr. Perry was also a part of this video resource for parents, Staying sane while Parenting with Shelter-in-Place! For service providers who would...
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Helping Kids Find the Wisdom in Overwhelm
In an unprecedented global shutdown, many of us, especially without the noise and distraction of everyday life, are facing intensified, often destabilizing feelings. And that includes kids—whether they’re able to say so or not.
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Helping New Parents Make Room for Uncertainty
A new program for parents and infants, thanks to generous support from Mill Town Capital , is coming to Pittsfield, Massachusetts. The Hello It’s Me Project shines a spotlight on these tender new relationships, investing resources around the birth of a baby with the long-term goal of building a healthy community from the bottom up. When world-renowned child development researcher Dr. Ed Tronick spoke in the spring of 2018 for an audience of a wide variety of practitioners in Berkshire County...
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Helping Parents Develop Positive Relationships with their infants to toddlers (National Partnership to End Interpersonal Violence,NPEIV).
Zero to Three Resource- extracted from website and with discussion text by Karin Hecht (September 14, 2018) Bonding activities between parent and child can be a great way to help a child’s development and strengthen the relationship. The Zero to Three website has great resources for child-centered activities to help little ones learn and grow. One particularly useful resource for parents and care providers are a collection of stage-by-stage age-based tips and what to expect as your baby...
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Helping Someone with PTSD: Helping a Loved One While Taking Care of Yourself (www.helpguide.org/)
"PTSD can take a heavy toll on relationships. It can be hard to understand your loved one’s behavior—why they are less affectionate and more volatile. You may feel like you’re walking on eggshells or living with a stranger. You may have to take on a bigger share of household tasks, deal with the frustration of a loved one who won’t open up, or even deal with anger or disturbing behavior. The symptoms of PTSD can also lead to job loss, substance abuse, and other problems that affect the whole...
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Helping Young Children Exposed to Trauma: A Systems Approach to Implementing Trauma-Informed Care [chdi.org]
By Alysse Loomis, Ph.D. Kellie Randall, Ph.D. Jason Lang, Ph.D., CHDI, June 2019. This IMPACT provides a summary of the research on the effects of early trauma exposure, discusses what Connecticut is doing across systems to support young children who have experienced trauma, and outlines a framework to expand Connecticut's robust system of trauma-informed care for older children to include younger children. There are more than 228,000 children under the age of six years old in Connecticut,...
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Hijacked by PTSD (www.parentingwithPTSD.com)
This was written by Joyelle Brandt. She is one of the co-editors of the Trigger Points Anthology which is being expanded and re-branded under the name Parenting with PTSD in June. Joyelle and co-editor Dawn (member of this group), will be joining us for a Parenting with PTSD & ACEs chat on June 13th. We'll get to talk more about their website, book, parenting and lives. Anxiety hijacked my day today. It showed up out of the blue this morning, this frantic, anxious feeling that hounded me...
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Holding Space for Our Kids?
This is an excellent article about "holding space" published a few days ago in Uplift . The visuals are exceptional. It's making me think about 'holding space' as it pertains to parenting. For me, it can be harder for me to drop my "I'm in the mom teaching role" and just hold space, as a parent. To listen rather than advise. To be with rather than make better. To offer myself rather than impose myself. To accept where my kid is at in a moment and be with that moment - and her - at the same...
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Home nursing visits provide wide-ranging benefits for mothers, young children (edsource.org)
Children born to low-income, first-time mothers who received home nursing visits showed increased mental health, stronger social and emotional development and academic gains, according to researchers who analyzed the impact of the Nurse-Family Partnership program, one of the largest home visiting programs in the country. The research team that conducted the analysis was led by James Heckman, a Nobel Laureate in economics and professor and director of the Center for Economics of Human...
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HOPE, Engagement, and COVID19
As children grow and develop, engaging with the larger community around them provides a sense of “mattering” — a sense that their participation in the community really does matter. The emergency conditions now in effect provide numerous opportunities to children and teens to pitch in. Here are a few ideas . . .
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HOPE in the time of Coronavirus: Inequities and Supporting Children
Today's blog is reposted from https: positiveexperience.org/blog/ Link there for the hyperlinks, and for other in this series. Having safe, stable, and equitable environments to live, learn and play forms the second of the 4 Building Blocks of HOPE. Children need homes where they feel safe and secure and have their basic needs met. Children thrive in an environment that encourages curiosity and provides opportunities for learning to play and interact with other children. Today’s blog is...
