LORI TERESA YEARWOOD
TRAUMA-INFORMED JOURNALIST & SPEAKER
TRAUMA-INFORMED JOURNALIST & SPEAKER
TRAUMA-INFORMED JOURNALIST
& SPEAKER
I am a trauma-aware and trauma-sensitive journalist and speaker currently covering the U.S. housing crisis for The Economic Hardship Reporting Project. A former reporter for The Miami Herald, The St. Louis Post Dispatch and The Syracuse Newspapers, I have always written stories about people from populations that have been marginalized.
My personal experience of losing my family and worldly positions — and then plunging into homelessness between 2014 and 2016 — has given me the unique privilege of reporting and writing from an “inside out” perspective. In that new thought construct, I have learned that the strength of the human spirit is beyond anything I ever imagined. As a result, I offer a radically different perspective about what it takes to heal from crisis, individually and collectively.
There is a great need for trauma-informed journalism that delves not only into the devastation of collapse — but also into the realities of the societal context of that collapse, and just as importantly, the Inner Strength of every individual, regardless of society’s judgments and labels.
Since my emergence, my pieces have been published in The New York Times, Mother Jones, The Washington Post, The Guardian, Slate, CNBC — as well as many other publications. I have also been interviewed for various shows and events, including The Young Turk’s “The Damage Report” with John Ladarola, as well as with Kris Boyd, host of the National Public Radio show, “Think.” In April, I presented at Yale via a Poynter journalism fellowship, this month I was the keynote speaker at Homeward Bound in North Carolina, and in less than a week, I will be the keynote speaker for the yearly conference at the Supportive Housing Network in New York. Please see my Public Appearances page for details and to listen to available recordings.
Thank you for your interest in my work.