All About Nothing With Ruth Cohn

At the core of neglect trauma is loss. Even loss of what was perhaps never there in the first place, but should have been. This week we will talk about two topics that rarely get spoken of: one's intimate sexual life, and aging. We will touch on both of these often secret or uncertain worlds, that way too often are navigated alone, or with a measure of shame.On the subject of aging and shame, when you watch the video you will see I have not one but two senior moments! Where my mind goes blank! Here is everything I could not remember!The 6 Principles: Consent, Non-exploitation, Honesty, Shared Values, Protection from Sexually-Transmitted Infections, Pleasure.My Golden Rule: If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, who what good am I? If not now, when? Now go and study!Sallie Foley's Book: Sex & Love for Grownups: A No-Nonsense Guide to a Life of Passion.

Hope Will Not Be Cancelled Healing from trauma and neglect can feel endless, and in a way it really is. Not infrequently, and even after all these years, I am humbly reminded: “Oh there it is again.” The experience of time standing still, emptiness, is a signature of the neglect experience. In a universe of nothing, nothing changes, which is why waiting and boredom are so excruciating and unbearable to survivors of neglect. It feels like deadness. There is no future. The state of the world is so bleak these days. Here it is, a new year. I wondered what can I talk with you about today? I remembered back in the early Pandemic days, it seemed as if time stood still. It was unreal. Solitary confinement is an internationally recognized form of torture and we were all virtually in it. It seems like a distant dream now. It did pass. And so will this. During COVID, things were getting cancelled right and left. I remember coming across the slogan Hope Will Not Be Cancelled. It was heartening to me, and I made a sticker of that slogan and pasted it all over everything. I figured that would be our topic for today. Please be sure to listen to the song today. It really says it better than anything I could. And let’s stay connected and keep hope alive.

The winter holiday season can be a time of joy and celebration for some, and for those with histories of trauma and neglect, it may very well be a time of particular pain and loneliness. Where I live there is a (to me) overblown culture of consumerism and consumption, with great emphasis put on buying and giving things, gifts.For those of us with histories of trauma and neglect, or the specific trauma of poverty, there may be even more distorted meanings around giving and getting.I always somehow imagined or dreamed that I would get something really special that would show me I was special, that I was worth something; or that I might be sufficiently known to receive something I would like.Giving gave me a way to at least for a minute, feel appreciated, even if it was not really me that was appreciated, but the material gift.Giving and receiving can be particularly fraught for survivors of neglect. That is the theme of this week's video.Finally, few words about hope:I had the privilege of going to hear revolutionary icon Angela Davis speak. She is now 82. Davis was a champion of the US Black Power Movement of the 1970's. It meant a lot to me that she of all people, is hopeful!Best wishes of the season to all!And hope for the year to come!

Amidst the buzz about sex that seems to always be around, for many of us, your clients may be wondering about their own lackluster sex lives, their partners having "lost interest," or accusing them of losing interest. They may be wondering "what is wrong with me?" Or what is wrong with my partner?" Or what is "normal."Those with a neglect history, who never had anyone to ask or talk to about even their pubescent changing bodies, may be full of questions that they may never ask. Admittedly this may be true for us personally.There are many reasons for the missing or lost spark. It may be an expression of the dysregulated, hypo-aroused neglect survivor's brain; developmental age-related bodily changes, or misconceptions about desire in the first place. Shame and prevailing myth, keeps people from speaking to or asking even their own partners. Similarly, one may wonder about their own or their partners' seemingly insatiable or extreme appetites for both quantity and sexual activity.This week's video breaks the silence about a very large topic.

It is a challenging time of year for those with neglect and incident trauma histories. The winter holidays of any denomination may be fraught with family memories of all kinds...disappointment, feeling outcast or different, or more traumatic episodes.In the US it is a time of great commotion, consumerism, and congestion. Pressure to have happy families to have happy celebrations with, lots of buying and giving and eating...these pressures on top of already existing difficulties.It is not fitting with the "Norman Rockwell" idyllic image of a harmonious, white, nuclear family with a beautiful tree and lots of presents. All this may result in feelings of shame, envy and grief.Oy vey! My husband and I choose to feel the whole thing, and head for someplace warm and quiet.Another insidious experience for many, the now better understood "anniversary reaction" phenomenon. The body/nervous system seems to have an uncanny additional sense or calendar where it registers the approach of a fraught time of trauma. One's reactivity seems to ramp up for no apparent reason. If you find yourself feeling more reactive, irritable or out of sorts at this time of year, you are not alone. That is our topic this week. Do take heart. As ever, the more trauma processing we do, the easier things get over time.

