For the past year, Echo Glen Children’s Center has partnered with Yoga Behind Bars (YBB) to provide trauma-informed yoga sessions for both staff and young people.
YBB is a national leader in designing and delivering trauma-informed yoga and meditation tools for stress reduction and trauma healing. Every year, they teach up to 4,000 incarcerated individuals across Washington State. They have also trained more than 800 community members in the neuroscience of stress, trauma, and healing.
“The training increases our ability to acknowledge and pay attention to the body’s natural response to trauma, and also our ability to teach that to our residents,” said Echo Glen staff. “It provides us with tools to deescalate, regulate, and avoid major incidents.”
Research shows that trauma-informed yoga is an effective supplemental therapy for trauma recovery, stress reduction, anxiety relief, and addiction treatment. As part of DCYF’s Strategic and Racial Equity Plan to successfully transition youth into adulthood, the YBB program helps strengthen therapeutic environments and enhance the quality of adult relationships youth experience.
To learn more about the YBB program, visit www.yogabehindbars.org.