Trauma and the Polyvagal theory

brain development

In our treatment of children and adults that have experienced trauma we have come to see the importance of the polyvagal theory in understanding triggers and responses that occur in daily life. These triggers are autonomic responses based on earlier experiences. A young child may find the touch of a parent frightening because he/she was…

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Beyond Behaviors

childhood stress

I have recently become exposed to the work of Mona Delahooke, PhD who has written two books. Both are about dealing with children’s behaviors. (Beyond Behaviors and Brain Body Parenting.) I will be writing a series of blogs about the valuable concepts that she details. In work with children recovering from early trauma I quickly…

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Dr. Perry’s Model

child trauma counseling

I thought this month I would share with you a positive story from Dr. Perry’s model (Neuro-sequential Model of Therapeutics) for children who have experienced trauma. “As an adoptive mom and child welfare professional, I have seen firsthand the incredible power of Dr. Bruce Perry’s groundbreaking insight into trauma treatment. On a stifling hot June…

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Regulate, Relate and Reason

bear with trauma

I just got done rereading Dr Perry’s thoughts on working with traumatized children using the “regulate, relate, and reason” sequence from his Neurosequential model of therapeutics and I thought it would be good to review this month. Step 1: Regulate. Since it is basically impossible to do any work with traumatized children when they are…

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Childhood Trauma and ACE’s

child trauma

In the 1990’s the Center for Disease Control discovered an exposure that dramatically increased the risk for developing 7 out of the 10 leading causes of death. In high doses it effects: Brain development The immune system The endocrine system And even how our DNA is read and translated What the risk is and is…

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