adverse childhood experiences or aces
and trauma-informed practice are
becoming buzzwords regardless of the
organization you happen to work for if
you've not heard of them yet you soon
well but what's it all about and what's
it got to do with you long well an
adverse childhood experiences an
experience that happens during childhood
that could be said to be be said to be
traumatic
so clearly any form of abuse would be
classed as an ace but more than that
we're talking about experiences where
the physical and emotional needs of a
young person are consistently not being
met so things like neglect or prevent or
substance abuse or even parental illness
and extreme poverty would be classed as
an adverse childhood experience but so
what don't look back you're not going
that way shouldn't we just be looking
forward well it's very easy to say until
we realize the time at which the brain
at these experiences are happening is
the time at which the brain is
developing and therefore these
experience have a long lasting impact on
the person on the way their brain
develops on the way they see themselves
and on the way they perceive the world
around them in effect they create what I
call their default setting and I'd like
to explain to you what I mean by that I
know I hate me too loud too brash with a
mouth that won't shush sure stupid cow
no one's interested in your pointless
stuff too arrogant too rude too
desperate to prove never amount to
anything too thick to improve I know I
hate me always on the outside never
truly belong in guilty room not welcome
stop stalling not good enough don't
deserve a total waste of space
- greed - selfish disgrace I know I hate
me desperate to be alone to stop people
getting too close
who'd want to be friends with someone so
gross you'd want to lie next to your
ugly face
can't even look at you to think the
words rape I know I hate me too
compliant to fight just praying you
won't appear lying silence in the dark
immobilized by fear doing as instructed
won't pay to make you angry instead of
responding I just stare at you blankly
you see I know I hate me even though the
reason hating is safe it protects what's
inside it keeps closed the barrier or
feelings have died too dangerous to
trust won't ever win better off alone
than to let the wolves in and I know the
real me remains locked up on hurt and I
know that she's waiting needs in love to
reverse past damage that was done bring
to the here to the now I know any change
what I don't know is how okay so the
last part of that is not strictly true
anymore I do know parts of how and the
part of how that we're looking at today
is the part that has got to do with you
and in order to do that we're going to
be looking at Steven Porges polyvagal
theory now in order to understand this
we need to be able to understand three
parts of the brain the prefrontal cortex
which is our thinking brain our limbic
system which is our survival and our
emotional brain and the brain stem which
is how our brain links to the rest to
the rest of our body now Paul G's argues
that the under traumatized brain is
linked to our vital survival organs our
heart our lungs our stomach and
digestive system through the ventral
vague or complex and what that means
simply is that so long as there's no
further sense of threat or danger that
our breathing and our heart rates works
as they should do is everything's normal
everything's fine
now when danger does present itself its
our limbic system that notices first and
specifically our amygdala which is the
smoke alarm of our brain warns of a
potential danger and the the message is
sent to the frontal brain to look for
the danger messages are then sent back
telling us whether you know we need to
be worried or not
at which point if we do we enter our
autonomic nervous system and what that
means is that our body gets ready to
fight or flight the danger so our heart
rates and our breathing speeds up access
to our stomach ease is cut off we feel
sick and that comes from when we were
cavemen and you know the danger was
potentially a saber-toothed tiger for
example and they needed to fight or run
away from it in order to survive that
hasn't changed so we will deal with
whatever the danger is and then we will
return to our ventral vagal complex
everything will go back to as it was but
for the traumatized brain things don't
work that way and when we think to the
past that we understand why a child who
is being bought up in traumatic
circumstances live very much in their
limbic system okay their amygdala is
constantly firing because they are
constantly in danger sometimes in danger
of their lives it is life-threatening
and therefore the limbic system becomes
swollen and the amygdala becomes
overactive which means that also the the
pathways that should develop to the
frontal brain during our childhood and
during teenagers don't develop as they
should which means as adults we have we
are stuck within the limbic system and
what that means is that when we're
triggered our brain our Nick Taylor
sort of says Danger Danger Danger and it
doesn't stop but it doesn't recognize
that that danger was years ago and has
long since passed
it's keeps telling us that there's
there's something to be afraid of
and I want you to think about what that
feels like
imagine a deep and searing pain no
marked wax as proof no swelling or
temperature or sickness or heat no sign
of any kind thought inside the pain is
constant but it's one that cannot be
described nails scratching across an
everlasting board the incessant
screeching of a whale a tap dripping
into an empty pot drip drip drip
unrelenting all played out together as
the by slight grip on the exhausted
brain gets tighter scratch and tighter
screech and tighter drip unceasing
scratch unremitting screech an ending
drip disjointed thought scratch speech
invade the mind March whoops shop
overall original thought screech
