December 2019

What are adverse childhood experiences and how do they impact us later in life? In California, where I live and work as a sex and intimacy disorders specialist, there is a movement for mandatory adverse childhood experiences (ACES) assessment in all public and private medical and psychotherapeutic settings. So, regardless of an adult patient’s presenting issue(s) – medical, psychological, or both – clinicians would screen for childhood trauma. The reason for this push, which I strongly...

By Dan Salmon, EurekAlert!, December 13, 2019 A major study led by researchers at La Trobe University in Australia has identified key themes that will be used to inform strategies to support Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander parents in the first years of their children's lives. The Healing the Past by Nurturing the Future project aims to break the cycle of intergenerational and complex trauma experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander people, by co-designing...

What are adverse childhood experiences and how do they impact us later in life? In California, where I live and work as a sex and intimacy disorders specialist, there is a movement for mandatory adverse childhood experiences (ACES) assessment in all public and private medical and psychotherapeutic settings. So, regardless of an adult patient’s presenting issue(s) – medical, psychological, or both – clinicians would screen for childhood trauma. The reason for this push, which I strongly...

This article was written by Alissa Quart and co-published by the Economic hardship Project and the Boston Globe . To read the rest of this essay by Alissa Quart, go here.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has identified child maltreatment as a major public health concern, and adult survivors of child maltreatment are at significant risk of chronic disease and premature mortality. This constant exposure to child maltreatment makes these health care practitioners uniquely vulnerable to stressors associated with burnout.

Interventions in the Attachment and Relationship Problems Trauma Can Cause Julie De Wilde Alfred Adler Graduate School Abstract Much research has been done on the negative effects of trauma on attachment, which then has negative effects on relationships. Research more recently has focused on the positive post traumatic growth that can happen when clients receive safe, healthy attachment to a therapist they can trust. Research also includes the benefits to the client when a therapist includes...

An original story for MIT, published December 6, 2019. Having trouble paying attention? MIT neuroscientists may have a solution for you: Turn down your alpha brain waves. In a new study, the researchers found that people can enhance their attention by controlling their own alpha brain waves based on neurofeedback they receive as they perform a particular task. The study found that when subjects learned to suppress alpha waves in one hemisphere of their parietal cortex, they were able to pay...

Last week's "Hope for the Holidays" LIVE video event was a tremendous success. The hour long program can still be watched on the shatteredbythedarkness.com website. During the program it was mentioned that a FREE PDF would be offered to those listening. This free "Managing Holiday Stress E-Book" can emailed to you if you simply request it by emailing Dr. Gregory Williams at gawilli1@texaschildrens.org "Breaking the Silence with Dr. Gregory Williams" radio program can be heard every Sunday...

The wounds from your childhood are still fresh. Understanding the effects of childhood trauma and abuse isn't easy, but it's worth exploring if you ever want to move on. You grew up and did the best you could to let go and move on. But, you’ve also had a lot of struggles, especially with mental health and relationships. You’ve suffered from anxiety. You don’t feel lovable. You haven’t been able to find love that works. You’re afraid of wanting too much. Maybe you have an eating disorder. You...

Many people use the phrase CPTSD to stand for PTSD from complex trauma. To me, C-PTSD means cancer and PTSD. I have cancer and I’m a trauma survivor. I’m a survivor with cancer but not yet a cancer survivor. Will I be a survivor squared?

“…Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding…. And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy; much of your pain is self-chosen. It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self….” – From The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran There are many kinds of loss that we can encounter in life. However, losses surrounding addiction can be particularly confusing; they tend...

By Mathina Calliope, Longreads, December 3, 2019 In 2014 my doctor took me off the antidepressant I had credited with making life okay for the previous 16 years; at 41 I was trying to have a baby with my boyfriend, Inti. I didn’t get pregnant, but this story isn’t about my failure to become a mother. Instead it’s about how a break from my meds led, ultimately and circuitously, to another kind of birth; to a different life for myself. My doctor’s orders seemed rash. Going off antidepressants...