About Dr. Lark
Lark Eshleman came to her career in child healing through her own childhood family experiences, by parenting her own children, through her work as a children’s librarian, elementary school principal, school psychologist, and then dramatically through her overseas volunteer work with children traumatized in the war in the Balkans after their wars of independence from 1991 – 1995.
Lark is an author, therapist and educator whose expertise is working with children and teens who have experienced early emotional trauma, attachment difficulties, neglect and abuse. She is Board Certified in Domestic Violence by the American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress, and is the creator of STAT™, Synergistic Trauma and Attachment Therapy
Author
Lark authored Becoming a Family: Promoting Healthy Attachments with Your Adopted Child (2003, 2006), and other works, and is a columnist for Fostering Families Today Magazine and contributor to Adoptions Today and other publications. Click here to view her full CV.
Therapist
Dr. Eshleman founded the Institute for Children and Families, which for 10 years was a leading treatment center providing extraordinarily successful and highly innovative treatment for children and families in the underserved population of adoption, foster care, and childhood trauma. In her clinic she and her staff provided and integrated model of attachment, EMDR, Theraplay, EEG Biofeedback, Trauma-Art Therapy and narrative therapies.
Educator
For 9 years she served on the Board of ATTACh, and has taught in Eastern Europe, Asia, and most recently in India, where she has been asked to share her findings and extensive knowledge in the areas of attachment disruptions, adoption, and healing. She is currently in talks about the possibility of taking her trainings to those who are working in the Syrian refugee camps in Greece.
Lark’s work has brought her into therapeutic contact with children and families who have suffered the emotional, psychological and neurologically damaging effects of war and other forms of organized violence. In 1997 she was instrumental in working with Rotary International, and the Rotary Club of Lancaster, PA to develop a treatment and professional training center in Croatia after the Balkan war. From 1997 through 2000 she volunteered more than 10 months at the center. She worked on a New Orleans/Houston base project called "Welcome Home" in which children returning to New Orleans schools were screened and referred for on-site programs to help them deal with the extreme stresses in their lives due to Hurricanes Katrina & Rita, and on trauma-relief teams for other natural and man-made emergencies. Recently she returned to Singapore to teach her program to professionals who will be addressing the trauma of children orphaned in natural disasters, such as the earthquakes in China in 2008.
Training Testimonials
