Making Sense of Trauma Treatment & Post-Traumatic Growth

And I think for so many of us, it's, it's kind of a, a big reason for why we might go into this, this line of work, right? So you had talked about trauma.

I mean, we just did a learning needs assessment and I just ran up some numbers, and trauma was mentioned 28, almost 29 times, give or take, uh, in our learning needs assessment.

So it's on the front, forefront of a lot of people's minds, a lot of DCYF staff's mind, and it's just a lot of people in general, I think, in the field, right? So this is a question that we probably could spend days on, but how might trauma impact kids and adults differently? 'Cause I know you both bring each unique perspective.

I can start with kids just because, you know, that happens first, right, before adulthood.

Um, so kids' brains are developing, right? So that puts them in a more vulnerable position.

Um, the way that kids could experience trauma could be you- they're demonstrating externalizing behaviors, which what that means or looks like is maybe agitated behavior.

There could be disorganization.

Um, they also could demonstrate some regressive behaviors.

So a kid that is 10 years old that you know was potty-trained between the ages, typically right between two and four, is now having accidents and is bedwetting.

They could, uh, relive the trauma through repetitive play.

So that could look like in real time maybe a child playing with a dollhouse and you're seeing repetition in what they're doing, maybe with a certain caregiver being on the outside of the house most of the time.

So that would be, like, that repetitive play that, that makes you start hypothesizing what's happening in their immediate family or what the dynamics are looking like.

Um, there could be things like nightmares that they experience that are more generalized, maybe a foreshortened future.

They could believe, um, that they could see into the future.

There could be a lot of somatic complaints, so some physical feelings, um, that could be headaches, stomach aches.

Um, and you can see that presented with comorbidity, right? So a kid could have a trauma that they experienced.

Maybe they are diagnosed with PTSD, maybe not yet.

Maybe we're seeing some traumatic reactivity or we're trying to formulate what's happening.

But maybe they have a diagnosis of anxiety or a somatic disorder or maybe a panic attack disorder.

So you could see some of that come up, too.

And it's usually magnified by threats, um, to caregivers and, like, the loss of loved ones.

So these effects actually could last into adulthood because when you do not have a stable, consistent caregiver figure early on in life, there's less of an ability to learn and have modeled regulation skills for you.

So later on in life, that then impacts you.

Um, and that has to do with our brain, and the body and the brain with trauma is very, very present.

So we know that the prolonged stress hormone can be activated for longer w- when you're not having that stable caregiver.