Trauma

   I don’t know who needs to hear this right now, but feeling traumatized by a medical provider/clinic/procedure is valid. The medical field is just as shaped and filled with biases, prejudice, misinformation and ignorance as any other field. And the more minoritized identities you…

June is national PTSD Awareness month. For many, the concept of PTSD is linked to military service.  The reality however, is that this disorder can affect anyone.  In the US, approximately 7-8% of adults will experience PTSD in their lifetimes, although many of us who…

There is a common misconception about trauma therapy that all we do or all we focus on is the bad thing(s) that happened. But trauma work includes working on the things that resulted from the trauma, such as your lack of trust in yourself, being…

The ACES study was conducted here in San Diego between 1995-97 and was spearheaded by Vincent Felitti, MD. This study was conducted with 17,000+ participants and clearly demonstrated a link between childhood abuse, neglect and other household challenges with adult health and well-being.  What I…

I like this quote because it speaks to a number of things that I see in trauma work every day. It is not uncommon for people to remember their traumatic experiences in a very detached clinical way, and the work we do will be to…

Ever heard the saying Sticks and stone can break my bones but words can never hurt me? Well, it is totally wrong. Words can and do hurt. And this idea that they don’t perpetuates a lot of further harm to victims an downplaying the effects…