stirring up memories doubt useless
helpless pathetic as the Vice gets
tighter scratch screech drip a tighter
pathetic a boa constrictor yes
suffocates the chest scratch screech
drip gets tighter yes
can't breathe feel sick take the silver
points of a card cold blade pressies
deep into soft relent in flesh silence
blood trickles across clammy skin it's
ok it's ok to breathe again ok so we can
see how unhelpful coping strategies such
a self-harm can develop when that
experience is so distressing but the
brain has a flip side to hyper vigilance
and you will notice if someone's within
this state because very often they talk
quite fast they move around quite a lot
they might be very guarded they might be
quite aggressive or they might sweat a
lot ok so we might notice this but
there's a flip side which is
dissociation and the signs of
dissociation is when someone is staring
into space for a prolonged period
time away with the fairies you might say
and the reason for that is that
basically their brain is cut off as a
child you can't fight or flight the
circumstances you are in you are
fighting adults in an adult world and
therefore the brain protects itself by
shutting down which is really really
helpful at the time but the brain
continues to use that strategy as an
adult which is really unhelpful okay a
glass wall surrounds me trapped in a
vacuum of nothingness the daily actions
continuous before but they are nothing
they mean nothing the actions robotic
feelings elusive I have become a
mannequin an empty vessel who no-one
sees or regards a blank face in an
aimless crowd of no more significance
than yesterday's torn up newspaper
floating on the wind redundant if I sit
still enough maybe I'll become a statue
maybe I'll fades away maybe I'll become
nothing okay so you get my point
clearly okay adverse childhood
experiences have a lasting impact but so
what what's he got to do with you not
your problem right you can't change the
past what are you supposed to do about
it now the thing is is the Aces you know
understandably lead to mental illness
and mental illness is something that is
protected under the Equality Act and
therefore organizations regardless of
what you are have a duty a legal duty to
make reasonable adjustments but you
might say how am I supposed to know
people don't go around talking about you
know past abuse or about mental illness
even very few people could disclose it
and you're right they don't because it's
still to booth the reason why I choose
to
talk about it but those the signs that
I've already mentioned that you might
notice and the suggestions I'm going to
make are ones that will benefit all
members of your organization be it you
know schools health organizations
businesses whatever okay not just those
who happen to have a traumatic past so
what's you're all about then what we
need to realize is that a child being
bought up in traumatic circumstances
does not feel safe they have they have
no sense of safety and therefore unsafe
situations are triggering extremely
triggering so we need to make our
workplaces safe so how do we do that
first of all relationships absolutely
vital ok we need to be able to treat
everybody within that organization be it
pupils be its staff of any status or
patient
whoever with unconditional positive
regard talk to them learn people's names
ask how was your weekend what did you
get up with be genuine be honest ok if
we're talking about schools or health
care extend that relationship to parents
to care as have that wraparound support
show that you care ok and whilst we're
at it let's get rid of the backstabbing
that goes on in the staff room because
I'll tell you what if your backstabbing
someone else whilst they're not there
then what are you saying about me too
dangerous to trust we'll never win that
barrier is going to remain absolutely
triple lock shot secondly predictability
and control as a child returning home to
an abusive home you do not know what you
are walking into monsters are not
monsters 100% of the time
it's unpredictable so you're constantly
walking on eggshells
not knowing having to try and guess when
these things gonna you know flare up
what's going to happen so anything that
is not predictable or over over which
there is little control triggers a
hyper-vigilant state you have to be
aware you have to be on the constant
lookout as to what's happening therefore
let's have those policies procedures
let's let's make people aware let's make
sure that people understand you know
what is going to happen how it's going
to happen why it's gonna happen and the
why it's really important those pathways
that should have developed during
childhood to the thinking brain haven't
developed in the way they should
therefore whilst you might assume oh
well that's obvious
it's obvious why we do that no not
necessarily no it's not let's be clear
and also let's be person-centered our
policies appropriate so is it is it
appropriate for a school for example to
send a child as who he's showing
symptoms of hyper vigilance because god
only knows what's happening at home is
it appropriate to ring home and give
them a detention or would it be more
appropriate with that child to have a
safe space for them to go to think about
what is appropriate for the person that
you are dealing with
and finally positivity the narrative of
any adverse childhood experience is
undoubted undoubtedly negative it is one
of useless helpless pathetic okay so you
can either choose to confirm that by
only ever pointing out the negative and
of course there's going to be negatives
no one's perfect okay or you can put
that negative into a context by also
highlighting the positive so ultimately
what we're talking about is a cultural
change okay
and you don't change culture through
emails and memos you change them through
relationships one conversation at a time
thank you
[Applause]