I suffered constant physical and mental abuse and a child and witnessed my brother being abused (often the abuse occurred with us both at the same time). It got to the point of having enough around the age of thirteen. I rebelled in a constant state of rage, venturing into alcohol and drugs, crime, violence. At the age of seventeen I was arrested and sentenced to serve the rest of my life in prison. Resilience: Early in my prison term I had a spiritual awakening. Turned my life around.

KQED is the National Public Radio affiliate in San Francisco, CA. We’d like to hear from adults (18+) who were separated from their parents when they were children. Perhaps the separation was due to economic reasons, war and conflict, incarceration, foster care, or something else. How did that period of separation impact you in the long-run? How has it impacted your connection to others and how you build relationships? If you're a parent, how does it influence how you parent? We’re...

Hi everyone, I am in the process of synthesizing resources and best practices for trauma-informed services for formerly incarcerated populations.  I am specifically interested in community-based mental health and substance abuse treatment services, housing related assistance, job-training assistance, and case management and civil legal services.  Do any of you have good examples or models of trauma-informed care for these types of services, specifically for formerly...

Hi Stephanie - in Lancaster County, PA, we have been working over the past several years to "build the foundation for a trauma-informed criminal justice system". We started by providing the following trainings for criminal justice professionals, using nationally developed curricula: 1) trained entire staff of our county prison and entire staff of our county adult probation & parole department using SAMHSA's "How Being Trauma-Informed Improves Criminal Justice System Responses" (400 CO's...