Implementation of Community-based Trauma-Sensitive Yoga Program for Youth with Complex Trauma

Format

Workshop

Presenters

Vira Salzburn, Chatham County Safety Net Planning CouncilFollow
Kierstin Graham, Chatham County Safety Net Planning CouncilFollow

First Presenter's Institution

Chatham County Safety Net Planning Council

First Presenter’s Email Address

virasalzburn@chlink.org

First Presenter's Brief Biography

Vira Salzburn is the Program Director for Safety and Resilience programs at Chatham County Safety Net Planning Council, Inc. She is a Mindful Self-Compassion (MSC) Trained Teacher, Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST) Master Trainer, SafeTALK Trainer, Certified Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness (TSM) and Trauma-Sensitive Yoga (TSY) Instructor, and Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) and Community Resiliency Model (CRM)® Facilitator. Vira earned a Master of Science degree in Management, Organizational Behavior and Leadership from Troy University and a Bachelor of Liberal Arts degree in Humanities from Auburn University at Montgomery. Vira is a Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM)® with Project Management Institute (PMI). She is also a certified Group Fitness Trainer and Group Yoga Instructor with Athletics and Fitness Association of America (AFAA). Vira is the developer of the upstream suicide prevention approach that uses Mindful-Self Compassion programming for building resilience and enhancing emotional wellbeing. Vira is a public speaker on suicide prevention, mindfulness and self-compassion, and has presented at multiple local, state and national conferences and symposia. As a Ukrainian-American and a world traveler, Vira recognizes the importance of overcoming cultural barriers and connecting with others for making a meaningful difference on personal, organizational, and community levels. Since moving to the U.S. in 2007, Vira has had the honor of volunteering as an interpreter and a liaison between Ukrainian orphaned children and American adoptive families, which has greatly impacted her perception of compassion and servanthood and helped her better understand the true meaning behind the idea of “changing the world one life at a time”.

Second Presenter's Institution

Chatham County Safety Net Planning Council

Second Presenter’s Email Address

kierstingraham@chlink.org

Second Presenter's Brief Biography

Kierstin Nicole Graham is the Program Development & Outreach VISTA for the Trauma Sensitive Yoga (TSY) program at Chatham County Safety Net Planning Council. KIerstin is a certified Experienced Registered Yoga Teacher (ERYT) 200 and Trauma-Informed ERYT 500, meditation and breath coach, and reiki master. Kierstin has a wealth of experience providing trauma-informed and adaptive yoga to youth and adults impacted by Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), trauma, and complex trauma. She is passionate about serving individuals in recovery and those experiencing homelessness with the desire to give people the tools to enhance their ability to empower themselves and change their story for the better.

Location

Session Four Breakouts

Strand #1

Health: Mental & Physical Health

Strand #2

Heart: Social & Emotional Skills

Relevance

It is no secret that yoga does wonders for the body and can calm the mind. There is growing evidence that modified yoga, when taught by specially trained individuals and employed in a therapeutic context, can be a tool of healing and empowerment for people who have experienced trauma.

The term “trauma sensitive yoga” was coined by David Emerson, E-RYT, founder and director of yoga services at the Trauma Center at the Justice Resource Institute in Brookline, MA, to describe the use of yoga as an adjunctive treatment within a clinical context. The practice aims to help people regain comfort in their bodies, counteract rumination, and improve self-regulation while enjoying the physical benefits of yoga exercise.

Trauma Sensitive Yoga (TSY) classes build awareness of the breath and physical sensations by softening the edges of rules and expectations participants may have for themselves while practicing the connection between their body and mind.

In TSY classes participants learn to connect to the choice of a form or practice at their comfort level, raise their body awareness by paying attention to their bodily sensations experienced through breath and movement, relate to their body with kindness rather than self-criticism, safely practice mindfulness and attention regulation, and use self-compassion to motivate themselves during practice.

Through trauma-sensitive yoga participants can experiment with breathing, moving, strengthening, stretching, and resting. TSY classes are set up so that participants are in control over what they are doing with their body at all times and the facilitator is there to provide safe, professional guidance.

