Tagged With "Trinidad and Tobago"
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How Caribbean Parents Can Hurt Their Children
Growing up in the Caribbean (Trinidad and Tobago) in the 1970s - before the age of enlightened parenting - meant that I was raised in a strict culture. Whenever there was an infraction by us children, there would be verbal and often physical "retribution". This culture did not only exist in the immediate home but also extended to our visits to our grandparents. (It was easy to understand where my mother had received her parenting style when I witnessed my grandmother disciplining me and my...
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ACEs and Human Trafficking Research
Ten years ago today the Trafficking In Persons Bill of Trinidad and Tobago was laid in the country's Parliament. It was eventually passed, assented to, and became law as the Trafficking In Persons Act, Chapter 12:10. (The Act itself took effect in January 2013.) So to commemorate the anniversary of the introduction of the Bill, we will share one of the first of what we hope will be many resources on the link between childhood trauma and human trafficking. The report, titled " Domestic Sex...
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Question of the Month - Is Child Adversity Linked to Ethnicity?
Hi Community! Here in Trinidad and Tobago, we are probably more diverse in terms of ethnicity than many of our Caribbean neighbours - a callaloo of sorts (Remember the national anthem proclaims: "...Here every creed and race find an equal place..." ) Well, research overseas shows that there is a difference in how children experience adversity based on their ethnicity. In the USA in particular, there are neighbourhoods that are predominantly white and others where the majority of persons are...
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Re: #ChooseToChallenge - What leads to a man assaulting a woman or a child?
Yes, this phrasing, versions of which are used in Jamaica too, assumes/suggests that the woman is always 'the victim’. And when we speak of GBV here, in the region, we rarely talk about emotional/verbal abuse. Put that into the equation and we’ll have a much clearer picture of the scale of women’s violence against men and boys in the Caribbean. In many ways, emotional verbal/abuse is just as egregious and harmful as physical abuse by men. In some cases, it is worse. I had a conversation...
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Re: #ChooseToChallenge - What leads to a man assaulting a woman or a child?
Excellent points made by all parties in that discussion, Juleus! Our societies are largely unaware of the harm caused because we are underplaying the value of regional research into the issues. Even then, the issue is hard to raise and engage in dispassionately due to the high emotions involved and the strong value placed on our matriarchs. Here in Trinidad and Tobago, reports from children's advocates revealed that abuse is perpetrated by female caregivers (largely physical and verbal) and...
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Re: #ChooseToChallenge - What leads to a man assaulting a woman or a child?
Thank you for your comment, Juleus. I assure you there is no intent to direct the conversation in any particular direction. The phrase is a colloquialism commonly used here in Trinidad and Tobago whenever the issue of SGBV is being discussed. I have heard it used by both men and women, especially recently amidst the anger at the murders of two women in our nation. I do agree that the issue is extremely complex. We in the region have to address it with open minds, including having those...
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Interesting Weekend Tweet.
For us in the Caribbean, there is a tendency to cover up sex crimes committed against children by their relatives. When the offence is made known, the first call is seldom to the police but to other relatives. This is often done to strategize how to preserve the family's reputation (albeit at the expense of the child's mental and physical health), may be motivated by a false sense of protection to spare the child the shame of the offence being made public, or to confer some benefits upon the...
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Why Call It Good?
That question was posed by a male relative as he sat teary-eyed and sad. To what was he referring? "Good Friday" which we celebrate today in Trinidad and Tobago and in many other Caribbean countries. His sincere concern: "How could a day which marks the brutal torture and death of Jesus Christ - who gave His life for the world out of His Love - ever be called "good"?" At the time, the explanation which he received was enough to satisfy him and change his demeanor. The death (and...
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A Nation in Trauma [A newsday.co.tt article]
Mr. Benjamin asked, "Does the cycle of death, trauma, outrage, and dismissal deal with the root causes of the violence which affects each person in T&T?"
