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For kids with PTSD, healing is happening in an unexpected place — a football field.

On a football field in Boston, several kids gather for an unlikely purpose: supporting each other in group therapy.

At the mention of group therapy, it’s easy to imagine it taking place across a seated circle in a quiet room. But this group therapy is no ordinary mental health program — it involves sprinting, catching footballs, and learning to run defense.

In fact, at first glance, a session might look like any other practice time for young athletes because just like any football team, they run drills, develop strategy, and work on throwing a perfect spiral.

But in these sessions, their coaches aren’t just coaches — they’re therapists. And the teams are made up of kids who have experienced child abuse, incarceration, PTSD, or other challenges.

A Doc Wayne practice session. Photo by Doc Wayne.

For struggling kids like these, traditional talk therapy — which involves a stranger’s office and opening up about issues that are difficult to discuss — often feels too intimidating.

“Many kids don’t want to talk about their issues or don’t really know how to talk about their issues,” explains David Cohen, CEO of the nonprofit Doc Wayne. “They certainly, in many cases, don’t want to sit down at a desk or in a room and talk to a clinician.”

Unfortunately, this is part of the reason why so many kids don’t get the mental health support they need. Of the 1 in 5 kids under the age of 19 who experience mental illness, only an estimated 20-25% are receiving mental health treatment.

That’s why, in order to truly help children, sometimes you need to meet them where they feel comfortable — even if it’s on a football field.

Susan Wayne, who has worked for decades with low-income youth, knows this firsthand. In fact, that’s why she founded Doc Wayne in 2002.

A coach and participant. Photo by Doc Wayne.

She had seen many young people struggle well into adulthood due to lack of proper treatment for their mental illnesses. She also knew how difficult it is to engage youth who don’t thrive in traditional talk therapy.  

But it wasn’t until the death of her brother, Dr. Eli Wayne, a pediatric surgeon and sports enthusiast, that she came up with the idea of a nonprofit named in his honor that would help these kids by combining both of his passions — health and sports.

Research shows that team sports can reduce symptoms of depression and boost kids’ ability to deal with stress, and also that young athletes also tend to have higher levels of confidence and mental wellness.

And that’s how Doc Wayne’s programs, which fuse athletics and mental health care, came to be developed.

One such program is a sports-based group therapy called Chalk Talk.

Here’s how it works: Say a kid gets frustrated after missing a shot in basketball. Instead of letting them get excessively angry or bottle up that frustration with no solution, their coach is there to help them figure out how to channel anger in a healthy way, such as learning from this mistake in preparation for the next drill.

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Rather than using clinical terms that kids can’t relate to, like “emotion regulation,” the coach uses coaching language like “step to your strengths.” While the terminology is different, the therapeutic concept behind it is exactly the same, allowing the children to engage in a way that they might not otherwise.

In other words, sports allow the kids to deal with their issues — such anger or impulsivity — without feeling like they’re being forced to.

And that’s whyresearch on this kind of sports-based therapy shows that it is just as effective in supporting mental health as traditional psychotherapy. Participants are learning to deal with their issues using the the same strategies they’d develop through traditional therapy.

Chalk Talk also helps build trust with kids who have experienced repetitive or ongoing trauma, like much of the youth at Doc Wayne. They do this by playing team sports such as soccer, flag football, basketball, and indoor rowing, where they can learn to support each other as teammates.

Photo by Doc Wayne.

This is reinforced when the kids circle up at the end of a session to give each other shoutouts — for instance, complimenting someone’s dribbling skills.

“Everything that we do is all about the team aspect,” says Cohen. “It’s all about learning skills in life that you’ll need to carry on so you can be a contributing member to your own community.”

He continues, “They have to learn how to show up and be present and ... respectful and have empathy for others.”

Today, Doc Wayne helps about 300 children a week — and these kids are seeing a big difference in their lives.

According to research on the nonprofit, they're showing lower rates of aggression and an increased ability to integrate into their communities.

Not only that, but kids are more likely to stay in sports-based therapy because they actually enjoy it. The no-show rate among kids for traditional talk-based therapy sessions is around 40% but at Doc Wayne, it’s only around 20%, according to Cohen.

“Sometimes you’ll see kids actually loving therapy,” he adds, because at Doc Wayne, healing goes hand-in-hand with their favorite sport.

Photo by Doc Wayne.

Cohen remembers observing one boy who wasn’t interested in engaging with the group. For about 15 minutes, the boy sat on the sidelines while the other kids practiced drills with their coach. Then, for another 10 minutes, he threw a ball against a wall by himself. Finally, he quietly joined the group.

He was allowed to do so on his own terms, and Cohen says that’s what helped him discover his own willingness to engage.

