by Rona | Apr 14, 2016 | Announcements, Appearances
I will be giving the Keynote address at the 22nd Annual Early Learning Conference presented by Contra Costa Child Care Council
Opening the Door to Family Engagement
Join us, Saturday, April 23—from 7:30-4:15PM
Diablo Valley College. Go to www.cocokids.org for more information and registration
There will be workshops all day, offering dynamic speakers with a wide range of experience from “Supporting Bilingual Learners” to “Recognizing and Reporting of Child Abuse and Neglect.”
See you there!
by Rona | Apr 12, 2016 | Announcements, Appearances, KPFA, Podcasts, Radio Shows
In the US approximately 5 children die every day as a result of child abuse.
Today on KPFA.org we discussed the complex subject of Child Abuse and Neglect.
You can listen now at
Every child deserves to be safe and healthy. We all need to do our part!
My Guest:
Abigail Stewart Kahn, LCSW, is 
the Director of Community Education and Strategic Partnership at the San Francisco Child Abuse Prevention Center. She has worked on issues of child trauma and family violence in the clinical, program development, and advocacy context for more than 15 years. A social worker and clinician by training, she joined the Prevention Center in August 2008 and is responsible for the organization’s education, partnership and collective impact strategy approaches. She is the author of “From Trauma to Healing—a social workers guide to working with survivors.”
by Rona | Apr 1, 2016 | Announcements, Appearances, KPFA, Podcasts, Radio Shows
We discussed Anxiety in adults, teens, and children.
social anxiety* panic or agoraphobia* phobias of things such as spiders, needles, or vomiting* excessive worry* separation anxiety* other issues. 
Anxiety can stop you from feeling confident, independent, happy, and fulfilled. Your worry or anxiety can stop you from doing things like being with friends, going on a date, taking your dream job, finishing school, or spending time in nature. With the right kind of help and compassion you can reduce your suffering, enjoy life more, and have better health.
Guest:
Jennifer Shannon has a Masters in Counseling and is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. She has over 30 years of clinical experience. She is the co-founder of the Santa Rosa Center for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. She works with children, teens and adults. She is a cognitive-behavioral therapist specializing in Anxiety Disorders, including Social Anxiety or extreme shyness, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD), Separation Anxiety, Panic Disorder, Phobias, Generalized Anxiety Disorder and some types of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and insomnia. She is the author of The Anxiety Survival Guide for Teens and The Shyness and Social Anxiety Workbook for Teens. Both published by New Harbinger Press.She is a Certified Diplomat of The Academy of Cognitive Therapy, and a member of the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, the California Association for Marriage and Family Therapists and the International OCD Foundation.
by Rona | Mar 18, 2016 | Announcements, KPFA, Podcasts, Radio Shows
In 2007, Janet Singer’s son Dan was diagnosed with OCD. “Hunched over with his head in his hands, he’d sit in his “safe” chair for hours, doing nothing but shaking, mumbling and moaning; he was in the throes of severe Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.”
“Overcoming OCD: A Journey to Recovery, is a mother’s account of the courage and perseverance of a young man who at times was hindered by the very people who were supposed to be helping him. It is a story of hope and the power of family, as well as a useful guide for all those whose lives have been touched by this often misunderstood and misrepresented disorder. Today, thanks to Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) therapy, one of the available treatments for OCD, Dan is a college graduate working in his chosen field and living life to the fullest. He is living proof that even those with the most severe cases of OCD can not only recover, but triumph.”
