Trauma

Childhood is arguably the most impactful stage in one’s life.  Early interactions and experiences help to shape the brains of young children.  Building a healthy brain early on in a child’s life is important because it provides a strong foundation and increases the likelihood of a positive adulthood experience.  However unfortunately some experiences in childhood that can happen have negative effects on brain development, this is sometimes known as trauma and refers to the emotional response we have to distressing experiences.  

We try our best to protect our children from harm’s way, but the unfortunate reality is there are distressing events in life that are sometimes unavoidable.  Traumatic events that are often experienced during childhood can include the death of a loved one, community violence, natural disaster, serious accident or illness, and more.  While some may think that childhood trauma is relatively uncommon, the unfortunate reality is that it happens far too often with nearly 35 million children under the age of 17 report having experienced at least one form of major childhood trauma, this equates to roughly 47.9% of children in the United States.  If your child has been the victim or witness of a disturbing or distressing event they may be at risk of post-traumatic stress disorder or other mental health concerns as a result of trauma.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) 

PTSD is a mental health condition that is triggered by a terrifying or traumatic event either by experiencing or witnessing it.  Symptoms of PTSD include flashbacks, nightmares, severe anxiety, as well as uncontrollable thoughts related to the event.  Traumatic events often come with a variety of negative effects on mental and emotional wellbeing, but if these effects last for several months or even years and interfere with day-to-day functioning PTSD may be present.  

Types of Childhood Trauma

Childhood trauma can consist of a range of different experiences and events.  Any event where a child feels intensely threatened in a situation they are involved in or of witness to can be classified as trauma.  The following is a general list of trauma types that have been identified by The National Childhood Traumatic Stress Network.

• Bullying.  Whether it be online, to your face, or behind your back, bullying is any action performed with the intent of inflicting social, emotional, physical, and/or psychological harm to another.  In some cases, bullying may be severe and cause damage to your child’s wellbeing.
• Community Violence.  Exposure to interpersonal violence within public areas can be very traumatic for children, even if they are not the victim.  This can lead to the development of fear, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress.  
• Complex Trauma.  Complex trauma refers to children’s exposure to multiple traumatic events, often related to the lack of a stable caregiver or home environment.  This commonly includes events such as abuse or neglect.
• Disasters.  Natural disasters such as hurricanes, tornados, floods, or earthquakes can be very traumatic as they may involve the need for an abrupt change in environment and can create a significant amount of panic and fear.
• Early Childhood Trauma.  Early childhood trauma refers to traumatic experiences that occur before the age of 6.  Trauma in such early stages in one’s life can have more profound effects on growth, development, and adulthood.
• Domestic Violence.  Domestic violence occurs when there is a threat or harm made between caregivers or household members.
• Medical Trauma.  Medical trauma is the psychological response children have to significant medical events, including injury and illness. 
• Physical Abuse.  Physical abuse occurs when a parent or caregiver intentionally physically harms a child that often results in injury.
• Refugee Trauma.  Many refugees face trauma related to war and political unrest in their environment as well as the trauma of having to move to a new and foreign country. 
• Sexual Abuse.  Child sexual abuse is when an inappropriate interaction occurs with a child in which the child is used for sexual stimulation of the perpetrator.  This can cause a number of lifelong health issues and struggles.
• Sex Trafficking.  Sex trafficking involves the exchange of money, food, drugs, and/or shelter for sexual acts.  Oftentimes young girls may be manipulated or forced into sexual trafficking. 
• Terrorism and Violence.  Families and children can be seriously affected by mass violence, acts of terrorism, or community violence in the form of shootings, bombings, threats and other types of attacks.
• Traumatic Grief.  Traumatic grief typically involves the loss of a family member or loved one.  Some children have more trouble coping with loss than others, and it may result in serious difficulties and interference with their lives.       

Effects of Trauma

Unfortunately, childhood trauma can have profound impacts on wellbeing, and the risk for these negative impacts increase if the individual’s trauma is left untreated.  In fact, trauma can have negative impacts on one’s relationships, physical health, cognition, emotion and behavior.  Depending on the person and type of trauma, trauma may make it more difficult for some children to learn how to trust others, regulate their emotions, interact with the world, and understand their own sense of values and self.  In addition to this, trauma can create an extreme and constant state of stress within the body which can lead to an impaired development of the brain, immune, and nervous system.  Traumatic experiences have also been linked to an increased risk of medical conditions in the long-term throughout the individual’s life, as well as higher exposure to risky behaviors and mental health consequences.     