For many of the kids who come to Doc Wayne for help, simply having a supportive adult to depend on is a luxury.

That’s why this organization is so helpful: It helps give these kids a reliable support system so that they can begin to trust others to help them through tough times.

“Their lives … have been disrupted in so many ways,” says Cohen. “[So] we make sure that we’re there, that we earn the trust … week in and week out.”

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Parenting

Man asks how to help his wife who works full-time with a baby at home and keeps getting the same answer

More and more families are trying to scrape by — by trying to do it all

Photo by Katie Emslie on Unsplash

There are times in parenting where you just feel kind of useless.

You can't carry the baby, take a late-night breastfeeding shift, or absorb any of the pain and discomfort of childbirth.

Sometimes the best you can do is to try to take care of your partner.

That's what brought user u/DietyBeta to the AskParents subreddit with a well-meaning question.

"My wife watches our 1yo, works, and is 12 week pregnant. How can I make her daily life easier while I'm away at work?"

He says that when he gets home from work, he takes over all parenting and homemaking duties.

But yeesh! That's still... a lot to handle. No wonder his wife is stressed out.

A few folks chimed in to pat the OP on the back. After all, it's great to see a dad who realizes how much is falling on mom's shoulders and actively looking for ways to lighten the load!

Some helpful suggestions rolled in, like taking over meal prep and making her easy lunches to heat up, hiring cleaners, or paying someone to walk the dogs.

woman in black shirt lying on couch Photo by Alexander Grey on Unsplash


But then even more people came in to the comments asking the same question over and over: If mom is working, why isn't the 1-year-old in daycare?

u/young-mommy wrote: "Is the one year old in daycare? If not, I would start there. Working from home with a child gets harder and harder as they enter toddlerhood"

u/min2themax said: "It’s nice of you to be asking how to help her but she really is getting the fuzzy end of the lollipop here. It sounds like she is literally always working or parenting. Sometimes both at the same time. Walking the dogs and making her lunches and prepping meals and doing laundry is all well and good but this is not at all sustainable."

u/alternative-box3260 said: "Have the one year old in daycare. I was in a similar situation and it’s impossible. I was able to breath after that, not before."

And u/sillychihuahua26 wrote: "She’s caring for your 1.year old while working? That’s a horrible plan. You guys need childcare like yesterday."

We have a legitimate childcare crisis in our country, and stories like this one really bring it to life.

Childcare in the United States isn't nearly accessible or affordable enough for most families. Period.

ChildCare Aware found that that average cost of childcare in 2022 was $10,853 per year, or roughly 10% of a median family income (in 2024, it's likely even more than that — yet the actual workers at childcare centers are somehow severely underpaid).

But even that eye-popping number is conservative. Anyone who lives anywhere close to a city (or in California or New York) knows the number will be way higher. It's just not feasible for most families to put their child, let alone multiple children, in full-time care while they're young.

And yet! The percentage of households with two parents working full-time has been rising for decades. Life is more expensive than ever, and the extra income from two working parents really helps, even if it's offset by those child care costs.

More and more families are trying to scrape by — by trying to do it all

woman in white shirt sitting on brown wooden armchair Photo by Keren Fedida on Unsplash

Now we don't know whether the OP's family can afford childcare for their 1-year-old or not, although in a later update to the post he wrote:

"As far as daycare, she doesn't want to because she feels like she would be missing out on the time"

So even if you can afford childcare, there's the still the crushing guilt of shipping your child off to be raised by strangers to deal with! Classic.

(Take one guess who shoulders most of the daycare guilt — dads or moms?)

The work-from-home revolution has been a Godsend for parents in certain ways — flexibility, balance, less commuting time — but its also saddled many of them with double duty.

'Hey how about you work full-time because we need the money AND keep an eye on the kids, since you're home anyway!'

But it doesn't work like that, and trying to do both is crushing modern parents.

In fact, the Surgeon General of the United States just put out an official advisory based on the plummeting mental state of today's parents.

We know parents are having a hard time and that it's getting picked up in the national conversation. But hearing about a mom working full-time with a 1-year-old on her hip while pregnant, and a dad stuck working out of the house who's at a total loss for how to make things better really paints a pretty bleak picture.

No one should have to work full-time and parent full-time, at the same time.

A fridge full of microwavable lunches and a fleet of dog walkers isn't going to make it any better until things start changing from the very top.

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Democracy

These before-and-afters will make you question everything about how our economy works

You'd think it was some sort of natural disaster. Nope. Totally man-made.



Yup. These images were taken only two years apart. And what you're seeing was not an accident.

When the economy crashed in 2008, it was because of shady financial practices like predatory lending and speculative investing, which is basically gambling, only the entire economy was at stake.


