Tagged With "Abuse Mental Health"
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The Soulful Journey of Recovery: A Guide to Healing from a Traumatic Past for ACAs, Codependents, or Those with Adverse Childhood Experiences
A groundbreaking new book from Tian Dayton, PhD, and the publisher of the New York Times bestseller Adult Children of Alcoholics …The book that started it all! T ian Dayton picks up where Janet Woititz author of Adult Children of Alcoholics left off…..for those who have grown up in a family with addiction, mental illness, or other adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), the heartache and pain doesn’t end when they grow up and leave home. The legacy can last a lifetime and spread to generations...
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The Soulful Journey of Recovery is out TODAY!!!
A groundbreaking new book from the publisher of the New York Times bestseller Adult Children of Alcoholics …The book that started it all! "Tian Dayton picks up where Janet Woititz author of Adult Children of Alcoholics left off…..for those who have grown up in a family with addiction, mental illness, or other adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), the heartache and pain doesn’t end when they grow up and leave home. The legacy can last a lifetime and spread to generations unseen. In The...
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The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger [by Kate Pickett & Richard Wilkinson]
From book's book's page on Amazon: It is a well-established fact that in rich societies the poor have shorter lives and suffer more from almost every social problem. The Spirit Level , based on thirty years of research, takes this truth a step...
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The Surviving Spirit Newsletter March 2020
Hi Folks, The March edition of the Surviving Spirit Newsletter is posted at the website - http://newsletters.survivingspirit.com/index.php To sign up for an e-mail copy, please write to me @ mikeskinner@comcast.net or sign up @ Website via Contact Us. PDF - http://newsletters.survivingspirit.com/pdfs/2020-03The_Surviving_Spirit_Newsletter_March_2020.pdf Thanks! Michael. Healing the Heart Through the Creative Arts, Education & Advocacy Hope, Healing & Help for Trauma, Abuse &...
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The Surviving Spirit Newsletter May 2020
Hi Folks, The May edition of the Surviving Spirit Newsletter is posted at the website - http://newsletters.survivingspirit.com/index.php or PDF - http://newsletters.survivingspirit.com/pdfs/2020-05-The_Surviving_Spirit_Newsletter_May_2020.pdf To sign up for an e-mail copy, please write to me @ mikeskinner@comcast.net or sign up @ Website via Contact Us, Thanks! Michael . “ Alone we can do so little, together we can do so much.” - Helen Keller The Surviving Spirit Newsletter May 2020 – please...
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The Surviving Spirit Newsletter November 2019
Hi Folks, The latest edition of the Surviving Spirit Newsletter is posted at the website - http://newsletters.survivingspirit.com/index.php http://newsletters.survivingspirit.com/pdfs/2019-11-The_Surviving_Spirit_Newsletter_November_2019.pdf To sign up for an e-mail copy, please write to me @ mikeskinner@comcast.net or sign up @ Website via Contact Us, Thanks! Michael. Healing the Heart Through the Creative Arts, Education & Advocacy Hope, Healing & Help for Trauma, Abuse &...
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The upside of epigenetics - Change your genes, Change Your Life October 2018 release.
Hi all, Too often in our work we deal with the negative impact of epigenetics. Dr Ken Pelletier has written the book listed below, to help us address those negative impacts. (Full disclosure, I worked for Dr. Pelletier many years ago. I have the utmost respect for his work.) I am looking forward to reading it and learning new tools that can enhance resiliency and mitigate the impact of ACES. I have included the blurb about the book below, but you can check out his website and reviews for...
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The wealthy suffer from an ‘empathy gap’ with the poor that is feeding a rise in inequality
Hey everyone, I'm sharing this article here because it reminded me of some great books I read recently in my Masters of Public Health program. I'll be posting the books throughout the week, so stay tuned! Wealth and income inequality have many causes,...
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Thinking Developmentally: New book by Dr. Andrew Garner and Dr. Robert Saul
Review from Amazon: Childhood experiences can affect a person’s lifelong health. Thinking Developmentally presents a clinical framework for understanding the impact of toxic stress and both adverse and affiliative childhood experiences on development. It makes a compelling case that many diseases of adulthood are not adult-onset, but rather adult-manifest, based on genetic and epigenetic consequences from early childhood experiences. Garner and Saul examine the needs of children and the role...
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This veteran found a creative way to talk about his PTSD with his child. (upworthy.com)
Kastle created the children's book titled, "Why Is Dad So Mad?" to help explain to his 6-year-old daughter his struggles with PTSD. And when it was published, he read it to his daughter for the first time "There’s a section in the book where I describe the anger and things associated with PTSD as a fire inside my chest," he says. "After I first read the book to my daughter, I remember her saying, 'I'm sorry you have a fire in your chest now, Dad." According to the PTSD Foundation of America...
