S2.E8. Turn Around Family Trauma
We start the year off by talking with Carey Sipp, Director of Strategic Partnerships at PACEs Connection, about sobriety, toxic intensity, cycles of trauma and addiction, and making the choice to turn around family trauma by healing at all costs.
Carey Smith Sipp is the Director of Strategic Partnerships at PACEs Connection and a disrupter of multi-generational cycles of trauma and addiction. PACEs = Positive and Adverse Childhood Experiences. Her book, The TurnAround Mom: How an Abuse and Addiction Survivor Stopped the Toxic Cycle for Her Family—and How You Can, Too! was published in 2007.
The author of a book on breaking multi-generational cycles of addiction and abuse, Carey was writing about the health implications of what she called “toxic intensity” before learning, in 2000, about adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). A lifelong student of the sciences, Carey is drawn to learn daily about brain development, health, and leadership. With all humility, she calls herself a cautionary tale and a success story of what positive and adverse childhood experiences can do to a human. She is an avid believer in post-traumatic growth, big ideas, and the power of good people working to change the world. She also believes that to disrupt toxic systems, we as adults must learn and share about PACEs science, examine and heal our own trauma, and view every child as being our own.
PACEs story: "I grew up in addiction and abuse. When I had children, I vowed they would have a saner, calmer childhood than my own, so I joined a recovery group for family and friends of alcoholics, immersed myself in parenting education, and quit drinking, just in case. Somehow I knew children’s brains are wired for peace and calm or for agitation and addiction. In 1996, when I started working on a book about breaking cycles of addiction and abuse, I called the National Association for Children of Alcoholics for resources. In 2000, one of the pieces of information they sent was the ACE Study. I read it and wept. My score explained my health issues; my prognosis was grim. Instinctively, I delved deeper into recovery, spirituality, parenting, exercise, and nutrition. A few years later, hope came when advances in brain science showed the brain has plasticity, the body wants to heal. In 2008 I started contributing articles about PACEs science to a medical information website. Five years later I met Jane Stevens, and five years after that, I was hired at PACEs Connection. My work comes full circle as I write about how PACEs lead to addiction and addiction leads to PACEs, and that PACEs science and trauma-informed communities hold solutions to preventing multi-generational cycles of addiction and abuse."