Tips for those dealing with trauma

Childhood trauma is no easy experience to cope with, for either the child or parent.  However, it is important to recognize trauma in children, and if you believe your child has been the victim of one or more traumatic events it is essential, they get the help they need.  If you or your child believes that the presence of a medical professional or professional help is needed, please do not hesitate to seek out a health care provider.  The following are tips from the Child Mind Institute for parents seeking to help their child cope after a traumatic event. 

• Provide reassurance and make them feel safe.
• Maintain routines as much as possible to avoid chaos.
• Encourage your children to enjoy healthy activities and time spent with others.
• Be open, but not pressing, to talk and listen.
• Help them relax with breathing exercises, yoga, reading or other peaceful activities.
• Acknowledge your child’s feelings and let them know they are valid and normal.
• Watch for signs of worsening trauma and know when to seek help.

It is important that as a parent caring for a child dealing with trauma you are taking good care of yourself.  Setting a good example by practicing positive self-care and coping strategies such as exercise, meditation, eating well, encouraging hobbies, self-love, and positivity are all ways to demonstrate and practice self-care. 

Solstice RTC Can Help

Solstice RTC is a residential treatment center for girls ages 14-18 struggling with the results of trauma, substance abuse, and/or mental health concerns.  We strive to help our students heal through a variety of therapeutic techniques based on traditional and holistic treatment methods.  Our mission is to support adolescents into living happy, healthy, and productive adult lives.

For more information about our program at Solstice RTC, please call (866) 278-3345.  We can help your family today!

The Solstice Team

When we talk about trauma, a car accident or the death of a loved one may be the first thing that comes into many people’s minds. But trauma can be small events as well as large ones. Being expelled from a friend group can be traumatic for a teenager. Experiencing a parental divorce, even an amicable one, can be a trigger for trauma as a teen’s entire world changes. Experiencing a global pandemic can also be isolating and traumatic for some teens. Unfortunately, trauma is pervasive, and it is important for parents to understand the many effects that trauma may have on their children. 

Childhood trauma has a significant impact on shaping one’s self-concept and view of relationships, but it also changes the perception of social stimuli on a physical level. Many people become hypervigilant to their surroundings and hypersensitive to sensory stimuli in their environment. Sensory processing issues after traumatic events are common and can trigger negative memories, making it harder to re-establish a sense of safety in the present.

Sensory Processing Issues and Trauma

When we think of the after-effects of trauma, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is probably the disorder that most people are familiar with. While many people related PTSD to military personnel experience, we now know that PTSD is a condition that can affect anyone who has experienced trauma. As we continue to understand trauma, we are also learning that there is more than just PTSD after a traumatic event. Trauma can have many different effects on different areas of the brain, which means that there are many different ways for teens to process that trauma. 

Sensory processing issues occur when the brain has trouble receiving and responding to information that comes in through the senses. Some people with sensory processing disorder are very sensitive to things in their environment. For these people, common sounds, like a crowded cafeteria, may be painful or overwhelming. Or a certain clothing material may feel unbearably uncomfortable on their skin.

Psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk argues that after traumatic events, our brains adapt to monitor for signs of danger and the body keeps the score. Especially as many people dissociate from what has happened to them and repress memories, “body memories” serve as a self-protective reminder. The body often responds to signs of potential danger before the brain is able to recognize them. Fight-or-flight mode was adapted as a survival instinct. People who have experienced trauma may also be hyper-vigilant and always on alert for any threat of danger. Their brains are constantly processing perceived threats in any given situation. They may have emotional reactions they did not have prior to trauma to certain sensory experiences of hearing, seeing, smelling or touching things.

Most people are familiar with the five senses, but there are actually eight senses that our brains are processing: sight, sound, touch, taste, smell, body movement, body awareness, and interoception, which refers to needing the toilet or feeling hungry. When a person has sensory processing issues, their brain cannot effectively process one or more of these senses. 

