From the archives: Damon Wood, PhD. Healing Inside A Prison

"Train people well enough so they can leave. Treat them well enough so they don’t want to." -Sir Richard Branson Dr. Damon Wood has held an interest in trauma focused therapies since his graduate education, and has completed trainings in Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, Internal Family Systems, and DBT. Since 2009, Dr. Wood has worked for the state of California in forensic institutions including Napa State Hospital and four California state prisons where he has provided treatment to the severely mentally ill, the severely behaviorally challenged, and the severely traumatized. In 2015 Dr. Wood was promoted to the mental health leadership team at Salinas Valley State Prison where he has led teams of clinicians to provide treatment in one of the state’s most violent maximum security prisons. In this role and setting, Dr. Wood has championed trauma informed organizational support for the clinical staff that work in such a stressful and difficult environment. Damon has spoken on this podcast before about safety within the prison setting. Today, though, we’re talking about what it means to work within the prison setting. What’s involved? What’s it like working with this particular population? What are the specific challenges, and also, what are the upsides and the rewards of doing this type of challenging and demanding work? In This Episode Games Criminals Play: How You Can Profit by Knowing Them, by Bud Allen, Diana BostaDamon's email Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-trauma-therapist--5739761/support.