The Question That Brings Families Home

TRAUMALITY has won the Social Impact Award at the Activist Without Borders Film Festival. Its central question, "What happened to you?", is one that families kept apart are rarely asked. I read Ton Mazzone's news today with real joy. TRAUMALITY has won the Social Impact Award at the Activist Without Borders Film Festival. When I watched the film, I kept thinking of the children and parents who are cut off from one another, sometimes for years. As a court-appointed advocate for children and as president of the Family Preservation Alliance, I have sat with many of them. Their stories are usually told in the language of blame, with courts, agencies and relatives all trying to decide what is wrong with whom. TRAUMALITY asks a different question, not "What's wrong with you?" but "What happened to you?" Asked early enough, that question can change how a family's story ends. I have seen what it looks like when it goes unasked. A child grows up believing a parent simply stopped caring, while that parent waits by a phone that doesn't ring. Ton's film doesn't tell anyone what to think about situations like these, but it opens the door to understanding, and that is where healing begins. Ton says the true measure of his work is every person who leaves a screening seeing themselves, or someone they love, a little differently. For a family that has been pulled apart, that small shift can be the first step back toward one another. Congratulations, Ton, and thank you to everyone who has shared TRAUMALITY. As Ton says, this is only the beginning. Watch TRAUMALITY at www.traumality.com, or bring a screening to your community at www.traumality.com/film.