In some states, TIC (trauma-informed care) is mandated as the standard.
But does it mean people are actually trauma-informed? In the year that I’ve been absent from my blog, I’ve had a lot of time to think and research. Here’s what seems to be the case:
-People still confuse trauma-specific treatment with trauma-informed care.
-Folks still see people who receive services as “them” instead of “us.”
-Vicarious trauma, the enemy of staff retention and quality services, is as high as ever.
-Colonization of people diagnosed with mental illness or of children removed from their homes marches on.
Legislators are to be congratulated for mandating trauma-informed care. It is a higher standard of care than the medical model allows us to pursue and one that potentially involves more resources because of its’ environmental focus.
Yet there is no standard for the standard. And the chances exceptionally high that if one is made, the majority influence of a medical model will color it so that we see the same process in a different skin, perhaps slightly changed, but not too much.
How should TIC differ from the medical model and why? Check our next post to learn more.
