Trauma-Informed Care

The Impact of Trauma

• Emotional Problems
• Behavioral Problems
• Poor socialization
• Risky behaviors
• Substance abuse
• Homelessness
• Unemployment
• Criminal behavior, and
• Long-term mental health issues

Many of the youth who come to Nexus have experienced horrific trauma, including physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, neglect, abandonment, and witness to violence.

This trauma impacts brain development and often results in challenging behaviors in these youth, such as excessive crying, pushing away, tuning out, withdrawing, not eating, inappropriate sexual acting out, or outbursts of anger.

Trauma-Informed Care

All Nexus staff, educators, and foster parents are trained in trauma-informed care to provide safe and effective behavior management techniques for the youth in our care. We also train a select group of therapists in Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT) so we can provide intensive trauma-specific treatment to the youth who need it.

• contains trauma reactions,
• understands that behavior is the result of trauma,
• and reacts positively to trauma symptoms.

We also teach youth and families to manage challenging behaviors at home by understanding and reshaping trauma-reactive behaviors.