Tagged With "brain plasticity"
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CA pediatrician develops, tests, gets state OK for whole-child assessment tool that includes ACEs
Over the last dozen years or so, many pediatricians, astounded by the ramifications of the science of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on the children they care for, began integrating this science into their practices. The most common approach has been to ask parents about ACEs using a questionnaire, and to use this information to counsel parents and identify resources for the family. Different practices have been using different questionnaires: Some ask parents for their ACE scores...
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CA pediatrician develops, tests, gets state OK for whole-child assessment tool that includes ACEs
[Editor's note: This blog was first posted in April 2017. Dr. Marie-Mitchell updated the assessment by modifying a few of the questions, so we are republishing with the new assessment, one in Spanish and one in English.] Over the last dozen years or so, many pediatricians, astounded by the ramifications of the science of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on the children they care for, began integrating this science into their practices. The most common approach has been to ask parents...
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Adversity and resiliency: The case for integrating ACEs and Strengthening Families approaches
Attached is the PowerPoint that was presented by Diane Kellegrew, Jane Stevens and Katie Albright in a webinar April 16. And below is the slide that ID's the presenters.
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We love science!
(click to download) We love science at Echo. It has been my greatest pleasure to share the science about the impact of trauma, including the changes that happen to the various systems of the body in our Trauma and Resilience trainings . The list is pretty exhaustive, and to try to make sense of it all, we’ve developed another of our popular infographics. Nervous system: This is where we focus a lot of our attention in trauma and recovery. The nervous system takes a beating when we live with...
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Wisconsin state agencies end year one of trauma-informed learning community; goal is to be first trauma-informed state
Here in California, many people think that it’s only liberal Democrats who have a corner on championing the science of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and putting it into practice. That might be because people who use ACEs science don’t expel or suspend students, even if they’re throwing chairs and hurling expletives at the teacher. They ask "What happened to you?" rather than "What's wrong with you?" as a frame when they create juvenile detention centers where kids don’t fight, reduce...
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Substance Use Disorder and Brain Development
The inputs a brain experiences during its developmental stages have a profound impact on whether that person will develop a substance use disorder (if they choose to drink or use other drugs). In turn, developing a substance use disorder (SUD) as a tween, teen, or young adult dramatically influences that person's brain development. And why is understanding this causality important? The risk factors for developing a substance use disorder are the result of inputs the brain experiences (or...
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Sacramento Court Helps Kids By Healing Parents’ Addictions [CaliforniaHealthline.org]
At 10 a.m. on a recent Wednesday, a line of parents pushing strollers filed into a conference room at the Sacramento County Courthouse. They sat at rows of narrow plastic tables, shushing their babies and gazing up at a man in a black robe. Hearing Officer Jim Teal sounded his gavel. “This is the time and place set for Early Intervention Family Drug Court,” he began, gazing sternly at the rapt faces of parents who sit before him. “Graduation from this court is considered a critical factor in...
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The Brain Architects Podcast: COVID-19 Special Edition: Self-Care Isn't Selfish [developingchild.harvard.edu]
By Center on the Developing Child, Harvard University, April 29, 2020 In the midst of a global pandemic, pediatricians are serving a unique role. While the coronavirus is generally showing milder effects on babies and children than on adults, there are still health concerns and considerations for infants in need of scheduled vaccinations, and kids who are home all day with parents who may be facing stressful situations. In the second episode of our special COVID-19 series of The Brain...
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The Brain Architects Podcast: Toxic Stress: Protecting the Foundation (Episode 2) from Harvard Center on the Developing Child
Excessive or prolonged activation of stress response systems in early childhood can have damaging effects on learning, behavior, and health across the lifespan. Such toxic stress can occur when a child experiences strong, frequent, and/or prolonged adversity without adequate adult support. But that's not the whole story. With the right supports, toxic stress doesn't have to lead to bad outcomes. The second episode of the Center's new podcast, The Brain Architects, explores what toxic stress...
