childhood trauma

We can’t keep celebrating “resilient” foster youth if we are not actively removing the systems in place that marginalize them, writes Kenyon Lee Whitman.

Earlier this week a report released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) linked Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) to several leading causes of death in the country, including heart disease, cancer, respiratory disease, diabetes and suicide.

Last week Kaiser Permanente announced it would invest $2.75 million in research to mitigate the effects of adverse childhood experiences. Kaiser Permanente conducted the original study with the Centers for Disease Control and those findings were published in 1998 linking childhood trauma and poor health outcomes later in life dubbed adverse childhood experiences, commonly referred to as ACEs.

According to a coalition of adoption advocates, broader acceptance of an emerging mental health diagnosis has the potential to help traumatized children access the help they need. That’s the goal of the End Childhood Trauma Tour, which stops in five cities this week in the name of promoting awareness of the disruptive effects of trauma on children.

Those who have experienced foster care have experienced traumatic events which may affect us short-term, long-term or permanently. Sometimes we believe that somehow we ourselves are responsible for such events. Sometimes we just do not know what to think, and the process of grief overcomes us, resulting in anxiety, depression and the development of new habits which may cause more harm than good.

So why are we focusing so much on childhood violence? Many people and organizations focus on preventing violence with the belief that if our society can stop violence against children, then most childhood trauma will be eradicated.

Projected on the enormous screen at the front of the room was a blue-tinged image of a brain scan with a seemingly simple phrase next to it: “Changing Minds.” The striking image and accompanying messages are still being developed by national nonprofit Futures Without Violence (Futures) for a public outreach campaign about the complex issue of childhood trauma.

The people who are doing most of the pioneering work to integrate trauma-informed, resilience-building practices based on ACEs research (writ large) are doing so in cities and counties across the U.S.

While meditation has expanded in recent years from a zen-seeker’s path to higher consciousness to a best practice for hard-charging CEOs, it’s now gaining a foothold at a school in Southern California serving students with serious emotional and behavioral issues.