Partner
One Mom’s Battle (OMB) not only has an international platform supporting survivors, it has a mission to raise awareness and educate family court professionals on post separation abuse as it relates to co-parenting and the family court system (divorce, paternity and child custody battles). For more information, visit: https://www.onemomsbattle.com
Moderator
Jayne O'Donnell Jayne O'Donnell is founder and CEO of Youthcast Media Group (YMG) and USA TODAY’s former health policy reporter. YMG, launched in 2017 as the Urban Health Media Project, trains diverse high school students from under-resourced communities to do multimedia health and social issue journalism – and gets their work published in media outlets. Jayne was a USA TODAY Money reporter from 1994 to 2013, covering auto and product safety, airlines, retail and white-collar crime. She then covered health policy, mental health, childhood trauma and patient safety until March 2021. An author, TV and radio contributor, Jayne has appeared on Good Morning America, CBS This Morning, CNN, MSNBC, NPR and C-Span and been published in magazines including Woman’s Day, Good Housekeeping, Parents and Autoweek. She has won several awards for her work, most notably for her 1996 articles in USA TODAY on the dangers air bags posed to children. That reporting prompted many government actions including the “smart" air bags and warning labels in every new vehicle. She has also spoken at dozens of conferences, including those sponsored by SXSW, the Business Roundtable, Foreign Policy magazine and the Association of Health Care Journalists. A graduate of University of Maryland’s College of Journalism, Jayne did graduate work at George Washington University’s School of Business. She lives in McLean, Va. and Westerly, R.I. with her husband, Richard Willing, who is also a journalist. Their daughter, Cate, is a 2022 Syracuse University graduate who majored in public health and public policy and works in health communications.
Panelists
Tina Swithin, the founder of Family Court Awareness Month, began documenting her journey through the Family Court System in her prolific blog, One Mom’s Battle. Before she knew it, her story had gained international media attention in publications such as Glamour Magazine, Washington Times and Huffington Post. Tina’s custody battle spanned from 2009 through 2014 and during this time, Tina acted as her own attorney against an individual who suffers from a Cluster B personality disorder. In the end, Tina secured the very thing that she fought so hard for: her daughter’s safety. During her journey, Tina wrote four books: Divorcing a Narcissist: One Mom's Battle, Divorcing a Narcissist: Advice from the Battlefield, Rebuilding After the Storm and The Narc Decoder: Understanding the Language of the Narcissist. She is also founder of the High Conflict Divorce Coach Certification Program. Tina has been awarded honors such as the “Top 20 Professionals Under 40” and the “Top 40 Professionals Under 40” in several regional California newspapers. Tina resides in San Luis Obispo, California with her husband and her two daughters.
Maisha Colter LCSW, JD has dedicated her professional life to advocating for the needs of children and families in crisis. Maisha has always found work that allows her to draw on the strengths of her educational training in social work and law. Maisha attended school in New York graduating from Syracuse University with dual bachelors’ degrees in Social Work and Public Policy. After obtaining her Masters in Social Work from New York University, Maisha was a licensed social worker in Brooklyn, New York working tirelessly with children and families involved with the State’s Child Protective Services Authority. She received her law degree from Rutgers University in 2001. After relocating to Texas 2003 she learned about AVDA and reached out to the Executive Director to volunteer, and was instead hired as the agency’s only staff attorney in 2004. She remained with the agency for almost 4 years and returned in 2012 to lead the distinguished staff of attorneys and paralegals charged with fighting on behalf of countless victims of domestic abuse in Harris, Fort Bend, Austin, Grimes, Waller and Washington Counties. She was selected after a nationwide search to serves as AVDA’s Chief Executive Officer on August 1, 2019.
Dr. Christine Marie Cocchiola, DSW, LCSW is a Coercive Control Advocate, Educator, Researcher & Survivor. She is a college professor teaching social work in the CT College System for the last 20 years and is also an adjunct instructor at NYU. Her expertise is in the areas of intimate partner violence, trauma, and child abuse, developing and presenting workshops on these topics both nationally and internationally. Christine, a Board Member of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, has supported policy codifying coercive control and has a small private practice, primarily serving victims and survivors of coercive control. She is the creator of the Protective Parenting Program, supporting protective mothers on their journey of healing their children.
Kathryn J. Spearman, MSN, RN is a trauma and violence predoctoral fellow at the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing supported by a T32 training grant from the National Institute of Child Health and Development under PI Dr. Jacquelyn Campbell. Her dissertation is entitled Understanding the impact of post-separation abuse on children’s health and flourishing. Her broad research interests focus on the intersection of intimate partner violence and child abuse, intimate partner violence related-homicides of women and children, structural determinants of health and safety such as family court judicial decision making, and risk-assessment and interventions that promote safety, resiliency, and recovery from trauma for children and mother/child dyads who have experienced family violence. Her scientific inquiry is informed by clinical experience working as a pediatric nurse with abused children and their mothers impacted by intimate partner violence. Her BS and MSN are from the University of Virginia and Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing, respectively.