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Trauma-informed Healthcare Approaches: A Guide for Primary Care
Our recently published book, Trauma-informed Healthcare Approaches was written to share basic principles of trauma-informed care and ACEs science with general medical practitioners and administrators. As the recent #METOO movement has demonstrated, interpersonal trauma is widespread. A growing literature has demonstrated the impact of traumatic experiences on mental, physical health and wellbeing. Trauma survivors commonly access healthcare but their histories and needs are commonly...
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Trauma, Mindfulness and Neurobiology of Self (dvd video) 1 hour 20 minutes
This presentation by Jon Kabat-Zinn was excerpted from the 24th Annual International Trauma Conference held in Boston, MA. In recent years there has been increasing recognition of mindfulness and self-awareness as the foundations of emotional responsiveness, psychological change, and personal growth. This workshop highlights work that constitutes the cutting edge on the neurobiological foundations of stress resilience, mindfulness, the effects of trauma on self-awareness and...
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Treating the Traumatized Child: A Step-by-Step Family Systems Approach, by Scott P. Sells and Ellen Souder
I haven't read this, but it looks like it might be of interest to therapists and other practitioners. From Amazon: This is the first book that addresses trauma treatment for child and adolescents using a Family Systems Trauma (FST) model which goes beyond individual therapy to include the child and their entire family. Co-written by a renowned family therapist who created the Parenting with Love and Limits® model, it delivers a research-based , step-by-step approach that incorporates the...
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Unity Radio - ALL NEW Talking Wellness. Today's special guest is Michael Skinner
Unity Radio WUTY 97.9FM Worcester, MA ALL NEW Talking Wellness with Mike MacInnis. Today's special guest is Michael Skinner I'm particularly proud and happy about yesterday's "Talking Wellness" episode. Michael Skinner was a trailblazer in trauma informed peer support work, getting it done before people even knew it was a thing. A class act and genuine good guy. Definitely give this show a listen!
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UPDATED Information Regarding Broken Places, Cracked Up, Paper Tigers & Resilience: Hosting a Film Screening to Start or Grow an ACEs Initiative: How-to Guide
Movie screenings of documentaries, such as Paper Tigers or Resilience are popular ways to introduce communities to ACEs science. Cissy White provides details about how to put on a screening event.
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Victim to Victory: Memoir
I wrote Victim to Victory, healing generational abuse from my bloodline, during a seven-year journey of being very sick. I am not a writer. I am a healer. In those years of losing my ability to walk and having my family abandon me I turned inward, asking why and how do I get out of this straight jacket. I did everything imaginable, but the pain was chronic and my will was losing strength. In my darkest hours, I would hear a voice during my meditations. I had nothing to lose, so I followed...
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What Happens When Old and Young Connect (dailygood.org)
This year, for the first time ever, the U.S. has more people over 60 than under 18. That milestone has brought with it little celebration. Indeed, there are abundant concerns that America will soon be awash in a gray wave, spelling increased health care costs for an aging population, greater housing and transportation needs, and fewer young workers contributing to Social Security. Some fear a generational conflict over shrinking resources, a looming tension between kids and “canes.” As I...
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What Happens When Old and Young Connect (dailygood.org)
This year, for the first time ever, the U.S. has more people over 60 than under 18. That milestone has brought with it little celebration. Indeed, there are abundant concerns that America will soon be awash in a gray wave, spelling increased health care costs for an aging population, greater housing and transportation needs, and fewer young workers contributing to Social Security. Some fear a generational conflict over shrinking resources, a looming tension between kids and “canes.” As I...
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What The Health! Why Every American Should Watch This Documentary (wakeup-world.com)
Back when I was studying nutritional science in university, I began to seriously question what we were being taught. The alarm bells didn’t truly go off, however, until we ventured into the core of the program — dietary recommendations for health. I was quite surprised to discover these recommendations were nothing more than the USDA food pyramid developed in the early 1990s. Processed food heavy — with a staggering recommendation of 6-11 servings of bread, cereal, rice and pasta — the...
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Wheeling to Healing.....Broken Heart On A Bicycle
To ride a bicycle across the United States—Los Angeles to New Jersey—takes courage, a mission, and stamina. I did it twice. The first trip, during my mid-twenties, was done in hurt and fueled by anger. The second, at age 56, was done in the pursuit of healing self and others by collecting stories of other experiences of trauma and healing, dispensing information about human resilience, and sharing a deep belief in the power all people have to engage with and be enlightened by the process of...
