When left untreated, traumatized children may become traumatized adults, who become traumatized parents caring for traumatized children. Traumatized children are the foundation (but not the cause!) of intergenerational trauma. So, where do we break this cycle? Anywhere. Working with traumatized children often means working with whoever walks the child through the door: parents, grandparents, other […]
Over the course of several months, training notices for the Flash Technique (Manfield et al., 2016) arrived in my email several times, before curiosity compelled me to attend the online training in February 2020. I was instantaneously hooked and began using it with my child clients. The advanced online trainings in June 2020 and March […]
Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, therapists around the world are rapidly adapting therapy to the online format. Our online forums and supervision sessions are full of conversations about Zoom fatigue, online security and how we best support our clients, even while we too are experiencing the stress of the pandemic. However, when it comes to […]
In the field of complex trauma and dissociative disorders we are accustomed to conceptualizing our work through the lens of a three-phase treatment model which includes: safety and stabilization, processing of traumatic memories and integration/new life as one integrated self. However, in my clinical practice I have found it useful to conceptualize the treatment as […]
Treating dissociation at times can feel like groping around in the dark. We know we are in the right ballpark, but every session can be an act of straining to interpret and understand what is being presented. Ever since I started doing treatment and parenting as a therapeutic foster parent, I wanted desperately to have […]
Child sexual abuse is an extensive health problem in the United States (U.S.) and leads to a variety of serious mental and physical health issues throughout the lifetime of the individual (Townsend & Rheingold, 2013). Short and long term consequences include exacerbation of autoimmune diseases, labile affect, dissociation, mood dysregulation, poor self-esteem, and problems related […]
Eli, age seven, lives with his younger sister Marianne, age four, and their mother Lisa, in New York City. They had lived in a domestic violence shelter for a year, and before that with his stepfather, Mark, till Lisa fled with the kids following repeated violence. Huddled in his bed, Eli had often heard his […]
“Oik, Oik, Oik,” Emmett, the Guinea Pig, squeaks with delight as one of his favorite child-clients enters the therapy room. He nuzzles on her lap to keep her grounded as she processes a traumatic memory through the EMDR Standard Protocol. In another session, Emmett is tenderly laid in the baby buggy and gently pushed around […]
As a criminologist studying organised child sexual abuse, I sometimes feel like I live in the ‘upside down’, the shadow world parallel to our own in the TV series Stranger Things. In the TV series, the ‘upside down’ looks like our own world, but darker and filled with unpredictable terror. Kids disappear into it sometimes, […]
Five year old Luke was referred to therapy by his kindergarten teacher due to his disruptive behavior in the classroom and his constant refusal to follow rules. When I asked him what had happened at school before coming to see me, he was perfectly capable of giving a narrative of the facts. When I asked […]
