Adverse Childhood Experiences & Toxic Stress
What can be done to mitigate the lasting impacts on our health?
Recorded February 27th, 2025. Stress is the natural reaction your body has when adversity or challenges occur. It can result in many different physical, emotional and behavioral responses. We know that persistent toxic stress can alter our brain and hormonal system, provoking our flight or fight response and resulting in impaired immunity and health issues. Early adversity such as physical, emotional and sexual abuse, parental mental or physical health issues and domestic violence can have long lasting impacts.
Our speakers:
Supervisor Sylvia Arenas represents District 1 on the County of Santa Clara Board of Supervisors and has been a champion for families, women, children, and racial equity. She has worked on public policy and community issues for over twenty years, including serving on the San Jose City Council and Evergreen Elementary School District Board. She will discuss her focus on uplifting and protecting children and families and will share her vision for a more healthy future for our children, families and community.
Dr. Rachel Gilgoff is an advisor with the California Aces Aware Initiative, UCLA-UCSF ACEs Aware Family Resilience Network (UCAAN), and Office of the California Surgeon General, as well as a clinician at GetzWell Personalized Pediatrics in San Francisco, and an Adjunct Clinical Associate Professor at Stanford University School of Medicine. She will discuss how Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) can impact long term physical and mental health, and her involvement with the ACEs aware network and the Safe Spaces Initiative.
The League of Women Voters of the Bay Area (LWVBA) invites you to participate in our ongoing series on Public Health Awareness. Our goal is to raise awareness of the importance and value of the public health system to our communities as a vital part of the civic health continuum of the League in empowering voters and defending democracy, to highlight the social determinants of health, and to raise and potentially answer the question: is our health a matter of personal responsibility or a public, collective good?