Obstacles to Re-establishing Healthy Relationships

A recent study by Bonn University Hospital was conducted to investigate the role of adverse childhood experiences in sensory processing, particularly physical contact. While many teens who have experienced trauma develop a rational fear of violence in relationships, this study wanted to explore why this fear often extended to all relationships, even previously positive ones. 

Researchers found that traumatized people found social stimuli, like touch, less comforting than people who had not experienced trauma and maintained a greater social distance from strangers. 

Examples of social stimuli include:

• Any kind of physical touch
• Physical distance
• Staring 
• Eye contact
• The sound of someone’s voice

Experiencing trauma also has a severe effect on people’s ability to trust. Research in 2007 found that exposure to trauma may create enough changes in the brain to sensitize people to overreact to an innocuous facial gesture years later, even in people who don’t have a stress-related disorder. Often, the traumatic event has shaken a person’s sense of safety, and because of this, they will do whatever they can to try to feel safe even if that means self-isolating. When rebuilding relationships, it is important for teens who have experienced trauma to be able to communicate their needs. These teens need to build new coping mechanisms and life skills to help them be able to have a healthy dialogue around their expectations and what may trigger their feelings related to past traumas. 

Neurological Changes Affecting Sensory Processing

The study compared brain activity to patients’ responses to various social stimuli. In many cases, there was a slight incongruence between the participant reporting few changes and their brain sending flashing signals of perceived threat. 

They found that three main areas of the brain were significantly affected by physical contact in participants with trauma. While areas responsible for body movement and body perception rapidly spiked with touch, areas related to emotional memory responded much slower to touch, showing a negative association.

This suggests that some physiological effects of childhood trauma linger beyond cognitive awareness and explains why teens often struggle with developing healthy relationships after traumatic events. 

The Benefits of Trauma-Focused Therapy

Some adolescents who are dealing with sensory processing issues after experiencing trauma may benefit from a residential treatment center where they will receive individualized care in a comfortable setting while working with clinicians who use trauma-focused therapy. 

As one of the leading trauma treatment centers for teens, at Solstice, we specialize in therapy for teens who struggle with issues of trauma, loss, attachment, and the often accompanying addictive patterns of behavior and thought. These are highly complex problems and require very specialized approaches to initiate and complete the healing process. Among many other approaches, our clinicians have received specialized, intensive training in trauma-focused interventions.

Trauma-focused therapy includes the following:

• Helps teens identify triggers
• Teaches teens about how trauma impacts them
• Helps them re-establish safety
• Encourages teens to practice somatic experiencing and relaxation techniques
• Empowers teens to develop healthier coping skills
• Allows teens to explore what healthy relationships and boundaries may look like for them

Unlike other trauma treatment centers, we define trauma more broadly than has typically been done historically. Recent neurological research has provided insight and support in developing the most effective treatment methods for trauma as it has helped us to better understand the impact of trauma on a developing, adolescent brain.

While some of our students have been victims of “big T’s”, we have found that many more of them are often as significantly impacted due to higher sensitivity, or susceptibility to “little t’s”  These events often result in levels of emotional dysregulation that exceed their peers in both frequency and intensity. Then, of course, this results in students seeking relief in unhealthy and destructive ways.

The comfortable, milieu therapy setting of Solstice contributes to a safe and open culture, which invites introspection and growth, making change seem less threatening. Milieu therapy is an experiential therapeutic approach that utilizes the residential environment of our program to better understand how to help your child approach and overcome their challenges. At Solstice West, milieu therapy is carried out by observing your child’s behaviors and emotions throughout the day, within a variety of different settings. Milieu therapy provides an invaluable “in the moment” understanding of your child’s challenges, unique from traditional talk therapy. Within an emotionally safe culture, unhealthy behaviors can be gently challenged, and new options adopted more readily. Our experiential therapy approach allows our students to grow and become open to positive change in their lives.

Our therapy for teens acknowledges the fact that to create lasting, effective change, a holistic approach to health is necessary. This fact underlies and drives all the components of the Solstice program. A holistic approach accounts for the fact that our physical, mental, emotional, spiritual and relational selves are all bound together. This “mind-body” philosophy is supported by a large and growing body of research that our mental and physical health is intertwined.