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When the recession hit, it literally hit home for millions of people. And Detroit was right in the middle of it.

I spoke with Alex Alsup, who works with a Detroit-based tech company that's mapping the city's foreclosed homes to help city officials see the bigger picture and find solutions. He also runs the Tumblr GooBingDetroit, where he uses Google Street View's time machine to document the transformation of Detroit's neighborhoods over the last few years.

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"There's a common sentiment that Detroit's looked the way it does for decades, but it's just not true," Alsup said.

It's astonishing to see how quickly so many homes went from seemingly delightful to wholly unlivable.

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When the recession went into full force, home values took a nosedive. But the city expected homeowners to pay property taxes as if they hadn't.

Not only does the situation defy logic, but it's like a brass-knuckled face punch to the people the city is supposed to be looking out for. Alsup explains:

"You had houses — tens of thousands of them — that were worth only $20,000 or so, yet owed $4,000 a year in taxes, for which very few city services were delivered (e.g. police, fire, roads, schools). Who would pay that?"

Indeed.

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A local group calls what happened to Detroit a "hurricane without water."

And like a real hurricane, homeowners aren't the ones to blame. They're even calling for what is essentially a federal disaster response.

Here are the three strategies they want to see in action — and they can work for basically anywhere in the country that's struggling with a housing crisis.

1. Stop kicking people out of their homes.

They want the city to end foreclosures and evictions from owner-occupied homes. Many people aren't just losing their homes — they've lost jobs, pensions, and services because of budget cuts. Putting them on the street is like a kick in the teeth when they're down.

2. If a home is worth less on the market than what the homeowner owes on their loan, reduce what they owe.

Those are called underwater mortgages. Banks caused this mess, and governments ignored it. It's only fair that people's mortgages be adjusted based the current value of their home.

3. Sell repossessed homes at fair prices to people who actually want to live in them.

Selling to banks and investors only encourages what led to the financial crisis in the first place. Wouldn't it make more sense to sell to people who are going to live in them and have a genuine interest in rebuilding the community?

Housing is a human right. And an economy based on financial markets doesn't care about human rights. Maybe it's time for a new economy?

Click play below for a silent cruise down a once lovely residential block in Detroit.


This article originally appeared on 12.15.14

Joy

Man attempts to rescue stray kitten and quickly discovers he got more than he bargained for

Here kitty, kitty! Oh wait, there are 12 more of you?

Photo by Dorothea OLDANI on Unsplash

It's kitten season!

Who can resist a sweet little kitten trying to cross the road? Even if you’re not a fan of cats, you’d likely stop for a baby animal in the street. That’s what happened to Robert Brantley of Louisiana. Brantley was on his way to work and spotted a tiny white and gray kitten trying to get across the street. Being a kind human, he stopped his car to bring the kitten to safety. But he got more than he bargained for, because as he was scooping up the little thing, several more kitty cat siblings came running out of the nearby grass.

In all, Brantley counted 13 kittens. Twelve more than he planned on caring for, but by the looks of his Instagram page, his family has taken their role of cat rescuers seriously. With kitten season being in full effect in these warmer months and pet surrenders remaining high since the return to work from the pandemic, Brantley taking on fostering 13 kittens is much needed. Humane societies across the country are reportedly full or even over capacity. My own local humane society currently has nearly 150 animals over its limit and is begging for foster families and adopters to help clear the shelter.

It’s not only humane societies that have reached or exceeded capacity. Animal rescues across the board are in dire need of people to take animals to make room for the inevitable drop off of puppies and kittens from the current litter season. Mating season, which subsequently turns into puppy and kitten season, starts in early spring and lasts throughout the summer. This inundates local shelters and rescues.

Some shelters, like my local humane society, are asking people who find litters of puppies or kittens to do exactly what Brantley is doing.

Foster them and attempt to adopt them out on their own. It looks like Brantley's wife decided to get these now cleaned up kitties in their Sunday best to have a photoshoot in her makeshift studio. One kitten sported a bow tie while the others climbed around the enclosure patiently awaiting their turn. It also seems Brantley himself is having fun with the situation—in one video he talks about what he packs to go on a marksmanship match and includes 13 kittens along with his tripod and toolkit.

In one of Brantley’s most recent updates, he says that two of the kittens, Michael Scott and Nala, have been adopted by a family in Alexandria, Louisiana. In the same update he informs his followers that one of the kittens still left to be adopted is currently on daily medication and the family is keeping up with check-ups for the rest of the furry crew.

Here’s hoping that all of these little guys get adopted out soon. And may more people take Brantley’s lead to foster the kittens or puppies they find if they have the means. This can also serve as a reminder to spay and neuter your pets and any strays you may be caring for outside of your home.