Guests:
Michael Tompkins, is a licensed psychologist, co-director of the San Francisco Bay Area Center for Cognitive Therapy, and Assistant Clinical Professor at the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Tompkins specializes in the treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder and other obsessive-compulsive spectrum disorders in adults, adolescents, and children. He is the author or co-author of numerous articles and chapters on cognitive-behavior therapy and related topics, as well as seven books, including OCD: A Guide for the Newly Diagnosed. https://www.newharbinger.com/ocd
Janet Singer, is an advocate for OCD awareness. One of her goals is to spread the word that obsessive-compulsive disorder, no matter how severe, is treatable. She is the author of Overcoming OCD: A Journey to Recovery which recounts her family’s story. She writes regularly for PsychCentral and has been published on many other websites including Beyond OCD, Anxiety and Depression Association of America, and Mad in America. She has a blog, ocdtalk, which reaches readers all over the world. She uses a pseudo name to protect her son’s identity. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22524270-overcoming-ocd
by Rona | Feb 29, 2016 | Announcements, KPFA, Podcasts, Radio Shows
The Girl Behind the Door, A Father’s Quest to Understand His Daughter’s Suicide, by John Brooks, provides a profound look into adoption, teenage suicide, and attachment issues.
“When John and Erika’s daughter Casey jumped off of the Golden Gate Bridge in 2008, John began to unravel a heartbreaking truth—Casey had been in pain since birth, living in an Orphanage in Poland until she was adopted at 14 months.”
John spent many years after Casey’s suicide trying to understand what lead to her taking her life. He learned so much—the things he didn’t know, the mistakes he made, and the help he didn’t get from the professional community. He asks, “What did everyone miss? What could have been done differently?”
When you tune in to hear John’s story, you’ll understand more about the struggles children who are adopted face, and the heartache any parent feels when a child’s behavior is out of control, and challenging to understand.
Guests:
John Brooks, a former senior financial executive in the broadcast and media industry, has turned to writing, mental health activism, and volunteer work with teenagers in Marin County. He maintains a blog: parentingandattachment.com to share his experience and educate other adoptive families about parenting and therapy techniques unique to children with attachment disorders.
Nancy Newton Verrier, M.A., is a psychotherapist in private practice in Lafayette, CA, specializing in adoption issues. She is an internationally acclaimed lextureer on the effects of early childhood trauma and deprivation caused by the premature separation of mother and child. She is the author of, Coming Home to Self and The Primal Wound: Understanding the Adopted Child. http://nancyverrier.com/
by Rona | Feb 7, 2016 | Announcements, KPFA, Podcasts, Radio Shows
Every year, there are approximately 50,000 new cases of leukemia in the U.S. When someone has Leukemia or Lymphoma—or other diseases for which a bone marrow or umbilical cord blood transplant from a donor may be their best hope of a cure—one question is “Will there be a match?”
It can be difficult finding donors, and within some ethnic groups, the search is even harder.
While Caucasians can expect a 93 percent chance of a match, the odds fall off steeply for others: 73 percent for Asian-Americans; 72 percent for Latinos and 66 percent for African-Americans, according to the national Be the Match registry.
Listen To The 2/15/16 Show Now:
Tune in to “About Health” on KPFA.org, 94.1 FM, 2-3 pm on Mondays. Call us with your questions at: 510-848-4425 or toll free 1-800-958-9008.
My guests were:
Carol Gillespie, has been the Executive Director of the Asian American Donor Program (AADP) http://www.aadp.org, since 2002. She is one of the original members of the Board of Directors for the AADP when it was founded in 1989. She volunteered for AADP for 3 years before accepting the position as Project Administrator in 1992. In 2002, she was selected as AADP’s Executive Director.
Dr Willis Navarro is a Board-certified hematologist and oncologist specializing in adult bone marrow transplants and hematologic malignancies including the treatment of leukemias, multiple myeloma, lymphoma, and myelodysplastic syndrome. He is an Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine in the Division of Hematology/Oncology at UCSF. He has published numerous papers in the field of marrow transplant and hematologic malignancies.
Dr. Navarro earned an undergraduate degree in chemistry at Brown University and earned a medical degree at the University of California, San Francisco. He completed an internal medicine residency at Yale-New Haven Hospital as well as a Hematology-Oncology fellowship at UCSF Medical Center.