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'These people are warriors.' Meet the waste workers taking risks to sort your recyclables [latimes.com]
By Susanne Rust, Tony Barboza, Los Angeles Times, April 6, 2020 On Friday morning, Noel Tucker — gloved, masked, and dressed in an apron and hard hat — attacked the refuse stream rolling by her on a fast-moving conveyor belt, pulling out plastic bags and loose plastic films, and tossing them into a metal bin by her side. She’s a sorter at San Francisco’s Recology recycling center. And while most of the city’s residents are hunkered down in their homes, keeping clear of the coronavirus that...
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Too young for juvie? California bill bars prosecution of kids under 12 [SacBee.com]
Sen. Holly Mitchell sits at her desk on the fifth floor of the Capitol and holds up a book. On the cover a small boy in oversized jeans and a Tommy Hilfiger T-shirt stands on a plastic milk crate, too small to reach, as a police officer presses the young child’s ink-soaked fingertips onto a piece of paper. “That image just stuck with me,” Mitchell said. The senator from Los Angeles is pushing a bill through the Legislature that would bar the state from prosecuting children under age 12. In...
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DHCS Expands Medi-Cal Young-Adult Eligibility, Restores Benefits, Adds Childhood-Trauma Screening in 2020 (DHCS)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: Norman Williams NUMBER: 19-03 (916) 440-7660 DATE: December 30, 2019 www.dhcs.ca.gov DHCS EXPANDS MEDI-CAL YOUNG-ADULT ELIGIBILITY, RESTORES BENEFITS, ADDS CHILDHOOD-TRAUMA SCREENING IN 2020 SACRAMENTO – Medi-Cal, California’s health care program for low-income individuals and families, will extend full coverage to tens of thousands of additional young adults statewide effective January 1, 2020, another step toward building a California for All. The young adult...
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El Dorado ACEs Collaborative Celebrates its 3rd Year of Accomplishments!
12.5 percent of people have 4 or more ACEs. FOUR! This statistic really hit me today as I attended my second El Dorado ACEs Collaborative meeting since starting my time with El Dorado County as a Community Health Advocate. I work in the Community Hubs program in which ACEs is at the heart of all we do, and today’s meeting solidified the importance of that. ACEs are a new topic to me but a fascinating one at that. I didn’t realize prior to coming to EDC that so much of a person’s overall...
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Looking for online training and consulting?
Looking for tools to help your organization or community integrate a trauma-informed and resilience-building approach? At Origins, we offer training courses to support you from your aha moment to your action plan. It all starts with The Basics, a 90-minute online training that will provide you with an overview of the key concepts behind a trauma-informed approach. When you’re ready to move from aha to action, sign up for The Resilience Champion Certificate, a self-paced 6-week online training...
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Need 45 Trauma-Informed Practitioners or Clinicians For Study on Using a Brain Regulation Headband-Bellabee Designed To Help Trauma Survivors Regulate Their Brains.
Need 45 Trauma-Informed Practitioners or Clinicians For Study on Using a Brain Regulation Headband-Bellabee Designed To Help Trauma Survivors Regulate Their Brains. All trauma informed practitioners who are suffering with or who work with adults or children suffering with C-PTSD, PTSD, Developmental Trauma, Depression, Anxiety, ADHD & Sleep Disorders are welcome to apply to be considered for this study. The deadline to request and submit your application is: March 20, 2020 As a trauma...
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Need 45 Trauma-Informed Practitioners or Clinicians For Study on Using a Brain Regulation Headband-Bellabee Designed To Help Trauma Survivors Regulate Their Brains.
Need 45 Trauma-Informed Practitioners or Clinicians For Study on Using a Brain Regulation Headband-Bellabee Designed To Help Trauma Survivors Regulate Their Brains. All trauma informed practitioners who are suffering with or who work with adults or children suffering with C-PTSD, PTSD, Developmental Trauma, Depression, Anxiety, ADHD & Sleep Disorders are welcome to apply to be considered for this study. We currently have 41 applicants, and applicantions are approved on a first come first...
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New Brief on Play & Trauma Available
Bay Area Early Childhood Funders have released a new brief, “The Power of Play for Addressing Trauma in Early Years,” available in both English and Spanish . The brief provides families, teachers and caregivers an easy-to-read, one-page online brief about the importance of play for addressing trauma in young children and tips for helping children cope. Additional materials on the importance of play are available here .
