Published 8/15/20

Histories of adversity and trauma are common among families served in intensive, in-home programs.  Although therapists may know the child’s trauma history, the caregivers’ current and past experience with adversity and trauma too often remains in the background, yet is equally as important for informing clinical decision-making.  The caregivers’ histories of trauma have a major impact on family structure, parenting, and response to treatment.  This training introduces participants to current science and conceptualizations of complex developmental trauma, describing what it is and how it impacts brain development and brain functioning in children and caregivers.  Clinician-friendly concepts from neuroscience (e.g. Siegal’s “hand model” of the brain and Porges’ concept of neuroception) are introduced to help therapists gain a basic understanding of how trauma and chronic adversity shapes emotional availability and parent-child relationships.  Bruce Perry’s neurobiology-informed neurosequential model of therapeutics is described as a useful tool for clinical problem solving.

This strength-based training translates knowledge about the impacts of toxic stress on the brain and body into clinical practice, informing therapists about how best to introduce, structure, and pace interventions.  Special attention is given to the important role of therapists in co-regulating stressed, dysregulated caregivers in family therapy sessions.

This course is comprised of edited segments from three live-streamed Zoom versions of a similarly named didactic presented to therapists working in Pennsylvania’s FBMHS programs in April 2020.  Since break-out rooms were used to foster interaction with the material, the webinars in this course contain a rich balance between lecture and conversation.  These conversations facilitate translation of theory to clinical application.

Objectives:

As a result of attending this training, participants will be able to:    

1. Identify the impacts of chronic adversity and traumatic stress on the brain and body
2. Describe co-regulation and its critical role in emotion regulation in parenting and in family therapy sessions
3. Explain the role of neuroception and trauma adaptation in presenting symptoms, as well as in the negative interactions of traumatized children and caregivers
4. Describe how family therapists can effectively apply the intervention rubric: “regulate, relate, and then reason” with reactive family members.

This is a beginning level course, introducing therapists to complex developmental trauma and its implications for treating families.

Course Outline

• Unit 1: How Chronic Adversity, Toxic Stress, and Trauma Impact the Brain and Body (75 minutes)
  • Webinar: Adverse Childhood Events (ACES and the Complex Developmental Trauma
  • Webinar: Reframing Challenging Behavior as an Adaption to Toxic Stress
  • Handouts: The ACE Pyramid, Slide Handouts

• Unit 2: Why It’s Important to View Emotional Reactivity in a Relational Context (60 minutes)
  • Webinar: The Relationship Between Attunement and Emotional Regulation
  • Webinar: Brain Adaptations to Alarm and Safety and the Capacity for Connection
  • Handouts: Model of the Brain, Summary of Science of Neglect, Slide Handouts

• Unit 3: The Critical Role of Co-Regulation in Family Treatment (75 minutes)
  • Webinar: Regulate, Relate, and Reason
  • Webinar: Becoming a Mindful, Emotionally Regulated Therapist
  • Case Presentation: Helping a Caregiver Remain Calm in the Face of Extreme Persistence
  • Handouts: Autonomic Nervous System, Co-Regulation Strategies with Child, Window of Tolerance, Slide Handouts

About the Presenters

Click here for information on Tara Byers, MS, LPC, NCC.

This course uses an online distance-learning self-paced format.  It includes recorded audio, recorded video-based webinars, and selected readings.  There are post-tests to ensure comprehension of the material. Participants can communicate with the instructors via the online moodle interface. Real-time communication with the instructor in our online, self-paced distance learning courses is not possible. However, participants can send an email to the instructor via the online moodle interface within the course and expect to receive a response within 48 hours. All course content, including post-tests, should take approximately 3.5 hours to complete.

Frequently Asked Questions
Visit our Self-Paced, Online Continuing Education Policies & FAQs for additional information regarding the CFBT online learning center, accommodations for disabilities, reporting problems with the course, instructions for viewing webinars, etc.

Most families treated in intensive, in-home programs have been impacted by complex developmental trauma.  Although every family adapts in their own way, there are several predictable negative adaptive patterns which have direct implications for a present-focused family based treatment. It is important for therapists to recognize these patterns, interrupt them, and create more functional ones. Towards this end, this course describes 1) the most common impacts of complex developmental trauma on the way families organize their relationships with one another and the community, 2) how the four pillars of ESFT are designed to address these common negative impacts, and 3) strategies for structuring trauma informed conversations with families.

This is a Beginning Level course. The target audience is all behavioral health professionals working with children and adolescents.

Course Objectives

1. Identify the most common negative impacts of complex developmental trauma on the family system
2. Describe strategies used in the ESFT model to address the most common negative impacts of trauma on the family
3. Describe how to introduce and facilitate trauma informed conversations among family members and develop more functional relational patterns

This course uses an online distance-learning self-paced format.  It includes recorded audio, recorded video-based webinars, and selected readings.  There are post-tests to ensure comprehension of the material. Participants can communicate with the instructors via the online moodle interface. Real-time communication with the instructor in our online, self-paced distance learning courses is not possible. However, participants can send an email to the instructor via the online moodle interface within the course and expect to receive a response within 48 hours. All course content, including post-tests, should take approximately 1.5 hours to complete.

Frequently Asked Questions
Visit our Self-Paced, Online Continuing Education Policies & FAQs for additional information regarding the CFBT online learning center, accommodations for disabilities, reporting problems with the course, instructions for viewing webinars, etc.