Solstice Can Help

Solstice RTC is a residential treatment program for young girls and assigned females at birth ages 14-18 who struggle with issues such as anxiety, depression, trauma, and unhealthy relationships. Solstice takes a holistic approach in understanding how these issues affect girls’ minds, bodies, and spirits. We create individualized treatment plans for each student considering their individual needs, strengths, and goals to help them regain a strong sense of self. 

With a strong emphasis on family therapy based intervention, nutrition, and physical fitness, and the supportive provision of cutting-edge academics, substance abuse/addiction therapy, equine therapy, and psychiatric services, Solstice sets the stage for the infusion of light into the previously darkened lives of the families we serve. Students will leave with the skills they need to transition into the world feeling confident, happy, and able to manage their emotions. We can help your family today!

Contact us at 866-278-3345 for more information about how we help teen girls and assigned females at birth struggling with trauma.

The Solstice Team

When we think of the holidays we may think of twinkling lights, family traditions, and general merriment. But the reality is that for many people, the holidays are fraught with difficult emotions and memories. This holiday season, think about what might make you go through the holidays feeling stronger and more confident. Even little changes can make a difference in the way we deal with trauma and stress during this time of year. 

Identify Triggers: Think about how the holiday season impacts you. What helps and what hurts? The holidays are full of nostalgia and memories that can be both positive and negative. It can be helpful to go into the holidays with a clear understanding of what situations or topics may have a negative affect on your mental health. 

Healthy Coping Skills: With the hustle and bustle of the holiday season many people lose sight of what keeps them physically healthy and mentally grounded throughout the rest of the year. Making the time to go for a walk or engage in a mindfulness practice can make a big difference in how you handle holiday stress. 

Have Realistic Expectations: The holidays can come with a lot of pressure and expectations of how things “should” be. Remember that those happy holidays that we see in commercials and movies are not most people’s reality. Most families have issues, whether that is stress or trauma. Having unrealistic expectations can lead to disappointment. Instead, know that the holidays will not be perfect and that’s completely normal. 

Set Boundaries: The holidays are a busy time for everyone, and with the pressure of family, friends, and work obligations it is also a time when it’s easy to feel overwhelmed. It can be helpful to discern what you “need” to do and what you “want” to do. For example, do you need to attend every gathering you’re invited to? Not if it causes you stress or is triggering. Do you need to attend your family dinner even though you know it will devolve into arguments? No, you do not. Try thinking about what you want to do. What brings you joy during the holidays? Maybe it’s baking cookies or visiting your grandparents. Those are the things to make time for. 

Reach Out: Dealing with family stress and trauma at any time of the year can be challenging, but it’s especially challenging during the holidays. In those times when you’re feeling overwhelmed, remember that you will not stay in this place forever. Allow your mind and body to process the grief that you may experience. Have people in your life, whether friends, family, or mental health professionals, who you can reach out to when those heavy emotions emerge. It is especially important to have a support system in place during the holidays. 

Solstice RTC Can Help

The core of our programming is based on healing damaged relationships and restoring healthy connections within the family system. In addition to weekly family therapy sessions by phone or video-conference, we also invite families to come to participate in face-to-face family therapy sessions. Weekend visits with their children are encouraged.

We also conduct onsite, multi-day, family seminars which includes all families who are currently enrolled in our program. These intensive, multi-family experiences are conducted 4 times a year and provide powerful, experiential, and therapeutic experiences. Oftentimes families will highlight these events as significant turning points in their lives. For more information please call (801) 406-7450.

The Solstice Team

When we talk about trauma, we usually refer to a specific event and memories of the event. Peter Levine, Ph.D., the founder of Somatic Experiencing, argues that “trauma is not an event, but energy that gets locked in your body around real or perceived threats.” This suggests that the effects of trauma linger in the body whether or not the event is actively on someone’s mind. Somatic Experiencing is an effective treatment option for teens struggling with trauma as it helps them tap into the “Felt Sense” of the experience beyond reprocessing emotional details of traumatic events.

What is the Traumatic Brain?

