the predatory bird

Tag: Bruce Perry

  • Episode 2 | Childhood Lasts a Lifetime

    Flight Response with John Rattray
    Flight Response with John Rattray
    Episode 2 | Childhood Lasts a Lifetime
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    In this episode I revisit a conversation I had with, photographer, journalist and trainee clinical psychologist, Alex Irvine.
    The conversation was to accompany a skate career retrospective (my skate career) in Free Skate Mag.
    Rather than a standard Q and A, I sent Alex a couple of thought starters and then we let the conversation flow from there.
    The thought starters were the statement, “Childhood Lasts a Lifetime” and the question, “Is skateboarding a form of self-harm?”
    I hope you find it helpful and/or informative.

  • A Front Rock and Four Books

    Front Rock:

    Mariners stadium in Seattle, Photo by Ben Wall

    John Rattray frontside roack and rolls on a mini-ramp at the Seattle Mariners baseball stadium

    Our friends up at 35th North in Seattle partnered with their local baseball team as well as the ever-awesome Skate Like a Girl and Nike SB. The result was this ramp plus in-stadium skate lessons for kiddos.

    With that, here are four books with great potential to expand your worldview.

    Book One:

    What Happened to You? by Dr Bruce D. Perry, M.D., Ph.D and Oprah Winfrey (more…)

  • Why So Sad? Summer ’22 | Post 3

    This is the third of three essays.

    Summer ’22 Essay 1

    Summer ’22 Essay 2

    A collage of various sad grab photographs

    Why So Sad? Encourage Self-help and Other Support Strategies

    “People underestimate their own therapeutic powers…The most powerful buffer in times of stress and distress is our social connectedness…” —Bruce Perry

    Key Concept: Being “well regulated”, being “dysregulated”, what that means & what we can do about it

    October 1990.

    My dad gives me the Beastie Boys album Paul’s Boutique for my 13th birthday. He passes it to me over the edge of his hospital bed.

    “I’ll take you fishing this summer, John,” he promises. (more…)

  • Why So Sad? Summer ’22 | Post 1

     

    John Rattray, Frontside Melonchollie Grab—aka Sad Grab—in Winnipeg Canada circa 2011
    John Rattray, Frontside Melancholy—aka Sad Grab— in Winnipeg, Canada, c2012. Photo by Jamie Thomas

     

    Why So Sad?

    Exploring How Childhood Experiences Affect Our Brain’s Response to the Stresses of Adult Life  

    10-minute read:

    May 8, 2022: Heads up, this story touches on the subject of suicide. If you, or someone you know, is going through a mental health crisis please reach out to your local support line.

    Section 1: The Thing that Hurts You So…

    Early in 2018, seven years after Katrina died, I was eating lunch alone.

    The good thing about being alone is it affords you time to quietly learn. Today I’m eating ramen noodles while listening to a conversation with Dr Rangan Chattergee and Johann Hari, author of Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression and the Unexpected Solutions.

    The reason I’m listening to this conversation, and the reason I’d read Hari’s book in the first place and found it so helpful, was because Katrina, my sister, died by suicide.

    Right after that, in 2011, I travel back to Scotland to be with mum (more…)