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How a bench and a team of grandmothers can tackle depression (bbc.com)
Zimbabwe is pioneering a groundbreaking mental health programme with stunning results – and the rest of the world is taking note. Globally, more than 300 million people suffer from depression , according to the World Health Organization. Depression is the world’s leading cause of disability and it contributes to 800,000 suicides per year, the majority of which occur in developing countries. No one knows how many Zimbabweans suffer from kufungisisa, the local word for depression (literally,...
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How a School Ditched Awards and Assemblies to Refocus on Kids and Learning (www2.kqed.org)
Together with the staff, they decided that handing out awards neither aligned with their beliefs nor brought out the best in their students—even for the sliver of kids who received awards. “Winners” got the message that product rather than process is what matters in education, Wejr said. “Learning should be the reward,” he added. And the far more plentiful “losers” heard that they weren’t good enough to be spotlighted on stage, or that their unique combination of attributes didn’t truly...
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How Child Care Enriches Mothers, and Especially the Sons They Raise [NYTimes.com]
As many American parents know, hiring care for young children during the workday is punishingly expensive, costing the typical family about a third of its income. Helping parents pay for that care would be expensive for society, too. Yet recent studies show that of any policy aimed to help struggling families, aid for high-quality care has the biggest economic payoff for parents and their children — and even their grandchildren. It has the biggest positive effect on women’s employment and...
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How Childhood Stress Can Knock 20 Years Off Your Life (www.theguardian.com)
Note: A friend sent this article to my boyfriend about that "ACE stuff" this weekend. I sense tipping point. Here are some excerpts from the article by Paul Cocozza. T here is a scene in James Redford’s new film, Resilience , in which a paediatrician cites a parental misdeed so outmoded as to seem bizarre. “Parents used to smoke in the car with kids in the back and the windows rolled up,” she says, incredulous. How long ago those days now seem; how wise today’s parents are to the dangers of...
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How do we end the cycle of childhood trauma passed from parents to kids? | Brain Trust [inquirer.com]
By Abraham Gutman, The Philadelphia Inquirer, November 9, 2019 Growing up in Philadelphia can be a traumatizing experience. Poverty, hunger, gun violence, evictions, and mass incarceration are just some of the difficult experiences that bear down on children here. Over the last couple of decades, public health researchers and policymakers have increasingly recognized that the body "remembers” childhood trauma, and these experiences at a young age can predict illness, risky behavior, and...
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How do you Stop Abusive Relationships? Teach Teens to be Respectful Partners (nationswell.com)
These NYC-based organizations are educating teens of all gender expressions about what makes romance healthy. Even though her high school had a guidance counselor, it was a meeting with her school’s RAPP (Relationship Abuse Prevention Program) coordinator, Ellen*, that helped her find the support she needed to end the relationship. “I didn’t go to my guidance counselor because they weren’t there to help with emotional issues,” Diana said. Unlike traditional counselors, RAPP coordinators are...
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How Does Trauma Affect a Person’s Interaction with Their Child? (www.nicabm.com) & Commentary
Has anyone seen this video posted on the National Institute for the Clinical Application of Behavioral Medicine (NICAMB) blog? "According to Dr. Ruth Lanius, a parent's experience of trauma can impact their ability to form a close, intimate relationship with their child." Ruth Buczynski, PhD Those of us Parenting with ACEs sure know that's the truth. Developmental trauma impacts our ability to form close and intimate relationships with ourselves, other adults and our children. The video was...
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How It Feels & How We Heal: Parenting with ACEs Chat Quotes (You Tube, Database, PDFs, Links)
Parenting with ACEs is sharing inspiration, information, and expertise from our chat series in 3 formats. Parenting with ACEs: How It Feels & How We Heal Quote Collection (pdf version below as well) Quotes Database (pdf version below as well) Links to Chat Transcripts and before and after-the-chat blog posts. Thanks to everyone who showed up, who shared, and who is doing the important work that is our mission (prevent ACEs, heal trauma, build resilience). We know that work happens...
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How Mindfulness Can Help Kids (and Parents!) Weather Emotional Storms (pbs.org)
All children have times when they become overwhelmed, overloaded or overstimulated. In her new book Under Pressure , psychologist Dr. Lisa Damour shares the helpful phrase, “Let’s settle your glitter.” Imagine a bottle filled with water and glitter. Now shake it vigorously: that’s a child’s brain during an emotional meltdown. My favorite technique — with preschools and adults — is mindful breathing. When we are anxious or upset, our breathing often becomes rapid and shallow. It’s a normal...
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How Much Free Time?
