Trauma-Informed and Trauma-Responsive Yoga Teaching

Catherine Cook-Cottone, Ph.D., is a licensed psychologist, yoga therapist, and professor at University at Buffalo, SUNY. She has written 10+ books and over 100 research articles and chapters on mindful self-care, yoga, embodiment, self-regulation, eating disorders, and trauma. She is a trauma therapist and conducts trainings internationally on trauma-informed and responsive yoga. In 2018, she was awarded the American Psychological Association's Citizen Psychologist Presidential Citation. She lives in Amherst, NY.Joanne Spence, D.Min, ERYT-500, C-IAYT is a certified yoga therapist and founder and director of Yoga in Schools. Joanne trains and teaches internationally in a range of settings, including teaching yoga in prisons, hospitals, schools, churches, and sometimes on street corners. She has more than thirty-five years of clinical experience as a mental health professional and twenty-plus years as a teacher and practitioner of yoga. She is the author of two books and book chapters. She lives in Pittsburgh, PA.

Catherine Cook-Cottone and Joanne Spence have written a marvelously useful book for yoga teachers. In any given yoga class, students arrive at the mat with a wide array of visible and less visible mental and physical health conditions - battling an eating disorder, feeling ashamed of their bodies, in the throes of an addiction, living with past trauma, having an incarcerated family member, or being diagnosed with cancer. In addition to being easy and enjoyable to read, teachers spending time with Trauma-Informed and Trauma-Responsive Yoga Teaching will become wiser and better guides for their students.