Next week is the Thanksgiving holiday here in the US, never a favorite of mine. For an anorexic kid, it was a true nightmare. I always thought of it as “the great American eating holiday.” There was no escaping all that food, that I did not even like. Now it is more an ideological distaste as it celebrates a fictitious harmony of colonial and Indigenous people breaking bread together, hardly the history as I understand it. However, I am all about any celebration of gratitude, and I am certainly grateful to have food, certainly not to be taken for granted in these times.A couple of weeks ago I had the good fortune to meet Trish McOrmond through a webinar I gave. Trish, a sociologist, trauma informed coach, mother and very wise woman, is of the Wahkotowin Cree Nation, Edmonton, Canada. She generously enlightened me about their Native attachment and parenting model, which unlike the dyadic one I am most familiar with, involves the collective. I was both humbled and fascinated.We are privileged to welcome Trish today as our special guest. She mentioned that she taught her children to express themselves freely, and say it all provided it is true, kind and necessary.Let’s all celebrate gratitude, whatever we might call it!

In today’s video we feature special guest Stephanie Simms. I met Stephanie in Oxford in 2024, when she was on a panel where she described an experience of racial trauma. Her story moved me deeply and we made one of those instant connections. Stephanie is a veteran of 20 years in the US Air Force, where plenty of racial and gender related trauma occurs, and later had a stint in the US space program, NASA. Stephanie, like me, has a story about the complex and the invaluable experience of forgiveness. As it happens, we welcome her just before the US observes Veterans Day. Stephanie can be found at beyondsolace.com

Like many children of trauma and neglect, I searched for heroes and idealized others, someone to look up to and identify with. I was and to some extent still am, a hero worshipper of sorts. Certainly not as I was. As a young activist who always loved music, musical icons with social justice messages were high on my list. It is always a terrible blow to find out a hero, may in fact have feet of clay. You have seen and heard in my blogs before, at least once, the powerful music of Buffy Saint Marie, icon of the Indigenous People of the North American continent. It was with great dismay that I discovered that perhaps this (to me) great musician, was not who she appeared to be.That little journey is the subject of this week’s video.

This week's episode was recorded in Oxford, where I was attending and speaking at the Transform Trauma 2025 Conference.In this episode, I reflect on a movie I watched on the plane. I describe to you the powerful discovery of a group of men in a truly bleak environment, that enabled a burst of joy and connection among them.It is a worthy practice for survivors of trauma and neglect, who may not often experience either. Thank you for tolerating my jet lagged face, and the less than glamorous setting. Next time we will be back to "normal."Have a good week!

This week we have a very special guest. We are honored and privileged to welcome Mike Niconchuk.I met Mike at the Boston Trauma Conference. I was so moved by his talks there that I invited him for an interview. Mike is a researcher, activist, author, hero and all around amazing human being.I say hero because Mike works on the front lines, where raw trauma is happening live around him. Mike is also of a different generation than I. And his story about intergenerational transmission hails back to a different part of the world than mine. But I am also interested in all our commonalities.Mike is also a founding member of the Salama Project, for those who may be as inspired as I am by him, and would like to know more or help:https://salamaproject.com/

Everyone is talking about it, and it seems to be everywhere. I figure it is time for me to say at least a few words about AI. I admit I feel very mixed about it, but then that is true about so many relationships, people and things in this complicated world. My giving it a chance to show its merits is admittedly quite new. And my apprehensions about mechanization and de-personalization are quite old! It does appear to be here to stay, and it certainly is proliferating where I live. The book I mention in the podcast is: Searches: Selfhood in the Digital Age (2025) by Vauhini Vara. I didn’t love the book, but it is written from a writer’s standpoint and was thought provoking. I am madly preparing for the Transform Trauma Oxford 2025 Conference that is rapidly approaching. Hope to see you there!

I was about five when they came out with color TV’s. We did not have one, and continued to huddle around the grainy old black and white for a long time. But I remember our dentist, who was a family friend, would sometimes have us over for dinner with his family on a Sunday evening. All I remember about those visits, is gathering around their spectacular color TV to watch Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color.I was enthralled by the intro’s. Vivid kaleidoscopic swirls of primary color, like a moving Jackson Pollack painting. I always loved color. This week’s video explores how the neglect brain gets stuck in black and white. And what that has to do with the “three P’s”, helplessness and hopelessness. With the help of neuroscience we connect these dots.