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When Silence Reigns Help Yourself Through Expressive/Therapeutic Writing
The pain and darkness of adverse childhood experience gave birth to this book as well as my research and empathy for others with similar experience. We ACEs are often told what to do but not how to do it. This book shows my arduous journey of...
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Why I believe Gregory Williams, and his book, Shattered By The Darkness, will help save lives and revolutionize healthcare.
When you first hear about it, it sounds unlikely, fact that something that happened to someone in utero, at the age of two months, or four years, or any time in childhood, is what is killing them as an adult, or making them want to die, or making them want to hurt themselves or others. Yet the connection between childhood trauma and adult disease, mental illness, addiction, suicide, violence – most all of society’s ills – is as irrefutable as the myriad truths revealed about it in the...
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Why Intentionally Building Empathy Is More Important Now Than Ever (kqed.org)
Those in helping professions like teaching, social work, or medicine can buffer themselves from burnout and “compassion fatigue” with self-care strategies, including meditation and social support . A study of nurses in acute mental health settings found staff support groups helped buffer the nurses, but only if they were structured to minimize negative communication and focused on talking about challenges in constructive ways. English Professor Cris Beam also studies empathy and wrote a book...
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Your Survival Instinct Is Killing You: Retrain Your Brain to Conquer Fear and Build Resilience
Jane Stevens posted a descriptive blurb about this title, How Your Survival Instinct Is Killing You , back in January, and I thought, “Why the heck not?” After all, I read everything I can get my hands on, searching for that magic elixir that will fix the feeling that I’ve called by many names over the years: Despair. Fear. Hole in the soul. Nameless dread. Whatever you want to call it, some of you with a high ACE score might know what I’m talking about. (I also experienced a very traumatic...
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Mistreated: Why we think we're getting good health care and why we usually are wrong. The connection to Adverse Childhood Events
Mistreated: Why we think we are getting good health care and why we usually are wrong and the connection to Adverse Childhood Events Over the past two years, I have written a column for Forbes. On several occasions, I have highlighted the medical consequences of Adverse Childhood Events (ACE's) and Intimate Partner Violence (IPV). The data is clear. Both if not recognized and treated produce negative health care outcomes. Both are very prevalent and asking about each should be standard for...
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My Struggle by Karl Ove Knausgaard
I’ve just finished reading the third volume of My Struggle, by Karl Ove Knausgaard, a Norwegian whose six-volume memoir recounts in minute detail his traumatic experiences as a child and later as a husband and father of four. The fourth volume...
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Nadine Burke Harris debuts "The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity" in Philadelphia
Dr. Nadine Burke Harris debuted her book, The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity , at the Philadelphia Free Library this evening in a talk and book signing. This first stop in an ambitious book tour that crisscrosses the country reflects a mission that Burke Harris has pursued for nearly a decade: to spread the knowledge about the science of adverse childhood experiences, and about how people can use this knowledge to help solve our most intractable problems.
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New Book: Crazy Was All I Ever Knew By Alice M. Kenny (pseudonym)
To this day, I still think of my childhood home as "the crazy house." Like me, millions of adult Americans are living with the effects of the precarious childhoods they experienced as offspring of mentally ill parents. If you are one of them, you can no doubt relate to my book. As a child, you most likely lived in a crazy house of your own. As an adult, you’ve probably retained and may even relive memories of your tumultuous upbringing. Crazy Was All I Ever Knew combines memoir with...
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New book explores storytelling and resilience.
“Run,” he would shout. On two legs, I couldn’t match the speed of a terrified calf or steer, but I was plenty fast, especially in a sprint, so I’d launch myself across the gravel in front of our trailer while my father stood about ten yards behind me twirling his rope.
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New book release “The Trauma Banquet”: The truth about how to overcome adversity
I am a Professor of Clinical Psychology at The University of Queensland, Australia. I recently released my memoir “The Trauma Banquet”. In this book I share about my ACEs and how I learnt to be resilient in the context of their enduring pervasive echoes. I have been practicing psychology for almost 40 years and I have engaged thousands of clients in psychotherapy. As a full professor I have also been teaching psychology and conducting research, which has focused on building resilience in the...
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New documentary focuses on trauma faced by first-responders (sandiegouniontribune.com)
“Keeping the Peace,” a new documentary that recently premiered at the University of San Diego, brings to light the trauma often faced by first responders and encourages police officers, firefighters and others in the field to seek counseling when dealing with emotional issues. They’ve lost colleagues to suicide, had people die in their arms, seen horrifying injuries and had to tell family members about a loved one’s death. It takes a toll on law enforcement officers, firefighters and other...