Our brains function in two primary ways: in safe mode or in survival mode. In safe mode, our brains are calm and open to new experiences. In survival mode, fear takes over. Our brains become hyper-focused on avoiding potential threats, whether they are based on the past or the present.

According to Levine, “if a person is unable to restore a sense of physical safety in the aftermath of a threatening event, their nervous system gets stuck in the survival states of fight, flight, or freeze. The longer survival brain stays on, the harder it is to turn off.”

This explains why your child may have a difficult time being present in the aftermath of a traumatic event. Her body’s memory may have a greater capacity than their emotional memory. As a result, they may become more hypervigilant and worry that traumatic experiences may repeat themselves. 

What is Somatic Experiencing? 

Somatic Experiencing helps teens move beyond the cognitive process of understanding their trauma by reprogramming the body’s primitive survival instincts, which allows them to feel a greater sense of connection, safety, and ease in one’s body. This model can be applied when processing traumatic events or any negative situations.

The goal of Somatic Experiencing is to help teens identify:

• Sensations in specific areas of the body
• Imagery associated with the experience
• Behaviors or Impulses that arise
• Affect or Emotions in the moment
• Meaning or thoughts assigned to the experience

Why is This Effective for Teens?

Cultivating awareness of these situations is the foundation of healing psychological effects of trauma because it allows teens to tolerate and move through physiological sensations trapped in the body. It can be difficult for teens to think about or describe details of events, but they are more conscious of how they feel physically, even if they don’t always understand the connection between physical complaints and intense emotions. 

While teens often struggle opening up to others about details of past trauma based on a fear of being misunderstood or rejected, this approach focuses on how it impacts them in multiple areas. Looking at these separate elements of somatic experiencing, teens can recognize how different areas influence each other and determine which elements are related to past experiences and which are rational in the present moment.

We integrate a variety of evidence-based techniques into our treatment model for trauma, including mindfulness, somatic experiencing, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), and Brainspotting.. By focusing on the relationship between how the body stores traumatic stress and how the mind processes it, we are able to help students begin the healing process. These techniques encourage students to slow down and increase awareness of their inner experience.

Solstice Can Help

Solstice Residential Treatment Center is a program for young girls and assigned female at birth ages 14-18 who struggle with issues such as anxiety, depression, trauma, and relationship struggles. We offer a multidisciplinary holistic approach to trauma recovery, including mindfulness, EMDR, and Brainspotting. Solstice Residential Treatment Center is dedicated to teaching teens how to incorporate healthy habits into their lives. Students will leave with the skills they need to transition into the world feeling confident, happy, and able to manage their emotions. We can help your family today!

Contact us at 866-278-3345 to learn more about treatment options for trauma.

The Solstice Team

Have you ever tried to talk to your child mid-sob? In between gasps for breath, they are less likely to want to have a conversation. In fact, talking about why she’s upset in the moment might lead to more tears and lashing out. It’s difficult to allow their time to decompress when you want to connect with your teen in crisis, but giving their space to feel how they feels allows you to revisit the issue later when you are both able to have a more productive conversation. 

“I feel so disconnected from their when she’s struggling”

When your child is struggling with depression, relationship problems, or trauma, you want their to feel comfortable talking to you about it. They may prefer to deal with things on their own or turn to their friends, but it can feel like they are hiding things from you or that they doesn’t trust you. Even if they doesn’t vocalize what they are going through, it can have an impact on the entire family.

You may not understand what she’s going through if you haven’t experienced similar things. You may be just as comfortable tiptoeing around the white elephant in the room. The disconnect may come from wanting to say the right thing or do the right thing and worrying that they won’t be receptive to how you try to connect with her. 

Although it can feel personal, it is not your fault, but it isn’t hers either. 