In this episode we pay a brief visit to the big topic of regulation and its many meanings and manifestations, from "over-reacting" to getting somehow stuck in trauma states, and feeling baffled by seemingly senseless or erratic relationship patterns. So very much of it begins with early neglect. And although it may elicit shame and confusion, or great fatigue, it is not a "character flaw" or a "pathology," but one of the many unfortunate impacts of early neglect trauma. And it may take a lifetime to get as regulated as we would like. I know I am still trying! As I mention in the podcast, many thanks to those of you who put your comments on the YouTube page. It is helpful to hear from you what "works" best, even if there is variation in what people want. It is helpful to hear them all. One person wrote about being interested in how to find the World Book Club. It is a very cool resource and concept, as well as an international community of readers. Look up BBC.com World Book Club, and you can find it.

Today video is a bit of a patchwork, bits and pieces of ideas I am sure I will develop, disarray of coming home from vacation, and trying to get organized to get back in the saddle. Hawaii is glorious. It is good to be home! Although it is freezing here in San Francisco, USA.Apologies for the chaos of videos! Last week you got none, but this week you get two. Yes, trying to get organized. The plan is resuming in August, the blog on alternate weeks. Thanks as ever for your interest!

Mind and BodyAloha everyone from glorious Kona, Hawaii, where I have the privilege to be this week. This video was made with a (real!) spectacular ocean view, not your Zoom perfect fake one!Being on vacation clears the head at least to some extent from the overcrowding of the “usual” thoughts and even coming back to a place I have been at least 50 times, I notice different things: a different flower or bird, a new and exotic food…and I think more freely and further outside of the workday “box.”Travel and jet lag has never seemed strenuous, nor has dramatic change of time zones… until now. This old body is not the same as it always was. Travel also invites the traveler to see many different bodies both en route to and at the destination. Here in Hawaii, partly due to weather, and partly due to culture, one sees a lot of skin, much of it tattooed, and of unabashedly all shapes and sizes. There does not seem to be the kind of body shame, “fat”-phobia or obsessive thinness. Well perhaps in Waikiki of “Surfin’ Safari” fame, (for those of us who are old enough,) where I have never been.In this brief video, I ponder about disability, weight, aging and the ways I find myself feeling different and thinking about different things. Age obviously is inevitable and is in fact a privilege! Perhaps we can enter into it informed, even prepared. But as with many other things, it is process, and there is no precise recipe.Let’s break taboo, speak openly about how rapidly we march through life. Body changes and identity, like neurons, continue to advance through the lifetime. In this week’s video, we take a rudimentary look at body, culture and attitude.

In this episode of All About Nothing, we welcome special guest Mariah Rooney. When there is trauma, neglect, violence and differentness, often family is lost one way or another. With Mariah we discuss families lost and found, new models created, and a wide world outside the box of what sorts of attachments are possible. Thanks for joining us!

While we are all inundated with grief, horror, shock and injustice, I thought we might look for a ray of light. Here in San Francisco, I awoke to a rainbow spectrumed search light across the sky in honor of Pride weekend. It was a wonderful way to start my day.The child of neglect, will readily default to a stance of “nothing matters.” It is a natural way to feel in a lonely world of disconnection. And a feeling we are up against as we strive to be more connected and to heal. This week’s video is about the benefit of little shots of positive into the “field,” into the world. Even small things we can do to shine a bit of light. And often it is easy!This one is a little shorter than usual. But next week you will get a long one! Meanwhile, keep it positive!

It is summer here in the US and a time of many comings and goings. Vacations, summer camps, and young adults graduating and launching for the lucky (I won't talk about all the involuntary departures...)It is often a time of trauma activations for survivors of trauma and neglect. Loss is the core of neglect trauma, so real or imagined, or even what are in real time short interludes of absence, can stimulate the survival terror of rejection, abandonment, or the desolation of "simple" absence. But I also have a message of hope, about a little guy who seemed to be truly gone, but through intention, care and loving, and knowledgeable action, found its way back.It's Pride Weekend here in San Francisco. Happy Pride to all!

In this episode, we have a special treat. Akillah Wali, who I met at the Boston Trauma Conference, will join us, and bring humor and fun to what is most often painful and difficult work.Hope you will enjoy it, while also growing your hippocampus!

I shamefully realized after recording the video, that it is summer in the Northern Hemisphere, but not everywhere! My one-person psychology at work: the whole world is me! Oy vey. In the Southern Hemisphere it will be getting colder and darker, but nonetheless, a good time to curl up with a good book. In this episode, I recommend three recent to me, really good reads, that broaden our focus on trauma and neglect to encompass more reminders, and are also relevant to recovery, as well as inspiration. Attachment and loss are important parts of each, that they are truly ubiquitous human experiences, whether or not they are the focus, as is the perennial question of what matters? I recommend them all. Happy reading (or listening if you prefer, all three are available in audio,) whether it be summer or winter in your part of the world.