A Journey of Post Traumatic Growth

What does it mean to move through developmental trauma into awareness and then sequentially resolving traumatic exposure? Shame and self forgiveness, going from a perception of flawed to adaptive, learning unconditional regard, identifying mentors, identifying discomfort and learning the sequence of establishing good habits for someone with a central nervous system built in chaos. We will look at these things that we see, experience and grapple with in our work with challenging environments and the humans that get built in them.

Frank Grijalva came through the California system as a child adopted into a family challenged with mental health and substance abuse issues. Raised in the East Bay area of Northern California, Frank attended 9 different schools in his first 9 years. Raised in a home of significant physical and mental abuse, Frank’s first training was in threat detection and an upregulated central nervous system. This gives Frank a unique perspective that translates for many of our most traumatized communities, families, and children. After high school, Frank found his way into the military. His first professional training was as a special warfare diver attached to the Marine Mammal program of the United States Navy where he spent 8 years learning behavior modification skills, stress management and understanding the dynamics of nonverbal communication that began the journey to self awareness. Later, as a stay at home dad for 2 kids and a student of psychology, he became aware of and struggled with development, his own trauma exposure, and behavioral progressions and sequencing. This led to a journey of self-exploration and an academic focus on psychological trauma.

Frank has worked with the International Trauma Center since 1999 and deployed to Ground Zero to manage a team of clinicians working with a federal agency in “the dig” to stabilize them ongoing as they did their difficult work. Frank also worked extensively throughout Louisiana and Mississippi in the aftermath of Katrina. Through the International Trauma Center Frank has worked abroad in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank, Nepal, Jordan, Haiti and several other countries for agencies like Save the Children, USAID, the World Bank and the International Center for the Protection of Victims of Torture to learn interventions in complex situations and train as well as be trained by clinicians from all over the world working with children and families.