Be There. But Not Too There. My parents worked. A lot. But they made sure they were home every night, and they were there every morning. And they were very diligent about the important stuff. They checked that I did my homework. But in the hours between getting home from school and going to bed, my sister and I were left to our own devices. So, my afternoons could be spent doing any number of things, from bothering my sister to listening to music with her to watching the Diff'rent...
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How Neuroscience Can Help Your Kid Make Good Choices (greatergood.berkeley.edu)
Self-regulation may sound like a tall order—but it’s also the best choice, according to Erin Clabough, a neuroscientist, mother of four, and author of the book Second Nature: How Parents Can Use Neuroscience to Help Kids Develop Empathy, Creativity, and Self-Control . Self-regulation is a skill that we need whenever we want to make a good choice or work toward a goal, especially when strong feelings are involved—in ourselves or others. Unfortunately, the qualities that support...
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How Neuroscience Can Help Your Kid Make Good Choices (mindful.org)
Imagine the following scenario: Your eight-year-old son is repeatedly poked with a pencil by his classmate at school. How does he respond? He might endure the pokes without complaint by using willpower, or he might stay silent, succumbing to feelings of fear or powerlessness. He could lose his self-control and act out, attacking his classmate verbally or poking him back. Or does your son “self-regulate” by considering his options and resources, taking stock of his feelings and strengths,...
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How One Connection at CYW’s ACEs Conference Sparked Awareness into Action
Origins offers a number of training and consulting services. We developed The Basics as a half-day session to provide the foundation to support trauma-informed and resilience practices across sectors and industries. The session includes an overview of the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study, the neurobiology of toxic stress, the impact of social and historical trauma, and the science of resilience. We have tested The Basics with two cross-sector audiences, in Los Angeles and Phoenix.
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How Parental Incarceration Affects a Child’s Education [TheAtlantic.com]
This past summer,The Atlantics Sarah Yager wrote about the rising popularity of prison nurseries as a means of saving costs, enhancing morale, and reducing recidivism among the ever-growing female inmate population. Such...
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How poor phone etiquette (or “phubbing”) affects the child of divorce
Posted on April 6, 2016 by Linda Jacobs There she sat at a fast-food restaurant, single mom alone with her daughter. The place was mostly empty. A worker was mopping the floor, and the little girl was fascinated with his chore. Her mom was glued to her cell phone. The little girl’s dinner sat at the table, untouched except for a few french fries she’d poke in her mouth as she ran back to the table every so often. Maybe it’s because I’m cognizant of what kids of divorce go through and aware...
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How School Closures Can Strengthen Your Family (greatergood.berkeley.edu)
Here in the U.S., millions of families are dealing with school closures. The number of students around the world whose education has been interrupted by the coronavirus is approaching 400 million, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization. As closed schools ramp up for online learning, we can retool in our families, too. Here are three practical ways families can cope—and even thrive—despite school closures, event cancellations, and a whole lot more...
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How Self-Compassion Can Help Teens De-stress (mindful.org)
Teen stress is on the rise. According to a new study, learning mindfulness and self-compassion can help a teen cope. In a 2014 national survey conducted by the American Psychological Association, 31 percent of adolescents aged 13 to 17 said that their stress increased in the previous year, and 42 percent said they were not doing enough to manage their stress. Adolescents who experience frequent stress are more prone to depression and perform worse in school Many teens turn to external...
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How straight parents can raise kids to be allies, during Pride Month and beyond (www.Washingpost.com)
Excepts from an article b y B onnie J. Rough in the Washington Post: Read more of this article by B onnie J. Rough in the Washington Post.
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How Supportive Housing Uplifts Families in Crisis [rwjf.org]
Editor’s Note : Although foster care placement is sometimes necessary to ensure the safety and well-being of children, research indicates that keeping families together is generally a better for children, parents, and the community. Working with the Corporation for Supportive Housing, RWJF launched Keeping Families Together in 2007. The program helps vulnerable families like Irma’s grow stronger, safer and healthier so that children—and their parents—might thrive. We are resurfacing this...
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How to Be a Good Parent Even If You Didn't Have One (www.rainbowkids.net)
Eight years ago I wrote a brief review of The Whole Parent: How to be a Good Parent Even if You Didn't Have One by Debra Wesselmann. It was, and still is one of the few titles on this important topic. While the article is older, and geared towards adoptive parents, the content is still useful and this book can help any of us who are Parenting with ACEs. Here's an excerpt: This book is fantastic because it manages to be non-shaming about our weak spots while stressing the importance of...