"...the nation is full of people whose traumatic childhood experiences have set them on a path that would lead them down violent roads with a fatal end. He said unless T&T puts preventative measures in place to handle childhood trauma, the cycle will continue and T&T will remain a nation in trauma."
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Saint Vincent and the Grenadines - A Season of Diverse ACEs
Hi everyone. While it is rare that we post on a weekend, we want to highlight that for the people of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, life has been challenging recently. Yesterday, what has been feared became a reality as the La Soufriere volcano began to slowly release ash, smoke and lava and eventually erupted, after months of seismic activity. This comes after a year of dealing with Covid-19 and the economic fallout from lockdowns and loss of employment. Thankfully, the death toll from...
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Wondering Wednesday - Could Your Children Study Here?
Hello everyone! Welcome to "Wondering Wednesday" where we share insights and experiments from across the globe and inquire how they might work in the Caribbean. For many of our territories, there have been waves of the Coronavirus and those have led to periodic imposition and relaxation of various public health restrictions. At present, Trinidad and Tobago is under a 3-week period of restrictions where beaches and rivers are off-limits following the Easter holiday weekend and a spike in...
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Still I Rise - A Documentary Highlighting Sex Trafficking (with ACEs Lurking in the Background).
Hey everyone! We hope the weekend has been a blast so far. As you know, we rarely post on the weekend. However, although it is Sunday, the date is the 25th of April, so we are sharing this post in fulfilment of our promise to highlight the issue of ACEs and Human Trafficking on the 25th day of every month. We did submit a post on the topic on 1st April to observe the 10th Anniversary of the laying in Parliament of the Trafficking In Persons Bill in Trinidad and Tobago. If you missed it,...
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'A lot of grief and anxiety' for kids, youth after living with COVID for 1 year, says psychotherapist. [CBC article]
Around the world, the 1 year anniversary of Covid-19 interrupting our lives was observed in different ways. For many, the concern is for the children and young people who are experiencing Covid-19 as an adverse childhood experience. The clinical observations of a Canadian psychotherapist may well be true for the Caribbean region as it relates to how children are coping one year on. Alyssa Strachan, based at the Delton Glebe Counselling Centre in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada has been helping...
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The Trauma of Nowhere to Go [Newsday article]
Good Monday morning everyone. We hope the week was restful. We bring you an extract from a Sunday Newsday article with an update from Saint Vincent and the Grenadines where the situation continues to evolve. As the threat of further eruptions from the La Soufriere volcano remains, a new trauma is being seen, particularly among those displaced by the event. "As St Vincent and the Grenadines enters into its third week of dealing with effects of the eruption of the La Soufriere volcano, the...
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Blog Post
Happy Mother's Day!
Happy Mother's Day to all the wonderful mothers, nurturers, biological or surrogates throughout the Caribbean and the world! Empirical data shows that 42% of our Caribbean families are single-parent in nature. From my observations in Trinidad and Tobago, many such homes are led by a lone woman caring for more than 1 child. With all that you have experienced - your own adverse childhood trauma, the trauma of adulthood, and the challenges of Covid-19 - we salute you! We cheer you on, admire...
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How can student progress in public schools be improved?
Good Monday morning everyone. It is a public holiday here in Trinidad and Tobago for the Arrival Day observance on Sunday but this article just cannot wait. Kudos to our ACEs Caribbean Community member, Mark Nicoll, whose article on ACEs and their impact on children's education was published last week in the Cayman Islands newspaper, Cayman Current. At the time, Mark was commenting on the Education Data Report 2020 that highlighted the poor performance of public schools as compared with...
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ADHD in first- and second-generation immigrant children: A nationwide cohort study in Sweden
Hi everyone, it's Food For Thought Friday again and we are excited to bring to you this study from Europe on ADHD prevalence in children and adolescents. The reason is that some of the respondents in this study are of Caribbean heritage! With the paucity of Caribbean research in this area, we are always on the hunt for global research that includes respondents from or in the Caribbean. Ahem, in case you missed it, that was a subtle ask for you to share whatever research you may come across...