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Postcard From The Edge: L.A. Street Vendors Who Can't Stop Working [californiahealthline.org]
By Anna Almendrala, California Healthline, April 8, 2020 One day last week, on a sunny, beautiful Los Angeles afternoon, 23-year-old Alex Salvador Morales set up shop on a sidewalk near downtown, selling freshly cut pineapple, mango and watermelon in quart-sized plastic cups for $5. Before the pandemic, fruit stands like his dotted streets on days like this, one every few blocks on the busy stretches. With millions of people staying home amid the COVID-19 pandemic, however, business was so...
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Calling all trauma nerds!
If you are on this site. you are probably familiar with ACES, the triune brain, and the resiliency zone. Are you ready to learn more? Come to Echo's one-day training Working with Childhood Trauma II to gain a more advanced understanding of the biology and psychology of childhood trauma - everything from how trauma impacts brain waves to microbiology, from a newly discovered stress hormone to the factors that lead to post-traumatic growth. Don't let your knowledge stagnate. In this...
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Re: The Brain Architects Podcast: Toxic Stress: Protecting the Foundation (Episode 2) from Harvard Center on the Developing Child
Diapers are a basic need, as important as food and a mother's love (I purposefully left out "a home" because I find people often say we first have to get families into a home, before we can do anything else. (please see: babies of homelessness.org) In 2019, a story by Belinda Luscombe titled Starting a Diaper Bank came out in TIME . The story is about Joanne Goldblum, a social worker in New Haven, Conn. who founded The Diaper Bank of New Haven to address the desperate need for diapers she...
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Equipping Hope: A Holistic Approach to Building Trauma-Informed and Resilient Communities - $15 Mini-Event
Are you seeking support to build a truly trauma-informed school or community? Trauma-informed work is never a one-size-fits-all program. It is about building a responsive and actionable culture that is rooted in the science of Hope. Building healthy communities takes a full-spectrum approach, from building the buy-in, to implementing and sustaining the process. In this online conference, you will learn the components for building change: understanding how to develop Hope ; learning how to...
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Youth Detention Facility finds culture of kindness more effective than punishment
A corner of the Multi-Sensory De-escalation Room, All MSDR photos courtesy of Valerie Clark When a young person enters the de-escalation room in the Sacramento County Youth Detention Facility , they’ll find dimmed lights, bottles of lavender, orange and other essential oils, an audio menu featuring the rush of ocean waves and other calming sounds, along with squeeze balls, TheraPutty, jigsaw puzzles, and an exercise ball to bounce on. TheraPutty, squeeze balls and more Sometimes, with a...
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Policing in schools: Redefining public safety to be supportive & healing, instead of punitive & criminalizing
A recent video , shared on the national news, shows a 16-year-old Florida student being slammed to the ground by a police officer working at her school. It’s one of many such incidents of school-based police violence against students captured in videos around the country. Some of the victims are as young as five years old. About 47% of U.S. schools employ armed police officers , known as school resource officers, who are there to keep students safe. But students who attend these schools...
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Childcare providers use two- generational approach to help preschoolers from being expelled
It’s shocking: Preschoolers are three times more likely to be expelled than children in elementary, middle and high school, according to figures from the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. Boys are four times more likely than girls to be kicked out, and African American children are twice as likely as Latinx and White children. One organization with childcare centers and mental health providers in Kentucky and Ohio began a long journey 15 years ago, when they began hearing about...
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Drained
I can agree with that when it comes to life and especially to life with cancer. But I keep wondering what is hardship anyway? What’s hard? What’s easy? It’s so subjective and varies by person and circumstance. What I do know is I was uncomfortable and unprepared for my PleurX surgery procedure even though it was done at my request. A PleurX is a type of chest tube that can be used at home, allowing me to drain the malignant fluid that keeps accumulating in my right lung due to...