Brief Program Description

This presentation will discuss the implementation and scale-up of an evidence-based Trauma-Sensitive Yoga (TSY) program as a part of a larger community-wide safety and resilience-building effort. It will explain the effectiveness of TSY interventions for both clinical and non-clinical populations and highlight the physical, mental, emotional, and social benefits of a modified yoga practice for youth and young adults with complex trauma.

Summary

This presentation will discuss a public health approach to building community resilience with a focus on an upstream prevention. It will highlight program development and implementation considerations for building a community-based trauma-informed programming.

Participants will be able to explore implementation and scale-up strategies for community-based mind-body interventions, build an understanding of basic trauma-sensitive yoga (TSY) theory and technique, recognize the physical, mental, emotional, and social benefits of TSY for youth and young adults with complex trauma, and practice TSY without any required prior yoga experience or equipment.

Additionally, participants will be able to recognize differences between trauma-sensitive yoga and traditional yoga, and learn movement and breath techniques helpful for building awareness, improving focus, and relaxation.

Evidence

Trauma-Sensitive Yoga:

Developed at The Trauma Center and newly listed by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) as an evidence-based treatment, TraumaCenter-Trauma Sensitive Yoga (TC-TSY) helps children to learn to self-regulate their bodies. It can be used as both a prevention and a treatment tool, with whole classrooms, small groups, and individuals.

TSY recognizes trauma’s impact on the whole person, guiding individuals on a journey of healing--mind, body, and spirit. Yoga is well known for its ability to:

• reduce symptoms,
• improve physical health, and
• decrease emotional distress.

Yoga is a meditative practice guiding individuals through rest, breath, and movement.

Unlike traditional yoga, TSY is sensitive to people with complex needs. Rather than being form focused, TSY empowers each person to choose movements which feel safe to the individual, increase tolerance at their own pace, and participate in a setting without touch or peer communication to guide.

TSY promotes present awareness and internal reflection of individual somatic and affective experiences to:

• support regulation,
• establish a renewed connection to self and community, and
• support a healthy relationship between body and mind.

Despite the recent proliferation of yoga-based interventions claiming to be trauma-informed, TSY intentionally designed for this purpose over a five-year period of model development, piloting and refinement, is the most extensively evaluated and widely disseminated of yoga-based trauma treatment model, and was the first yoga-based therapy to be recognized as an evidence-based practice in the United States.

Population served:

TSY was initially developed for adult civilian and veteran trauma clients, but has been adapted for use with adolescents.

TSY is offered individually, as an open group, or as a closed group. Groups are also often organized by gender preference. TSY groups are primarily facilitated in select:

• studios,
• social service organizations,
• outpatient or community treatment centers,
• VA’s or residential treatment facilities.

Individual TSY has been adapted to be readily incorporated by mental health clinicians into ongoing psychotherapy in clinic or private practice settings.

Citations and evidence:

West, J., Liang, B., & Spinazzola, J. (2017). Trauma Sensitive Yoga as a complementary treatment for posttraumatic stress disorder: A Qualitative Descriptive analysis. International journal of stress management, 24(2), 173–195. https://doi.org/10.1037/str0000040

Clark, C. J., Lewis-Dmello, A., Anders, D., Parsons, A., Nguyen-Feng, V., Henn, L., & Emerson, D. (2014). Trauma-sensitive yoga as an adjunct mental health treatment in group therapy for survivors of domestic violence: a feasibility study. Complementary therapies in clinical practice, 20(3), 152–158. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ctcp.2014.04.003

Learning Objective 1

Discuss implementation and scale-up strategies for community-based mind-body interventions

Learning Objective 2

Summarize basic TSY theory and technique

Learning Objective 3

Explain the physical, mental, emotional, and social benefits of TSY for youth and young adults with complex trauma

Keyword Descriptors

yoga, trauma, trauma-informed, mindfulness, evidence-based, community-based

Presentation Year

2022

Start Date

3-8-2022 8:30 AM

End Date

3-8-2022 9:45 AM

Recommended Citation

Salzburn, Vira and Graham, Kierstin, "Implementation of Community-based Trauma-Sensitive Yoga Program for Youth with Complex Trauma" (2022). National Youth Advocacy and Resilience Conference. 46.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/nyar_savannah/2022/2022/46