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How Does Historic Trauma Impact Blacks Swimmers?
Good Monday morning everybody! It's warm weather time in the global North and the "wet season" here in the Caribbean. In times before 2020, this would have signalled a lot of beach and river bathing in Trinidad and loads of people headed to Tobago to enjoy the more attractive beaches there. Now, beach-going and sea-bathing are restricted as part of the current national State of Emergency. With those thoughts in mind, that may explain why this recent article from an African American mother...
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About Our Livestream Guests
Are you ready? It's almost time! Yes, we are 2 hours away from the start of our Father's Day Livestream titled, "ACEs & The Father Wound - A Cross Cultural Discussion" . Join us for the discussion via this link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgeVx3-3EFo With us today will be Mr. Mark Nicoll, Dr. Kenneth Niles, Queen Mother Dianne Sears and Dr. Joanne Spence. Dr. Spence will do double-duty as moderator for this afternoon's discussion. Their bios are below so you will have some context...
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How to (Mentally) Prepare for Hurricane Season
Hi everyone! We are well into the Hurricane Season for 2021 and today Trinidad and Tobago was put on a Yellow Alert due to the passage of a weather system. For those interested in learning more about the possibilities of the hurricane season, try to register for the Pre-Hurricane Conference 2021 put on by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies ( IFRC ). It runs from Wednesday 23rd to Friday 25th June 2021. While there is great value in developing a Disaster Plan...
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Upcoming Presentation on the Causes/Impacts of ACEs in the Caribbean
On Friday, August 27, 2021, at noon, I will be the guest speaker at Port of Spain Adult Library’s monthly International Men's Day Trinidad and Tobago (IMDTT) discussion. The title of my talk is The Causes and Impacts of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) in the Caribbean. ACEs pose huge challenges across the globe. Unfortunately, not much has been done in the Caribbean to uncover the links between ACEs and many of the developmental challenges we face. My presentation will highlight some of...
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Juleus Ghunta aims to make the Caribbean nations PACEs-informed
If Jamaican poet, children’s book author, and appointee to the nation’s Task Force on Character Education, Juleus Ghunta had his way, all 44 million people living in the Caribbean—from Barbados to Guyana to Grenada—would become PACEs-informed in the near future. To start off, everyone—including children, parents, teachers, social workers, doctors, and policymakers—needs to read his new book, Rohan Bullkin and the Shadows: A Story about ACEs and Hope , due out this December, just in time for...
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How Trauma Can Affect Adult Relationships (A NICABM website Resource)
Hello everyone! If you're in Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana or another territory that observes Diwali, I hope you are enjoying the public holiday today. We would like to share an Infographic with you that was recently posted to the website of the National Institute for the Clinical Application of Behavioural Medicine (NICABM). It was adapted from Terry Real, MSW, LICSW. Please see the attachment for the infographic. To read more about this resource please visit the NICABM website at the link...
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New Podcast Episode! Get to know the Leaders of the Caribbean ACEs Movement
Latchkey Urchins are kids who grew up unsupervised or without attentive emotional care. Latchkey Urchins & Friends Podcast delves into trauma and childhood emotional neglect topics weekly through survivor and expert interviews. We bring a touch of humor to these normally heavy topics—laughing about life's never-ending struggles, even as we quest to create a future free from violence. In this week's episode, cohosts Anne and Alison (me!) interview @Adrian Alexander and @Juleus Ghunta ,...
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Addressing Chronic Homelessness (NY Times article)
Hi everyone and Happy Monday! 😀 In several Caribbean countries, such as Trinidad and Tobago, there is a crisis of homelessness. With Privy Council and other judicial pronouncements that restrict the government from forcibly removing persons from the public streets, it is important to identify ways to address the needs of persons experiencing homelessness. The article linked to below gives the example of Houston, Texas and how its mayor and public authorities are pulling together a cadre of...