The high prevalence of trauma among the children and caregivers served by community based programs demands that all intervention be informed by a clear understanding of trauma and its impacts.  This course describes in detail how a history of danger and emotional injury shapes family member attitudes, expectations and relationships — and the implications these trauma histories have for a “present focused” family-based treatment.

This course is designed to help therapists “see” family member’s efforts to adapt to fear and vulnerability that is often hidden beneath dramatic, seemingly irrational interactions.  And then be able to utilize this awareness within a systemic framework to help families create more safe, stable and  functional relationships. The course is organized into four units, each addressing one major question or component considered essential for the well-prepared trauma informed family based therapist.

This is a Beginning Level course. The target audience is all behavioral health professionals working with children and adolescents.

Learning Objectives

1. Describe the core principles of a trauma-informed approach and the reasons it is critical for family based programs to incorporate these principles into the treatment of children with SED and their caregivers
2. Describe the nature of trauma, particularly when it is chronic as in Complex Developmental Trauma Disorder
3. Explain common impacts of chronic trauma on the internal and relational experience of children and families.

Course Outline

• Unit 1: The Importance of a Trauma-Informed Approach to Treatment (60 minutes)
  • Webinar: Being a Child Can Be Dangerous
  • Webinar: Working with Wounded Caregivers
  • Webinar: Trauma Informed Treatment & ESFT
  • Video on Complex Developmental Trauma

• Unit 2: Trauma and Complex Developmental Trauma Disorder (Approx 60 minutes)
  • Webinar: The Nature of Trauma
  • Webinar: In Their Own Voices – Teens with Complex Developmental Trauma Disorder talk about their experiences
  • Resources: Checklists for Identifying Trauma Symptoms

• Unit 3: The Impact of Trauma on Health and Development (50 minutes)
  • Webinar: The Impact of Chronic Hyperarousal on Health
  • Webinar: Developmental & Psychological Impacts of Trauma
  • Video: How Childhood Trauma Differs from Complex Trauma

• Optional Online Resources on Trauma and Complex Trauma

This course uses an online distance-learning self-paced format.  It includes recorded audio, recorded video-based webinars, and selected readings.  There are post-tests to ensure comprehension of the material. Participants can communicate with the instructors via the online moodle interface. Real-time communication with the instructor in our online, self-paced distance learning courses is not possible. However, participants can send an email to the instructor via the online moodle interface within the course and expect to receive a response within 48 hours. All course content, including post-tests, should take approximately 3.0 hours to complete.

Frequently Asked Questions
Visit our Self-Paced, Online Continuing Education Policies & FAQs for additional information regarding the CFBT online learning center, accommodations for disabilities, reporting problems with the course, instructions for viewing webinars, etc.

Updated 2/1/19

This course explores in detail the population served by community based programs such as BHRS and FBMHS – children and youth with Severe Emotional Disturbance (SED) and their families. The course begins with first hand accounts from adolescents with mental illness and their caregivers.  Links to youtube videos, a podcast and readings highlight their experiences related to living with emotional problems and trying to get services. Although there is incredible diversity among these children and families, there are also some common patterns.  These patterns are described in the second unit of this course through a 25 minute webinar.  The question is addressed, “what family interactions maintain or exacerbate SED.”  The implications these patterns have for treatment are highlighted.  The third unit in this course highlights common multi-generational patterns that leave multi-stressed families crisis-oriented.

This is a Beginning Level course. It introduces therapists to the topic of serious emotional disturbance. The target audience is all behavioral health professionals working with children and adolescents.

Learning Objectives 

1. Describe common characteristics children with SED
2. Describe common characteristics of multi-stressed families.
3. Describe the impact of chronic family stress adversity on the development of basic social-emotional skills in children.
4. Identify family interactions and multi-generational patterns that maintain and exacerbate SED.

Course Outline

• Unit 1: A Close-Up First-Hand Perspective of SED (80 minutes)
  • Podcast:  How adversity undermines the development of tenacity, resilience, and impulse control.
  • Videos: The experience of parents in accessing mental health services for their children with SED.
  • Reading: Adolescents with SED share their experiences and perspective

• Unit 2: A Clinical Perspective on Children with SED & Their Families (45 minutes)
  • Webinar: The shared characteristics of children & adolescents with SED
  • Webinar: A Developmentally-informed strength-based perspective on SED
  • Webinar: What Multi-Stressed, Fragile Families have in common
  • Webinar: What Maintains SED

• Unit 3: Multi-Generational Patterns in Crisis-Oriented Families (45 minutes)
  • Reading: Generational patterns in families of children at risk for SED

About the Presenters

Click here for information on C. Wayne Jones, PhD.

This course uses an online distance-learning self-paced format.  It includes recorded audio, recorded video-based webinars, and selected readings.  There are post-tests to ensure comprehension of the material. Participants can communicate with the instructors via the online moodle interface. Real-time communication with the instructor in our online, self-paced distance learning courses is not possible. However, participants can send an email to the instructor via the online moodle interface within the course and expect to receive a response within 48 hours. All course content, including post-tests, should take approximately 3.0 hours to complete.

Frequently Asked Questions
Visit our Self-Paced, Online Continuing Education Policies & FAQs for additional information regarding the CFBT online learning center, accommodations for disabilities, reporting problems with the course, instructions for viewing webinars, etc.