ACS Mental Health

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ACS Mental Health Contact information, map and directions, contact form, opening hours, services, ratings, photos, videos and announcements from ACS Mental Health, Nonprofit Organization, 3119 Central Ave, Ceres, CA.

ACS Mental Health is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization dedicated to research, education, awareness, collaboration, and healing or R.E.A.C.H in the capacities of mental health and wellness through traditional and holistic approaches.

🧠 Let’s Talk Mental Health! 💜Join Shamiram Media for an important conversation with Christina Salem, Founder & Director ...
09/23/2026

🧠 Let’s Talk Mental Health! 💜

Join Shamiram Media for an important conversation with Christina Salem, Founder & Director at ACS Mental Health, hosted by Ramella Rostamou.

đź“… Wednesday, September 23
⏰ 8 PM PST
đź“ş Live on Facebook & YouTube

Let’s break the silence, raise awareness, and prioritize mental health in our community 💜

09/21/2026

COMMUNITY VOICES: FLEEING WAR

Leaving a war zone does not always mean the experience ends when you arrive home.

In this installment, ACSMH Founder & Director Christina Salem reflects on fleeing Iraq during conflict, returning home, and the complicated aftermath of trying to feel safe again.

For many people affected by war and displacement, survival can continue long after the immediate danger has passed — through memory, hypervigilance, grief, guilt, and the process of making sense of what happened.

🎥 From our Trauma & Stressor-Related Disorders panel at the 93rd Annual Assyrian American National Federation Convention.

09/20/2026

Understanding Fearful Attachment

Some people want closeness — and fear it at the same time.

In this part of our conversation, Rania Jando, LCSW explains fearful attachment: a pattern where someone may deeply want connection, but struggle to feel safe being vulnerable.

That fear can create a painful push-pull dynamic. As relationships become more emotionally intimate, the person may begin to withdraw, shut down, or create distance — sometimes leaving first because they are afraid of being left.

These patterns can develop as a way of protecting ourselves, but they do not have to define how we relate forever.

Recognizing the pattern is one step toward building safer, healthier connection.

🎥 From our Trauma & Stressor-Related Disorders panel at the 93rd Annual AANF Convention.

09/18/2026

Unresolved trauma can affect more than the person who experienced it.

Rania Jando, LCSW, explains how a caregiver’s unresolved trauma may affect their ability to respond consistently to a child’s emotional needs — and how those early experiences can influence attachment patterns later in life.

Anxious attachment may show up as a fear of rejection or abandonment and a strong need for reassurance and connection.

Avoidant attachment may look very different: discomfort with emotional closeness, difficulty relying on others, and a tendency to pull away when relationships become vulnerable.

These patterns are not identities or life sentences. Understanding where they may come from can help us recognize the cycle — and begin changing it.

🎥 From our Trauma & Stressor-Related Disorders panel at the 93rd Annual Convention.

09/17/2026

One person wants to talk it through immediately. The other wants to shut the conversation down. Sound familiar?

Rania Jando, LCSW, explains how anxious and avoidant attachment patterns can create a push-pull dynamic in families and relationships.

For someone with anxious attachment, conflict may trigger fears of rejection or abandonment, creating an urgency to reconnect and resolve the issue. Someone with avoidant tendencies may respond to that same conflict by creating distance or withdrawing.

Neither response tells the whole story of a person — but recognizing the pattern can be the first step toward changing it.

🎥 From our Trauma & Stressor-Related Disorders panel at the 93rd Annual Assyrian American National Federation Convention.

During conflict, do you need to talk NOW or need space first?

09/15/2026

What happens when a child’s brain does not respond more strongly to a primary caregiver than to a stranger?

In this next part of our conversation, Dr. Ishaq Lachin, MD explains Disinhibited Social Engagement Disorder (DSED), a condition associated with severe disruptions in early caregiving.

Children with DSED may seek comfort, attention, or connection from unfamiliar adults in ways that can look very different from the withdrawal seen in Reactive Attachment Disorder.

Dr. Lachin also highlights research showing how the brain’s response to a caregiver versus a stranger can become less differentiated, illustrating how deeply early attachment experiences can shape social and emotional development.

🎥 From our panel on Trauma & Stressor-Related Disorders at the 93rd Annual AANF Convention.

09/14/2026

What happens when severe neglect begins to shape the way a child seeks—or avoids—comfort?

In the next part of our conversation at the 93rd Annual Assyrian American National Federation Convention, Dr. Ishaq Lachin, MD explains Reactive Attachment Disorder, one of the conditions that can develop following severe, persistent neglect.

Children with RAD may become highly withdrawn, avoid seeking comfort, and push others away even while experiencing real emotional pain. That distress can later show up through irritability, anger, sadness, and other behaviors.

But one of the most important points in this discussion is that Reactive Attachment Disorder is treatable. Consistency, stability, and reliable caregiving can make a profound difference in a child’s development and recovery.

🎥 From our panel on Trauma & Stressor-Related Disorders at the 93rd Annual AANF Convention.

09/11/2026

What can disrupt attachment?

We look at the difference between everyday imperfections in caregiving and patterns that can meaningfully disrupt attachment.

Dr. Lachin explains how severe, repeated neglect can affect a child’s sense of safety and connection, while also emphasizing that an occasional delayed response does not automatically create attachment trauma.

He also highlights another important factor: repeated disruption of a primary caregiver bond, even when the caregiver themselves was loving and supportive.

🎥 From our panel on Trauma & Stressor-Related Disorders at the 93rd Annual Assyrian American National Federation Convention.

09/10/2026

How early do we begin learning what safety feels like?

At the 93rd Annual AANF Convention, Dr. Ishaq Lachin on our discussion on Trauma & Stressor-Related Disorders by explaining attachment — the early bonds we form with our caregivers and how those relationships can shape the ways we seek comfort, connection, and security later in life.

🎥 Part 1 of our conversation on trauma, stress, and mental health within our community.

Dr. Ishaq Lachin, MD
Board-Certified General Adult and Child & Adolescent Psychiatrist

We are grateful to have had the opportunity to return to the 93rd Annual Assyrian American National Federation Conventio...
09/07/2026

We are grateful to have had the opportunity to return to the 93rd Annual Assyrian American National Federation Convention for a conversation on Trauma & Stressor-Related Disorders and their impact within the Assyrian, Chaldean, Syriac community.

Alongside an incredible group of mental health professionals — Dr. Ishaq Lachin, MD; Dr. Juliet Dinkha, PsyD; Dr. Alan Georges, MD; Dr. Dennis Gelyana, MD, MPH; Rania Jando, LCSW; and ACSMH Founder/Director Christina Salem — we explored trauma through both a clinical and culturally informed lens.

Dr. Ninos Adams, MD also contributed to the development of the presentation and discussion materials, although he was unable to be with us in person.

Together, we explored:
🧠 Stress, trauma, and trauma- and stressor-related disorders
🧬 Transgenerational trauma and the ways historical experiences can continue to affect later generations
🌍 The intersection of displacement, loss, family, culture, and mental health
đź’¬ How greater education and culturally relevant conversations can help our community better recognize and respond to trauma

For ACSMH, these conversations are about more than identifying what our communities have endured. They are about building the language, research, resources, and understanding needed to move toward healing.

We are grateful to Assyrian American National Federation for continuing to make space for mental health at our national convention, to each professional who contributed their expertise, and to everyone who joined us for the conversation.

🎥 Clips from the session will be shared soon.

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3119 Central Ave
Ceres, CA
95307

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