Support legislation to protect and benefit children, families, communities before the end of the 117th Congress.

@Jeoffry Gordon posted:

First I do not know how your remarks relate to the issue that we need to continue fundamental USA federal support for the whole panoply of interventions to support preventive, social and therapeutic interventions in cases of child abuse and neglect.

Secondly, the text you quote outlines or approximates decades of research documenting the bio-physiology associated with childhood trauma from abuse or neglect. It is foundational to what we have consensually accepted as PACES science. It describes how people's bodies respond to trauma, but does not rise to the level of scientific cause and effect. This physiologic understanding guides successful therapeutic interventions.

Thirdly, personally I love sarcasm, but I think yours is misplaced. Nowhere in your quote does it indicate the proper or best response is pharmaceutical. In fact, drugs seem to be consistently less potent in maltreated traumatized patients. PACES experience is that cognitive-behavioral therapy (with the emphasis on behavioral) works best with approaches ranging from talk therapy to EMDR to yoga, etc. I am aware of at least one good small study where CBT reversed documented epigenetic abnormalities.

Open up and enjoy the sunlight!

@Frank Sterle Jr. posted:

[The following italicized/bold text within quotation marks is from the book Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal. The intervening sarcasm in regular text is mine.]

_______________

“When the brain can’t moderate our biological stress response, it goes into a state of constant hyperarousal and reactivity. Inflammatory hormones and chemicals keep coursing through the body at the slightest provocation.

In other words, when a child is young and his brain is still developing, if he is repeatedly thrust into a state of fight or flight, this chronic stress state causes these small, chemical markers to disable the genes that regulate the stress response – preventing the brain from properly regulating its response for the rest of his life.”

I didn’t know that. But then I didn’t need to, since I’m already sedated via pharmaceuticals.

“The children who’d been maltreated and separated from their parents showed epigenetic changes in specific sites on the human genome that determine how appropriately and effectively they will later respond to life’s stressors.

Seth Pollak, PhD, professor of psychology and director of the Child Emotion Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin, found that fifty children with a history of adversity and trauma showed changes in a gene that helps to manage stress by signaling the cortisol response to quiet down so that the body can return to a calm state after a stressor. But because this gene was damaged, the body couldn’t rein in its heightened stress response. Says Pollak, ‘A crucial set of brakes are off’.”

Really? No one told me that. Still, I should feel better when I take my tranquilizers.

“When the HPA stress axis is overloaded in childhood or the teenage years, it leads to long-lasting side effects – not just because of the impact stress has on us at that time in our lives, but also because early chronic stress biologically reprograms how we will react to stressful events for our entire lives. That long-term change creates a new physiological set point for how actively our endocrine and immune function will churn out a damaging cocktail of stress neurochemicals that barrage our bodies and cells when we’re thirty, forty, fifty, and beyond.

Once the stress system is damaged, we overrespond to stress and our ability to recover naturally from that reactive response mode is impaired. We’re always responding. … Imagine for a moment that your body receives its stress hormones and chemicals through an IV drip that’s turned on high when needed, and when the crisis passes, it’s switched off again. Now think of it this way: kids whose brains have undergone epigenetic changes because of early adversity have an inflammation-promoting drip of fight-or-flight hormones turned on high every day – and there is no off switch.

When the HPA stress system is turned on and revved to go all the time, we are always caught in that first half of the stress cycle. We unwittingly marinate in those inflammatory chemicals for decades, which sets the stage for symptoms to be at full throttle years down the road – in the form of irritable bowel syndrome, autoimmune disease, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, fibroid tumors, ulcers, heart disease, migraines, asthma, and cancer.”

What, me worry? Don’t need to because of convenient chemical sedation of formidable symptoms! Thank you, Big Pharma!

First I do not know how your remarks relate to the issue that we need to continue fundamental USA federal support for the whole panoply of interventions to support preventive, social and therapeutic interventions in cases of child abuse and neglect.

Secondly, the text you quote outlines or approximates decades of research documenting the bio-physiology associated with childhood trauma from abuse or neglect. It is foundational to what we have consensually accepted as PACES science. It describes how people's bodies respond to trauma, but does not rise to the level of scientific cause and effect. This physiologic understanding guides successful therapeutic interventions.

Thirdly, personally I love sarcasm, but I think yours is misplaced. Nowhere in your quote does it indicate the proper or best response is pharmaceutical. In fact, drugs seem to be consistently less potent in maltreated traumatized patients. PACES experience is that cognitive-behavioral therapy (with the emphasis on behavioral) works best with approaches ranging from talk therapy to EMDR to yoga, etc. I am aware of at least one good small study where CBT reversed documented epigenetic abnormalities.

Open up and enjoy the sunlight!

[The following italicized/bold text within quotation marks is from the book Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal. The intervening sarcasm in regular text is mine.]

_______________

“When the brain can’t moderate our biological stress response, it goes into a state of constant hyperarousal and reactivity. Inflammatory hormones and chemicals keep coursing through the body at the slightest provocation.

In other words, when a child is young and his brain is still developing, if he is repeatedly thrust into a state of fight or flight, this chronic stress state causes these small, chemical markers to disable the genes that regulate the stress response – preventing the brain from properly regulating its response for the rest of his life.”

I didn’t know that. But then I didn’t need to, since I’m already sedated via pharmaceuticals.

“The children who’d been maltreated and separated from their parents showed epigenetic changes in specific sites on the human genome that determine how appropriately and effectively they will later respond to life’s stressors.

Seth Pollak, PhD, professor of psychology and director of the Child Emotion Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin, found that fifty children with a history of adversity and trauma showed changes in a gene that helps to manage stress by signaling the cortisol response to quiet down so that the body can return to a calm state after a stressor. But because this gene was damaged, the body couldn’t rein in its heightened stress response. Says Pollak, ‘A crucial set of brakes are off’.”

Really? No one told me that. I could really use some psychotherapy, but I cannot afford it. Still, I should feel better when I take my tranquilizers.

“When the HPA stress axis is overloaded in childhood or the teenage years, it leads to long-lasting side effects – not just because of the impact stress has on us at that time in our lives, but also because early chronic stress biologically reprograms how we will react to stressful events for our entire lives. That long-term change creates a new physiological set point for how actively our endocrine and immune function will churn out a damaging cocktail of stress neurochemicals that barrage our bodies and cells when we’re thirty, forty, fifty, and beyond.

Once the stress system is damaged, we overrespond to stress and our ability to recover naturally from that reactive response mode is impaired. We’re always responding. … Imagine for a moment that your body receives its stress hormones and chemicals through an IV drip that’s turned on high when needed, and when the crisis passes, it’s switched off again. Now think of it this way: kids whose brains have undergone epigenetic changes because of early adversity have an inflammation-promoting drip of fight-or-flight hormones turned on high every day – and there is no off switch.

When the HPA stress system is turned on and revved to go all the time, we are always caught in that first half of the stress cycle. We unwittingly marinate in those inflammatory chemicals for decades, which sets the stage for symptoms to be at full throttle years down the road – in the form of irritable bowel syndrome, autoimmune disease, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, fibroid tumors, ulcers, heart disease, migraines, asthma, and cancer.”

What, me worry? Don’t need to because of convenient chemical sedation of formidable symptoms! Thank you, Big Pharma!

This is an important notice. In all the partisan bickering in Washington renewal of necessary ongoing federal legislation to support child welfare and distressed families is being overlooked and may not get renewed. Use the email template and links to send legislators your INDIVIDUAL support for these programs. Every letter helps.