Where do we find answers to the world’s growing plagues of chronic illnesses—from diabetes to high blood pressure and from cancer to depression? In childhood. Surveys and research show a connection between ill health in adults and adversity in childhood—including divorce, substance abuse, neglect, and various other forms of emotional and physical abuse. And research shows that high stress levels during childhood change our neural systems in ways that can last a lifetime. What is the nature of the connections between childhood stress and health? How can we better assist unhealthy adults whose problems are rooted in childhood trauma? And how can we make children more resilient? Dr. Nadine Burke Harris, pediatrician, and founder and CEO of the Center for Youth Wellness in San Francisco, and author of The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity, and Carol S. Larson, president and CEO of the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, took part in a Zócalo Public Square event titled “Does Childhood Trauma Live in the Body Forever?” at the National Center for the Preservation of Democracy in Little Tokyo in downtown Los Angeles. They explored the newest thinking on how people can overcome childhood trauma and avoid its long-term ill effects.
