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Foster care is a crucial system designed to provide temporary homes and care for children who are unable to live with their biological families. While foster care aims to offer stability and support, the experience can be emotionally complex for children. One emotion that often plagues foster children is guilt. Guilt can arise from a range of circumstances and can significantly impact a child's emotional well-being and overall development. This article delves into the various sources of...

Coping skills and stress management are essential for parents as they face unique challenges and responsibilities. Here are some coping strategies and a brief history of stress management techniques that can be helpful: Self-Care: Parents should prioritize self-care to maintain their well-being. This includes getting enough sleep, eating healthily, exercising regularly, and taking breaks when needed. Don’t underestimate the impact of taking a few minutes to yourself. Taking care of your...

Our speaker for the August PACEs Connection Cooperative of Communities meeting will share ways of building community connections we may not have thought of before – starting with trust in the earliest and most important relationships – as well as some challenging news, exciting resources, and timely inspiration. Cooperative of Communities members and members of their communities are invited to join us tomorrow, August 8, 2023, at 10 a.m. PT, Noon CT, and 1 p.m. ET when we welcome Deborah...

Last November, a government study estimated that nearly 1.5 million people in Japan were living as recluses CREDIT: Eri Miura/Getty By Nikola Smith, The Telegraph, July 31, 2023 For seven years in the prime of his youth, Hiroki Takimoto barely emerged from a bedroom in his parents’ home, reading old books, playing video games and eating, as he tried to hide himself from the world. Now 42 and fully recovered from a syndrome known in Japan as ‘hikikomori’ – or ‘shut-ins’ – the professional...

By Mary Beth Miotto and Robin Cogan, Photo: Unsplash, New England Journal of Medicine, July 6, 2023 “I was working in my preschool health office when the loudspeaker came on, but this time, it was not the voice of the school principal, it was the sound of gunshots. I had no students in my office, so I locked the door, covered the glass, closed the blinds, and hid in the corner. I had no idea if this was an unannounced lockdown drill or an active shooter in our building. In the end, it was a...

By Michael Goldberg, Photo: Rogelio V. Solis/AP Photo, Associated Press (AP), August 5, 2023 Monica Lee sat outside her parents’ home, where a former Mississippi sheriff’s deputy pummeled her son, who died hours later in the hospital. It was a sweltering afternoon in Braxton — the same town where, in a separate episode, six white law enforcement officers tortured two other Black men in January, shaking seasoned federal prosecutors, elected officials and ordinary people to their core. The...

By Lisa Dogget, Illustration: ssnjaytuturkhi/Getty Images, National Public Radio (NPR), August 2, 2023 The young man was in his mid-20s when he came to see me for severe abdominal pain at my small community clinic. The pain, worse than any he'd ever experienced, had persisted for weeks and was getting worse. He cried out when I examined him. I didn't know the cause of his pain, but I could think of possibilities, including a ruptured appendix, a perforated ulcer or pancreatitis. He needed an...

The U.S. Department of Education building stands in Washington, D.C., Aug. 18, 2020. Erin Scott/Bloomberg via Getty Images, FILE By Kiara Alfonseca, Aaron Katersky, and Robert Zepeda, ABC News, July 26, 2023 A teachers association in Tennessee has filed a federal lawsuit against the state education department's restrictions on curriculum regarding race and gender in public schools. The Tennessee Education Association and five Tennessee public school educators behind the lawsuit believe the...

The Trauma Informed Health Care Education and Research (TIHCER) Collaborative presents... Vickie Choitz, Director of Trauma and Resilience at Work Corporation for a Skilled Workforce In this webinar, Corporation for a Skilled Workforce (CSW) will share information on how to cultivate trauma-informed workplaces to support staff who experience toxic stress and trauma. They will share examples from the Detroit at Work public workforce development system; a pilot with substance use disorder...

The truth is: your spaces, programs, and services are not safe just because you say they are... You may not be able to guarantee that your spaces, programs, or services are safe for others-but what you can do is design, facilitate and show up in a way that uses mutually beneficial skills and tools to create an environment where safety can be felt by everyone-including you. We know safety is a core human need. There are various types of safety: physical, emotional, relational, psychological,...

What If We're the Bad Guys Here? David Brooks https://dnyuz.com/2023/08/02/what-if-were-the-bad-guys-here/

Hearts of gratitude! Cooperative of Communities members shared hearts on the July member call to show gratitude to guest speaker Elaine Miller-Karas, whose non-profit, the Trauma Resource Institute, is a member of the Coop, and a young man identified as "Z", who uses the co-regulation model Miller-Karas co-created to help people in traumatic situations -- and with every-day stresses -- be able to work with the central nervous system and body to re-regulate. Tools taught in Community...