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New film rethinking incarceration for women in Canada
A new documentary film has recently been released called Conviction. It is self-described as A COLLABORATIVE DOCUMENTARY FILM THAT ENVISIONS ALTERNATIVES TO PRISON THROUGH THE EYES OF WOMEN BEHIND BARS
I've recently seen the film and highly recommend it. The content is Canadian, but no doubt the issues the women deal with are universal.
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New Intervention Fact Sheet: Parent-Child Care [nctsn.org]
A 7-page fact sheet describing Parent-Child Care (PC-CARE) is now available. A dyadic psychotherapeutic intervention for enhancing the caregiver-child relationship and making behavior management more effective, PC-CARE combines teaching and coaching on how trauma exposure affects children’s mental health. Caregivers can be biological parents, relative caregivers, resource parents, grandparents, nannies, or anyone caring for a child. While caregivers play with the child, therapists coach...
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NEW MEMOIR BY A PSYCHOLOGIST WHO IS A SEXUAL ABUSE SURVIVOR
Hello Friends, My name is Carolee Tran and I'm a psychologist who is a survivor of sexual abuse. I teach at UC Davis and also have a private practice in mid-town Sacramento. I specialize in the treatment of trauma. I am writing to announce the publication of my book “The Gifts of Adversity: Reflections of a Psychologist, Refugee, and Survivor of Sexual Abuse. ” I felt compelled to write this book to help others- refugees, sexual abuse, and trauma survivors. I also felt a deep sense of...
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Nurturing Resilience: Helping Clients Move Forward from Developmental Trauma--An Integrative Somatic Approach
From Amazon: A practical, integrated approach for therapists working with people (both adults and children) who have been impacted by developmental trauma and attachment difficulties Kathy L. Kain and Stephen J. Terrell draw on fifty years of their combined clinical and teaching experience to provide this clear road map for understanding the complexities of early trauma and its related symptoms. Experts in the physiology of trauma, the authors present an introduction to their innovative...
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Opening Up by Writing It Down: How Expressive Writing Improves Health and Eases Emotional Pain, by James W. Pennebaker, PhD and Joshua M. Smyth, PhD
In my last post, I highlighted a book Vincent Felitti mentioned at the CAMFT conference in Orange County. In the same talk, Dr. Felitti also recommended a form of therapeutic writing developed by James Pennebaker to help individuals uncover painful emotions and heal trauma. Pennebaker's book Opening Up by Writing It Down: How Expressive Writing Improves Health and Eases Emotional Pain details the why and how. The Pennebaker method has been referenced elsewhere on ACEs Connection; I thought...
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Overcoming Educational Racism in Community Colleges (indiancountrymedianetwork.com)
Dr. Cynthia Lindquist, Ta'Sunka Wicahipi Win (Star Horse Woman), president of Cankdeska Cikana Community College on the Spirit Lake Reservation in North Dakota, is a contributing author to Overcoming Educational Racism in the Community College: Creating Pathways to Success for Minority and Impoverished Student Populations , edited by Angela Long. Written by several contributing educators, the book answers why students of color end their time at community colleges twice as often as middle to...
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Parent Handouts updated and available In Dari, English & Spanish
The updated parent handouts are now available in Spanish as well as English and Dari. Here's the blog post with links to all three versions of each flyer. All versions of the Understanding ACEs and Parenting to Prevent & Heal ACEs parent handouts can be downloaded, distributed, and used freely. Both flyers were made with generous support from Family Hui, a Program of Lead for Tomorrow, who is responsible for making the Spanish and Dari translations available. These are updates of the...
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Parenting through the Storm Book Review
Parenting Through the Storm: Find Help, Hope, and Strength When Your Child Has Psychological Problems , is written by Ann Douglas. The author, a member of this group and network , has a warm, open and honest tone. She's a parent and gets that parents and kids are sometimes or even often scared, struggling and in crisis. She knows. She writes about the time she almost lost her daughter, thirteen at the time, to death by suicide. Her daughter was vomiting and sleeping, restlessly, all night...
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Playing for Their Lives: The Global El Sistema Movement for Social Change Through Music (ssir.org)
In the world’s happiest country, we encountered one of the world’s most challenging Sistema environments. The United Nations World Happiness Report has ranked Denmark the happiest nation on earth, using internationally agreed-upon measures—of wealth, health, social welfare, generosity, and freedom—to rate happiness in 150 countries . Just outside of Aarhus, the Gellerup district is the largest housing project and the poorest neighborhood in Denmark. Fully 88 percent of its population is...
