About the Founder
Mrs. Madelyn Wright

​My Story​

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My trauma informed journey started by watching my foster siblings display behaviors that seemed completely absurd compared to the situation. They would exude a shrill and terrible scream that would last an entire car ride, flinch at the perfect temperature bath, scratch incessantly at the sheets, and not sooth at bedtime.

As a teenager, I started with an attitude of ignorance. They were just bad, annoying kids in my mind. As I spent more time with those kids though, and grew to love them, I began to notice a trend. A trend that spread across the eleven foster children that came into our home. I did not have an answer but began to wonder who would be able to care for and meet these children's needs longterm?

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This sent me sprinting towards my bachelors degree in Special Education at Lee University in Cleveland, Tennessee. I learned about how the system would treat these children, and I started to learn about behavior and disabilities. Sometimes behavior and special needs go hand-in-hand, but with my foster siblings still at the forefront of my mind, I knew that they were not all disabled. So what was causing them to act the way they did? Another trend began to form. A group of children like my foster siblings being mislabeled and misdiagnosed and drowning in a system that had no idea what to do with them. 

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The answer came to me in the form of a weekend seminar being offered by a local non-profit called OrphanWise. They introduced me to the term "complex developmental trauma" and exposed me to how the brain and body react to trauma. Not only did they explain the why they told me what to do about it. I was then introduced to Trust Based Relational Intervention® or TBRI®. 

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I was hooked. 

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I spent the next three years reading, researching, and listening to everything I could get my hands on related to complex developmental trauma and the world began to make so much more sense so it seemed. TBRI® is a complete change in mindset. Now I looked at children with genuine curiosity, why were they acting out? What need was causing this behavior? How could I meet that need? 

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I can remember being not sure if the strategies would work but was determined to go all in and try. Not only did they work, but I started to become known as someone who could work with kids who had "tough behaviors" in my first job at HeadStart as a substitute, as a student teacher in a 6th grade middle school classroom, and later in a 12th grade high school classroom. I was a novice implementing new strategies and they were working. 

Not only does TBRI® give you tools to help others but also insight to look into your own past and your own attachment style. Attending that weekend seminar led me to my counselor who is now a good friend and mentor. I learned the value of deep healing for myself so that I could offer it to others. 

My senior year of college, I reached out to that very same non-profit asking for more resources and direction and instead received a life changing job. I served as an AmeriCorps VISTA with the United Way of the Ocoee Region for one year and during my term worked side-by-side with OrphanWise who taught me the ins and outs of TBRI®. Not only was I becoming more trauma informed but my VISTA position enforced skills of community outreach and capacity building for an organization. 

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Thanks to OrphanWise I am now a TBRI® Practitioner trained by the source itself, The Karyn Purvis Institute of Child Development, and can offer the TBRI® Caregiver Training to my home state of Delaware.

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Since moving back to Delaware, I have spoken with many of the professionals and organizations offering services to children from hard places. The defining difference between TBRI® and other trauma informed trainings is that we focus on not only the why of trauma but also actionable behavior management strategies that caregivers can implement right away. In other words, we create empathy for the need but then also tell you what to do about it. 

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TBRI® for me is my North Star but there is surrounding research and efforts that I have begun to explore to further meet the needs in our Delaware communities and to make myself the most well-rounded trauma informed practitioner that I can be. One such exploration led me to become a HALO Project Making Sense of Your Worth Facilitator. 

There is much work to be done and more to learn! 

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