Ways to Support Your Struggling Teen in Crisis:

• Be patient. If your teen is in the middle of a personal crisis, it will take time for them to find their footing again. You may be confident that you have solutions that might work for them, but they may not be in a solution-oriented mindset yet. While you may want your child to feel better, offering solutions can be internalized as “not being allowed to feel the way I do.” Listen to them express their emotions and let them have that space. When they are ready to ask for suggestions, they will ask.
• Be present. Whether or not they want to talk about how they feel, let them know that you are there for them. Acknowledge that what they are going through is difficult. You may not be able to offer new solutions, but it can be comforting to know that they are not alone as they go through this. Continue to check in.
• Be specific. Asking open-ended questions like, “is there anything I can do” implies infinite possibilities but may also suggest that you aren’t confident about what might help. Often, your teen might not know either. Coming up with a few concrete suggestions can encourage them to think about and choose what might be beneficial. Be willing to be flexible if they turn down your first suggestions.
• Try to distract them from overwhelming feelings. Even if they reach out to you, chances are focusing on how they feel by processing it can sometimes reinforce how often they’re stuck in those thoughts. Suggest doing something fun together to get their mind off the situation.
• Take care of yourself. It can be difficult to separate your daughter’s feelings from your own as you try to step in to help. It’s important to remember that their emotions can influence your own. Role model self-care by putting yourself first so that you are better prepared to be there for them. 

Solstice Can Help

Solstice Residential Treatment Center is a program for young girls and assigned female at birth ages 14-18 who struggle with issues such as anxiety, depression, trauma, and relationship struggles. This program provides three types of therapy: individual, group, and family therapy along with an accredited academic program that emphasizes creative expression and experiential learning. Solstice Residential Treatment Center is dedicated to teaching teens how to incorporate healthy habits into their lives. Students will leave with the skills they need to transition into the world feeling confident, happy, and able to manage their emotions.

Contact us at 866-278-3345. We can help your family today!

The Solstice Team

Our society does not give people much room or time to grieve. Many teens are not taught how to grieve or how to support others experiencing loss. Instead, they are taught that losses of all kinds are inevitable and that people learn to move on eventually. While this is true, many teens struggle with coping after loss for an extended period of time. In order for parents to understand how to help their child, it is important to differentiate between if they are experiencing grief or trauma.

What is Grief?

Grief is a “normal emotional response” to not only the death of someone you love, but any loss – loss of health, romantic relationships, friends, or even faith. When we lose someone or something we have held dear or have felt attached to, we grieve.

Labeling grief as a “normal” response to loss does not mean that traumatic grief is an “abnormal” response, but it suggests that it is natural to feel sad, anxious, or hopeless in the aftermath of loss. While people should check in and offer support, it is important to allow people time and space to grieve without judging the way they are processing their loss. 

What is Traumatic Grief?

One cannot underestimate the impact of personal factors like emotional regulation, cognitive responses, secondary stressors, coping style, prior history of trauma, and access to support and resources in determining how a person responds to an event.  It is true that certain types of loss happen in a way that they are more likely to be experienced as traumatic, but it isn’t a given that someone will be traumatized by an event or that everyone involved will be affected in the same way.

Traumatic grief can significantly impact one’s health, relationships, and outlook on life. Teens may take on responsibility for the event and become hypervigilant that they will re-experience the event. Even if they were not directly impacted, secondary trauma can have a similar effect as being personally victimized.

How are responses different?

There is not a time limit on the length it takes to heal after loss that sets grief apart from traumatic grief. While there are many similarities, traumatic grief tends to be internalized more and is associated with other emotional issues.

• While grief reactions generally stand alone, trauma reactions include grief reactions. 
• The most common reaction to grief is sadness. The most common reaction to trauma is terror. 
• Many people who have experienced traumatic events struggle to talk about what happened, while people who are grieving are more likely to want to talk about painful reminders.
• Grieving is often focused on what life is like in the absence of something. Trauma distorts one’s self-image and sense of safety.
• When grieving, many people express anger toward an event, while people healing from trauma are more likely to internalize anger or express it towards others.

Ways to Support Your Child Coping with Loss:

• Validate the pain of their loss. Many teens are in denial after loss and try to repress intense emotions. Mourning requires teens to acknowledge the pain they are experiencing and to search for meaning. As your teen grieves, you may feel impacted by their pain. Reassure them that it is natural to be significantly affected and that they are not expected to move on immediately.
• Give them appropriate “breathing room.” Don’t take it personally if they are struggling to open up and talk about what they’ve experienced. Social withdrawal is a common response. They may feel distant from others and the person they were before the event. They may feel overwhelmed getting back into their normal daily routine and need more time to readjust. 
• Let them know you are always there for them so they feel comfortable talking to you whenever they are ready. Ask open-ended questions about how they’re doing and offer to support them in whatever way they might need. Don’t judge the way they are dealing with their situation.
• Find resources available to help your teen cope with the loss they’ve experienced. If you are concerned about how they have been coping, reach out for professional help for guidance. It is common for teens to feel hopeless as they grieve and they are more likely to participate in risky behaviors. Learning more about the impact of trauma teaches you how to support them better. 

