Psychosocial Assistance Without Borders

Bruce Perry, MD, PhD, the lead author of the Childhood Trauma article referenced earlier, is a child psychiatrist and brain scientist at Baylor College of Medicine. I attended medical school at Baylor, and when Perry taught, his passion for preventing trauma and safeguarding children made a deep impression on us.

While resiliency should be bolstered in all reasonable and rational ways, we must keep another eye towards preventing traumatic stimuli; because bouncing back from every trauma may not be neuro-biologically possible. It is useful to know that traumatic stimuli -- even in the absence of a physical blow or injury -- induce a cascade of neurotoxic insults to brain tissue. Sometimes we can clear the toxin, and sometimes our coping skills are overwhelmed.

Equally important, if we believe that resiliency is possible for everyone, then we secretly judge those who do not demonstrate resiliency as weak or “not trying hard enough.” While resilience is of the utmost importance to pursue, we in the field should never confuse non-recovery from trauma as evidence of failed resilience.

# posted by Siddharth Ashvin Shah, M.D., M.P.H. @ 9:12 PM