What Looked Like Defiance Was Actually Grief: The Healing Power of Peer Support in Children’s Mental Health

• By: Susie Branagan, BSN, RN Susie Branagan Consulting
• July 29th, 2026
• children's mental health, emotional resilience, family peer support, grief and loss, pediatric behavioral health, peer support, school-based mental health, Summer 2026 Issue, trauma-informed care
• 416    0

Ten-year-old Marcus stopped talking after his father was incarcerated. At first, school staff assumed he was angry. Then they thought he was being oppositional. Over time, his silence became impossible to ignore. He stopped participating in class discussions. He isolated himself during lunch. He...

Building Sanctuary: Creating Trauma-Informed Workplaces to Heal Burnout and Secondary Trauma in Behavioral Health

• By: Susie Branagan, RN, BSN Susie Branagan Consulting
• January 19th, 2026
• behavioral health workforce, burnout and compassion fatigue, healthcare technology, peer support, psychological safety, secondary trauma, staff wellbeing, trauma-informed care, Winter 2026 Issue
• 2353    0

The quiet exhaustion in Sarah’s eyes told a story that statistics could never capture. After eight years as a behavioral health nurse, she found herself sitting in her car each morning, summoning the strength to walk through the clinic doors. Anxiety in her chest, her neck, and the very hands she...