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Prevention Diaries by Larry Cohen [PreventionDiaries.org]
Prevention Diaries reveals the unexpected (yet foreseeable) parts of daily life that shape our health. Health happens in our communities and homes, not just at a doctor’s office, and many illnesses and injuries are preventable through commonsense solutions – saving lives and reducing burden on families, communities, and taxpayers. Prevention Diaries outlines why prevention is the solution to many social challenges, and what we can do to advance prevention. Topics include violence, the food...
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Prince Harry and Oprah’s New TV Series Could Change the Way We View Mental Health at Work (thriveglobal.com)
A couple of years ago, Prince Harry joined the ever-growing list of high-profile public figures who are opening up about their mental health struggles. “I can safely say that losing my mum at the age of 12, and therefore shutting down all of my emotions for the last 20 years, has had a quite serious effect on not only my personal life, but my work as well,” Harry said on a podcast for The Daily Telegraph . Now Harry and Oprah Winfrey are teaming up on a series for Apple TV+ that will debut...
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QUEST Movie: A Benefit for the Coalition on Homelessness
Quest-The Truth Always Rises" is an important film about trauma, love, and resilience. I know the film maker of Quest, and I know how passionate he is to help people understand about Adverse Childhood Experiences and what can happen when one person believes in you. Santiago Rizzo tells a compelling story of his childhood that all should see. His passion is contagious, and his willingness to speak about trauma, the power of love, and the need for honesty is powerful. I suggest folks go and...
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Recovering Your Sacredness
Building on culturally-based teachings, through the use of traditional stories and personal reflections, Jerry Tello shares the “medicine” and process to detox from, and break the cycles of painful, generational patterns, and harmful relationships; guiding the reader through a journey to recover one's sacredness . Recovering Your Sacredness re-introduces values and generational wisdom that are found in virtually every cultural tradition and spiritual school of thought. Tello lifts up these...
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Review of Carol Craig's book on ACEs in Scottish culture - Hiding in Plain Sight
An interesting article in Scottish Review by Andrew Hook who clearly had no prior knowledge of ACEs or the extent of Scotland's ill health. http://www.scottishreview.net/AndrewHook410a.html More information on the book can be found at http://www.postcardsfromscotland.co.uk/book13.html
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Season's Greetings!
Hello everyone! My name is Jesus and I am a new Community Manager here ACEs Connection. It just so happens that this is one of the groups that I get to work closest with and I wanted to say HAPPY HOLIDAYS before I go on winter break until early...
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Self Care Via Nutrition - An Anti-Antidepressant Approach
Whilst I'm not promoting this book, I am trusting Chris Kresser, a 'functional nutritionist', in his 'endorsement' of Dr Kelly Brogan, to a degree at least. It was Chris Kresser who really started a conversation years ago about gut health, way before the mainstream medical cohort were embracing it. As to a Paleo diet, it's fraught with contentious toing and froing of its benefits, or lack thereof. Depends who you listen to! Chris Kresser seems to have a more nuanced approach to Paleo...
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Self-Compassion for Teens
With teens today facing unprecedented levels of toxic stress, self-compassion is one way to nurture inner wisdom, promote self-kindness, and self-heal. Christopher Germer, author of the Mindful Path to Self-Compassion says my forthcoming book, Self-Compassion for Teens: 129 Activities & Practices to Cultivate Kindness is "just the ticket for parents, teachers, and counselors who know the burdens of modern teens and want to help." Tara Brach, author of True Refuge and Radical Acceptance...
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Struggling With Chronic Illness? HEAL is the One Documentary to Watch (wakeup-world.com)
The innate wisdom of the body can heal any disease, any disorder — if we would only get out of the way. This is the premise behind the documentary HEAL, which takes the mind-body connection to a whole new level with interviews from leading scientists, holistic practitioners, energy workers and medical doctors — including Kelly Brogan, M.D., Bruce Lipton, Ph.D., Dr. Deepak Chopra, Anthony Williams, among many others. While extremely valuable for situations of trauma and acute crisis like...
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Supernormal: The Untold Story of Adversity and Resilience by Meg Jay
From description on Amazon page for book: Clinical psychologist and author of The Defining Decade, Meg Jay takes us into the world of the supernormal: those who soar to unexpected heights after childhood adversity. Whether it is the loss of a parent to death or divorce; bullying; alcoholism or drug abuse in the home; mental illness in a parent or a sibling; neglect; emotional, physical or sexual abuse; having a parent in jail; or growing up alongside domestic violence, nearly 75% of us...