Trauma-Informed Blog
Content relevant to survivors, mental health professionals, partners, and anyone interested in reading about CPTSD and mental health.
Weekly Content
New posts 4-5 times per week
Relevant & Informative
Survivor stories, research articles, poetry, and more
Staff and Guest Writers
Everyday survivors, clinicians, coaches, and mental health professionals
Featured Partner: TAR Network
Home for the Holidays
The holidays are an intense time of reflection for me. I used to have a big family—a big, loud, Hispanic family—we would gather for birthdays, holidays, and random Sunday dinners. My grandmother held the group together with love and community. Those days are long...
Transforming Perimenopause, Menopause, and Burnout: Holistic Approaches to Wellness
The physical and emotional changes associated with perimenopause and menopause can be overwhelming. Struggles with falling or staying asleep, fatigue, brain fog, hot and cold flashes, mood swings, anxiety, and a loss of motivation are common [1, 2, 3]. ...
Healing through Art, Love, and Remembering My Dog Rusty
As a survivor and forty-year practitioner of trauma recovery, I guide individuals through cathartic, intuitive writing, visual art, dreams, and embodied approaches to recover from trauma. Children are born primal and free You are meant to be innocent, organic, and...
Learning To Live With Alexithymia
On my healing journey, I discover new things every day. When I learned I had Alexithymia, after the initial feeling of "great, another thing to contend with" because of my trauma, it actually helped me better understand what it was I was experiencing, how to...
It’s Never Too Late to Heal From Childhood Trauma
***TRIGGER ALERT - The following article describes childhood trauma and could be triggering.*** I twirled around, causing the skirt of my best Sunday dress to flair out in a way that delighted my four-year-old sensibilities. It was 1966, and my black patent leather...
Mastering Emotional Intelligence
A Crucial Skill for Trauma Survivors in the Workplace Introduction Embarking on a career journey, especially as a trauma survivor, is a courageous adventure that demands resilience, strength, and a key understanding of emotional intelligence (EI). In this article,...
Living In the Dis-World
Living in the dis-worldBy Jesse Donahue 2019©Avow, to make known, to confess or admit. The most striking aspect of my life is the depth, the ever-lurking, unconscious presence of a sense of self that feels… disregarded and dissed from the realm of normality. I feel...
How to Release Shame
Are you hiding behind your shame and staying at home so you don’t have to face that inner critic that comes out when you are socializing? Do you avoid having people over because of the intense shame you feel about the state of your home? Shame shows up in many ways...
Life Isn’t All Black And White
Having cPTSD often makes you look at life through a black-and-white lens, and your trauma response to life is not just constantly assessing whether or not people are safe but also whether our environments are safe. For a really long time, my thinking was on a...
Healing Self-Blame From Childhood Trauma
My mother had been in a car accident. The second one that year, and this time, the car was totaled. Rushing to the emergency room, I was ushered back to one of the bays where she dressed to go home. She had suffered only a few cuts and bruises. I couldn’t say the...
Join The Live Stream: The Public Health Disaster of Narcissism & Toxic Masculinity
Narcissism and toxic masculinity aren’t just societal issues-they are public health crises disrupting relationships, families, and the mental health of men and women alike. This November, during Men’s Health Month, STAR Network is hosting a transformative...
Finding Peace in the Present: Mindfulness and Grounding Techniques for Conquering Anxiety and Panic Attacks
In today’s fast-paced and demanding work environments, the prevalence of anxiety and panic attacks among employees has become a pressing concern. The workplace, often a hub of productivity and achievement, can simultaneously foster an atmosphere that triggers...
What is Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder?
“Complex PTSD comes in response to chronic traumatization over the course of months or, more often, years. This can include emotional, physical, and/or sexual abuses, domestic violence, living in a war zone, being held captive, human trafficking, and other organized rings of abuse, and more. While there are exceptional circumstances where adults develop C-PTSD, it is most often seen in those whose trauma occurred in childhood”.