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Op-Ed: As a doctor in a COVID unit, I'm running out of compassion for the unvaccinated. Get the shot [latimes.com]
By Anita Sircar, Los Angeles Times, August 17, 2021 My patient sat at the edge of his bed gasping for air while he tried to tell me his story, pausing to catch his breath after each word. The plastic tubes delivering oxygen through his nose hardly seemed adequate to stop his chest from heaving. He looked exhausted. He had tested positive for the coronavirus 10 days ago. He was under 50, mildly hypertensive but otherwise in good health. Eight days earlier he started coughing and having severe...
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Peer-led organization offers San Francisco's unhoused food, work, dignity and more
He is sprawled out on the sidewalk, motionless, flushed cheeks framed by high cheekbones. He’s slender, probably in his mid-20s, his straight, coal black hair pulled back, and his orange t-shirt twisted up over his stomach. “He’s OD’ing on fentanyl!” shouts a guy holding a skateboard.
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Peer-led organization offers San Francisco's unhoused food, work, dignity and more
He is sprawled out on the sidewalk, motionless, flushed cheeks framed by high cheekbones. He’s slender, probably in his mid-20s, his straight, coal black hair pulled back, and his orange t-shirt twisted up over his stomach. “He’s OD’ing on fentanyl!” shouts a guy holding a skateboard.
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The spa-like atmosphere of ‘calming rooms’ help students find peace in turbulent times [fontananewsroom.com]
By Fontana News Room, Photo: Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times, Fontana News Room, February 7, 2022 When I conjure the image of a typical public school — the bright fluorescent lighting, the hard, unyielding plastic desk chairs and the shrill bells that announce the beginning and end of class — the word “calming” doesn’t exactly come to mind. Combine that with the frenetic energy that comes with 15 to 30 students crammed into a relatively small room all day, and you’ve got a recipe for...
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Re: Looking for online training and consulting?
Thanks for sharing such an amazing and informative blog. This is really good for those who are in the search of getting online therapy. As a Black Therapist Online California I also offer my services physical as well as online for the betterment of those who are suffering from mental health issues.
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Finding Joy After Adverse Childhood Experiences
Adverse childhood experiences understandably can numb feelings, including feelings of joy, happiness, and pleasure.
Making time to be joyful rewires the wounded brain. Once healing has progressed, the capacity for joy can usually be expanded through the repeated application of proven joy strategies.
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Bouncing Forward After Adverse Childhood Experiences
Once the healing of hidden wounds from adverse childhood experiences has sufficiently progressed, attention can turn to developing a richly satisfying future. Your innate inner strengths, experiences, and acquired skills will help rewire your brain for a brighter future.
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How to Disarm Shame Mindfully: A Counterintuitive Approach
Shame-based memories imprint primarily in the non-verbal right brain, largely beneath conscious awareness. When our usual attempts to cope with the inner turmoil of shame fail, mindfulness can help. Bringing the various aspects of a disturbing memory to awareness gives the brain a chance to change the memory.
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Keys to Calming Anxiety from Adverse Childhood Experiences
Anxiety rooted in the hidden wounds from childhood need not be a lifelong sentence. A combination of effective strategies offer hope and help to alleviate anxious conditions, including excessive worry and panic attacks, that originate in childhood.
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Early Relational Health Innovators Partner In Program Supported by PACEs Connection Cooperative of Communities Members in Twelve California Counties
Christina Bethell, Ph.D, MBA, MPH, founder of the Child and Adolescent Health Measurement Initiative (CAHMI), principal author of the groundbreaking study on positive childhood experiences, and creator of the free Well Visit Planner, among other innovations. Two internationally-respected leaders and innovators in complementary aspects of early relational health and childhood and maternal health equity recently launched a partnership they believe will benefit everyone from newborn babies and...
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Vital Self-Care for Adverse Childhood Experiences Recovery
Often overlooked, intelligent self-care is vital during and after the recovery process. Tending to important needs optimizes mood, mental health, and the ability to handle everyday stress. These keys say, "I matter," and sustain you in your recovery journey.
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For Better Relationships and Self-Esteem, Replace Common Mr. Nice Guy Thought Patterns
The Mr. Nice Guy syndrome's dysfunctional thought patterns are common in survivors of adverse childhood experiences. Uprooting these patterns can improve self-esteem and relationships.