Trauma

I ran across a very good article, or at least part of it, in the November/December 2007 issue of Fostering Families Today magazine. Part of the story is missing because I tore out another story about a friend and mailed it to her. The article is about the impact of a traumatized child on a family. We often talk about trauma’s impact on a child, but bringing that traumatized child into a family will have repercussions, no matter what the family dynamic is. This was a consideration in our family recently. Someone had asked me to do respite for a little girl very close in age to my own Hannah. I have been working with this family for several years and this little… [more]

Continuing with my discussion about PTSD, here is an interesting article that postulates low cortisol levels may predict PTSD risk. This article describes a study of the children of Holocaust survivors. The article states: A major conclusion of these studies is that these children have a higher risk of developing PTSD than other people. In a study presented in the August 2000 The American Journal of Psychiatry, the research group discovered that adult children with at least one parent who is a Holocaust survivor have low cortisol levels. The discovery could mean that low cortisol levels may be predictive of the development of PTSD. As many of you already know, cortisol is a hormone the body releases in response to stress. As stress increases, so should the… [more]

If one Googles “PTSD definition”, what pops up on your computer monitor is a long list of definitions and associated links. The definitions all describe variations of the same basic mental health issue … chronic stress reactions to some acute trauma, considered acute even if the trauma spans a few months or even a couple of years, such as military service. Of course, the term PTSD was first coined when describing the mental health issues faced by returning Viet Nam vets; however, mental health journals describes very similar issues with every group of returning soldiers throughout history. Google Answers states: After the Civil War, soldiers began experiencing “soldier’s heart,” with symptoms of startle responses, hyper-vigilance, and arrhythmias. During World War I “the effort syndrome” was… [more]

The last few days have been heavenly, as I have not had to scurry around with a thousand things to do and no time to do them. I actually did some sewing … Beth is modeling a fleece top I completed. The M & M fabric was a remnant from a “sleeping bag” robe I made for Amy. I used to call Amy “Peanut” when I was still struggling to connect with her. Eventually the nickname more or less faded away … Hard to believe I am excited about waiting for a repairman, but I am. I haven’t had a working washing machine in over two weeks. Seems two brilliant “young ladies” decided taking about 50 toothpicks from a restaurant and stuffing them in their pockets… [more]

I know that many of you who read this blog read Julie’s blog as well. If you do, you know that Julie’s daughter, Lulu, was hospitalized again a couple of days ago. This recent development occurred after Lulu’s escalation, where she once again threatened to hurt herself or others. As Julie was describing the scene to me yesterday, she mentioned KayKay’s reaction … Without sharing details that are not mine to share, I will tell you that it was at that point I lost it myself. Suddenly I was having my own flashbacks to scenes that occurred in my own home … scenes my healthy kids witnessed with the attendant fall-out on their emotional health. Traumatized kids share their trauma with everyone. Julie’s entire family… [more]

Reader’s Digest is one of my favorite quick reads. My life is so crazy that reading in small bytes is about all I can do … and Reader’s Digest gives me a chance to read about something besides attachment and trauma issues … or does it? The recent November issue of the magazine had several articles that brought me back to … you guessed it … trauma and trauma related issues. One article was about an Iraq war veteran who had what was termed “conversion disorder”. This young man was confined to a wheelchair because he wasn’t able to walk, and yet all the tests and MRI’s had indicated there was no physical reason for his “paralysis.” He was sent to a lady shrink …… [more]

Yesterday while I was on the road I made good use of my time (and played with my new Bluetooth earpiece) and returned several phone calls. One call was to one of the most awesome moms I have met in this gig … the mom I wrote about in this post. In a nutshell, her son has serious attachment and trauma issues as a result of repeated medical procedures. He’s not yet three years old, but he’s quite angry. He sees his mother as both the source of his abuse (she took him to doctors) and his protector. She is still struggling to find the right kind of help. Several things she shared with me really bothered me. First of all, she articulates… [more]

There are some reoccurring themes that appear over and over as I work with families and speak to parents across the country. Sometimes I think I sound like a broken record, but some things bear repeating… I cannot emphasize enough the importance of providing significant structure for children who have experienced loss and trauma. Think about my horse and zebra analogy. If I look out at my domesticated horses, especially the one I just bought who is so low key and mellow, he is most certainly not worrying about the next predator that might appear on the horizon. He’s calm and relaxed, even though he is in a brand new environment. Nothing in his history … either the past seven years (that’s… [more]

When we adopted Beth after having had so much difficulty with our first two adopted kids, many folks wondered why on earth we had ventured forth yet again. We did try and adopt Beth through the domestic foster care system, even though she was a disrupting international placement, because we were hoping to secure some kind of subsidy to hedge our bet against hemorrhaging money on yet another deeply wounded child. My husband figured we had spent over $40,000 on our first two troubled kids by the time we added Beth. That is a lot of money … and that is just what the insurance DIDN’T pay. We were not successful, though, in running Beth through the system, so we took… [more]

In this post I mentioned how PTSD was rampant in returning Iraq vets. It came as no surprise to me that in this millennium, even after all that has been learned about this disorder, our brave guys and gals are still not getting the mental health services they need. My husband and I watched Flags of Our Fathers last night on Pay-per-view television. This movie was directed by Clint Eastwood and told the story of the soldiers who fought on Iwo Jima in 1945. Specifically, it was the story of the marines who raised the flag and who were immortalized in the famous photograph depicting that historic event. My husband and daughter are major history buffs, but I am not. I found… [more]