This article originally appeared on 6.16.22

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Heroes

Heroic sanitation workers save abducted, 10-year-old girl while on their trash route

"I was just doing my job man. I was just doing my job and actually came across somebody who needed help."

via Dion Merrick / Facebook

At 1:30 am on a Monday morning in February, an AMBER Alert went out in southern Louisiana about a missing 10-year-old girl from New Iberia. It was believed she had been kidnapped and driven away in a 2012 silver Nissan Altima.

A few hours later at 7 am, Dion Merrick and Brandon Antoine, sanitation workers for Pelican Waste, were on their daily route when they noticed a vehicle that fit the description in the alert.

The sanitation workers thought it was suspicious that a silver sedan was parked alone in a field in St. Martin Parish.

"Something told me, like just look, I said what is that car doing in that field like that? What the car doing? Guess what, that's the dude with the little girl," Merrick said in a Facebook Live video. "That's God."

The video has been seen over 1.5 million times since it was posted on Monday morning.

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To prevent the possible kidnapper from escaping, they parked the large sanitation truck the wrong way on the highway to "Make sure they couldn't get out," Merrick said. Then, they called 911.

When police arrived they arrested Michael R. Sereal, the man whose car was mentioned in the AMBER Alert. The police were also able to safely recover the girl who appeared unharmed. She was later taken to the hospital to be evaluated by medical personnel.

The Iberia Parish Sheriff's Department's online sex offender registry has a Michael Roy Sereal but authorities wouldn't confirm it's the same man.

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The young girls' family got in touch with the two men who saved her and have shown amazing gratitude. "I'm just so happy and blessed that I have actually seen the car and we actually responded like we were supposed to respond," Merrick told KHOU.

Merrick hopes that his actions will inspire others to be proactive as well.

"Don't be scared if you see something. If you know something is wrong, report it," Merrick said. "Call authorities because it could save someone's life."

via Office of the Louisiana Attorney general

The two men were applauded by the St. John Parish's Sheriff, who offered to buy them lunch.

"I was just doing my job man. I was just doing my job and actually came across somebody who needed help," Merrick said. "Got me tearing up."

The AMBER Alert system was created in 1996 after nine-year-old Amber Hagerman was abducted and murdered while riding her bike in Texas. Since its inception, nearly seven in 10 AMBER alert cases have resulted in children being successfully reunited with their parents.

In 17% of the cases, the child's recovery is a direct result of the alert.

As of December 2020, 1,029 children rescued specifically because of the system.


This article originally appeared on 02.09.21

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heroes
Joy

Video of cats punching above their weight gives us a new appreciation for our feline friends

Maybe they're actually as superior as they think they are.

Photo by 傅甬 华 on Unsplash

Cats are far more badass than we give them credit for.

Cats have a reputation for being aloof and standoffish, like they're better than everyone and simply can't be bothered. Those of us who have cats know they're not always like that … but yes, they're sometimes like that. They can be sweet and affectionate, but they want affection on their terms, they want to eat and play and sleep on their own clock, and we puny, inferior humans have little say in the matter.

There's a reason why we have obedience schools for dogs and not for cats. Maine coon or Bengal, Savannah or Siamese, ragdoll or sphynx, domestic cats of all breeds are largely untrainable little punks who lure us into loving them by blessing us with the honor of stroking their fur and hearing them purr.

But perhaps we assume too much when we think cats are full of themselves for no good reason. Maybe they are actually somewhat justified in their snootiness. Maybe they really, truly are superior to pretty much every other creature on Earth and that's why they act like it.

Cats, if they could talk, would be nodding and prodding us along at this point: "Yes, yes, you're so close. Just a little further now, keep going."

Think about it. They're beautiful and graceful, but also quick and powerful. They groom constantly so they're almost always clean and their fur even smells good. They can fall from ridiculous heights, land on their feet and walk away unscathed. They're wicked good ambush hunters. They can walk completely silently, like ninjas, then pull out the razor blades on their feet at will and do serious damage in an instant.

All of that makes them impressive specimens, but ironically it's their total hubris that makes them truly superior. When they feel like it (because cats only do things they feel like doing) they will take on anyone and anything. Big, small, dangerous, fierce—doesn't matter. That unbridled confidence—earned or not—combined with their physique and skill makes them the badasses of the animal world.

Want proof? Here ya go:

The snakes, man. I can't get over the snakes.

Cats really are better than us and every other living thing, basically. And even if they aren't, they believe they are, which counts just as much. They're either the ultimate creatures or the ultimate conmen. Either way, you just don't mess with them.


This article originally appeared on 08.17.22

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