“Pam’s work fosters the kind of change in survivors that leads to true healing."

                                            Elizabeth Hudson, LCSW
                                            Tauma Services Coordinator
                                            Wisconsin Department of Health Services       

Pam Woll's work for the past 20 years has laid the best possible foundation for her concentration on resilience and the effects of trauma.  Beneath most of the problems she has studied—developmental and educational challenges, mental illness, substance use disorders, interpersonal and community violence—lies a high incidence of unaddressed stress and trauma in people's life histories and cultural histories.  And resilience—the ability to bounce back from life's challenges—is at the heart of both prevention and recovery.  Her focus on social stigma for the past 10 years has also prepared her to address the crucial role that stigma plays in keeping people from getting the help they need, and the vital importance of healing stigma within ourselves and in the society that surrounds us.

This web site is designed to provide information about these concepts, and about Human Priorities and Pam Woll's work, and to make it easier for people to find some of the documents she's written,  including: 

• Information on resilience, stress, and trauma, including:
• A web-based guide to some of these concepts
• A page exploring some of the implications of trauma for behavioral health and primary care conditions, including a one-page logo model for download (at the bottom of the page) 
• Materials for and about returning and transitioning veterans and service members:
  
• Finding Balance:  Understanding and Optimizing Your Stress System After Deployment (formerly called Resilience 101), a series that includes a pocket-sized quick guide and a workbook for service members and veterans, a workbook for military families, a 100-page clinician's guide, and a set of suggestions for facilitators(counselors, trainers, mentors, etc.)
  
• The America's Best series of materials for employers, educators, and trainers who are or might be working with or teaching service members or veterans
• "A Rope Across the Chasm," an open letter to service members, veterans, and civilians, with considerations for bridging military and civilian cultures and making home more welcoming and hospitable
• "The Red Blood of the Somme," the lyrics to a song written in the voice of a fictional British Soldier who fought in the Battle of the Somme during World War I
• Tools for personal growth and for use in therapy:
  
• The Power and Price of Survival:  Understanding Resilience, Stress, and Trauma, a workbook that explains post-trauma reactions and shows why these reactions are really signs of strength (same basic content as in the section of this site called Resilience, Stress, and Trauma)
  
• How to Get the Piranhas Out of Your Head, a slightly silly but insightful little booklet, accompanied by a Piranha Workbook and Piranha Leader's Guide
• Worth Protecting:  Women, Men, and Freedom From Sexual Aggression, a self-help book for both genders, on building healthy relationships and avoiding manipulation
• The Magnet:  A Plan for Aligning Purpose and Professional Practice, a workbook for human service professionals, written for the Great Lakes ATTC
• Small Answers to Big Questions, a little booklet about life
• Materials for and about children and youth:
  
• emPOWER!, an empowerment curriculum for youth, developed for the Joliet Township High Schools' YESS (Youth Enjoying Success in School) program
  
• Breaking the Chain:  Making Prevention Programs Work for Children of Addicted Families, written for Prevention First, Inc.
• Materials about social stigma, its effects, and ways of addressing it:
  
• Healing the Stigma of Depression:  A Guide for Helping Professionals, written for the Midwest AIDS Training and Education Center (MATEC) and the Great Lakes Addiction Technology Transfer Center (ATTC)
• Healing the Stigma of Addiction:  A Guide for Treatment Professionals, written for the Great Lakes ATTC
• Other kinds of writing (outside the professional realm):
• Lyrics from a few of the Songs that Pam has written
• The Cloud Catcher, the novel that never got finished!