Solstice Can Help

Solstice West is a residential treatment center that creates a supportive space for teenage girls and assigned female at birth ages 14-18 to process loss that they have experienced and grow emotionally. We take a relationship-based approach to healing from personal trauma that encourages friendship, peer support, and mentorship through group therapy and teamwork. Our treatment model incorporates adventure therapy, fitness, artistic expression, and community service to encourage normal adolescent experiences, social skills, and independent living skills.

Contact us at 866-278-3345 to learn more about trauma and grief. We can help your family today!

The Solstice Team

David Treleaven, author of “Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness: Practices for  Safe and Transformative Healing” defines trauma as “any experience stressful enough to leave us feeling helpless, frightened, and profoundly unsure. After such experiences, we are left with a diminished sense of security with others and in the world, and a sense of feeling unsafe inside our own skin.” Treleaven suggests that integrating Trauma-informed techniques into mindfulness practices helps make the benefits of mindfulness more accessible to everyone.

How Traumatic Stress Interferes with Mindfulness

David Treleaven discusses the subtler ways that our body can be traumatized by certain experiences and how these experiences can get in the way of being fully present during traditional mindfulness practices that are intended to reduce symptoms of traumatic stress rather than trigger them. In traditional settings, it can be difficult for mindfulness teachers to pick up on signs that their students may have a history of trauma; however, they can pick up on body cues that signal discomfort, tension, or insecurity. 

4 R’s of Trauma-informed Therapy: 

• Recognizes symptoms. Our therapists conduct thorough assessments of students and discuss their trauma history directly, but they also observe their triggers and the way their body responds when discussing trauma and in their everyday lives.
• Realizes the impact. Our therapists have years of experience working with teen girls and assigned female at birth who have a history of trauma and have seen how it can impact multiple areas of their life, including relationships, academic performance, and self-esteem.
• Responds by integrating knowledge about trauma into policies. They are sensitive to their student’s history and use strategies that emphasize self-regulation and nonjudgmental. 
• Resisting re-traumatization is the end goal of trauma-informed therapy. students have learned to identify triggers, challenge negative thoughts, and choose a different path. 

Goals of Trauma-informed Mindfulness: 

• To minimize distress for people practicing mindfulness
• To forward a systemic understanding of trauma
• To advocate for a continued partnership between mindfulness practitioners and Trauma professionals

Integrating Mindfulness into Trauma Therapy

We integrate a variety of evidence-based techniques into our treatment model for trauma, including mindfulness, somatic experiencing, EMDR, and Brainspotting. By focusing on the relationship between how the body stores traumatic stress and how the mind processes it, we are able to help students begin the healing process. These techniques encourage students to slow down and increase awareness of their inner experience. 

While many mindfulness practices may involve controlling the breath and focusing on specific things, the goal of Trauma-sensitive mindfulness is to notice whatever is happening in your body and to let go of judgments about what your practice is supposed to look like. This may include changing settings, moving more often, playing certain songs, or scratching sitting all together and looking for other ways to find your flow free from judgment and fear. Mindfulness practices and mindful living principles are an integral part of our program as coping mechanisms and healthy habits.

Solstice RTC Can Help

Solstice Residential Treatment Center is a program for young girls and assigned female at birth ages 14-18 who struggle with issues such as anxiety, depression, trauma, and relationship struggles. We offer a multidisciplinary holistic approach to trauma recovery, including mindfulness, EMDR, and Brainspotting. Solstice Residential Treatment Center is dedicated to teaching teens how to incorporate healthy habits into their lives. Students will leave with the skills they need to transition into the world feeling confident, happy, and able to manage their emotions. We can help your family today!

Contact us at 866-278-3345.

The Solstice Team