PTSD And Trauma Treatment Category
Where Were You When The Boston Marathon Bombs Exploded?
Breaking news, yet again of another major national crisis. Two brothers have been allegedly identified for planting two bombs that exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon this past week.
It is difficult, if not impossible to avoid the barrage of information cast out across our nation like a giant sand storm. The media coverage was nearly as impressive and swift as the police and military response to this crisis. Information is presented to us in every known form from newspapers to internet, to tablets, even through text messages.
This decade brought the advent of “embedded reporters” who broadcasted live, graphic coverage from the Middle East. Our nation, and indeed the world can experience tragedies that occur on the other side of the world just as visceral as if we were there in person.
Generations ago, people would ask one another, “where were you when Kennedy was shot?” This generation remembers “where were you when 9/11 happened?”...
Spring...1986, Fall...2012
Spring...1986
I am curled up in the fetal position. Clad only in swim trunks and a t-shirt, I lie in the bottom of a wooden ship, sailing in the open waters offshore of Somalia and Kenya. The night is deeply and painfully black. The ship is fifty feet long at most. As I lie in the shallowly-keeled bottom, I feel the rough thick mango wood of which it is comprised, against my skin. I am floating in a foot of briny water that laps against my skin and drenches my clothes. It is so much like a dream. The winds are strong and the ship heaves upon each ten foot wave, before crashing down into the troughs. With each smash of the ship’s bottom against the phosphorescent salty wave troughs, I consider vomiting yet again.
Inside my body, traveling in my bloodstream, are millions of malarial parasites. They conspire to make me wretch that which is not there. For the last two days, I have drank only a little and eaten nothing. This is the work of the parasites. To dehydrate and to emaciate...
The Dark, Black Hole...Women and Depression
The Dark, Black Hole…Women and Depression
It seems like there is an epidemic of depression in women in this country. Depression can seem like a dark hole that can hold you down and suck you under, draining the life out of you. It can leave you powerless, unable to function even in a normal fashion. It deprives you of your self-esteem, making you tell yourself “if I would just try a little harder, I could be a better wife, a better mother.” Depression wants to win the battle for your life, and many times it is a daily struggle.
What are some of the causes of Depression?
There can be many factors that bring about depression:
1. A chemical imbalance with too little dopamine, serotonin, or other neuroreceptors; typically inherited.
2. Addictions (drugs, alcohol, sex, food) can reset the dopamine receptors in your brain, and continued use of the addiction will be needed just to feel “normal”.
3. Medical traumas such as surgery or a recent illness.
4. Tr...
What is Trauma?
WHAT IS TRUMA?
There are large “T” traumas such as rape, war, assault, sexual, physical & emotional abuse, accidents (or witnessing one), natural disasters, divorce, chronic/acute illness, etc and there are small “t” traumas such as betrayal, mild forms of bullying or negative feedback, lack of proper emotional support as a child, etc.
Events happen to you that you are unable to process and you are left feeling overwhelmed, with symptoms that just won’t go away, that’s also considered a trauma response. Memories are stored in the brain and symptoms can also be experienced and felt throughout pains or aches in the body. There is a mind-body connection and what we think and feel reflects our pains and joys through behavioral and thought patterns. In order to heal you have to deal with the whole person, both the body and mind. If the trauma remains unresolved, it will, many times, cause symptoms in your present life.
Following is a short list of p...
Why Time Doesn't Heal All Wounds
Why Time Doesn’t Heal All Wounds, from Getting Past Your Past by Francine Shapiro
If we cut ourselves, unless there is an obstacle, we tend to heal. If we remove the block, the body goes back to healing. That’s why we’re willing to let ourselves be cut open during surgery. We expect incisions to heal.
The brain is a part of the body. In addition to the millions of memory networks just described, we all have hardwired into our brains a mechanism – an information processing system – for healing. It is geared to take any sort of emotional turmoil to a level of mental health or what is called a level of adaptive resolution. This means a resolution that includes the useful information that allows us to be more fit for survival in our lives. The information processing system is meant to make connections to what is useful, and let go of the rest.
Here’s how it works: Imagine that you’ve had an argument with a coworker. You can feel upset, angry or ...
How to get Un-Stuck
I am constantly asked by clients HOW they can change unwanted patterns in their lives. The question is varied but usually revolves around the same theme: I keep doing the same thing even though I don't want to be doing it. I guess you could call that the dictionary definition of being stuck, right? And it seems that in all of our lives there is some area in which we just feel that if we just tried hard enough, I would be able to establish a new patter. 'Then,' we tell ourselves, 'Then I'll be happy.'
And yet time after time, with every New Year's Resolution that comes and goes, with each new promise we make to ourselves or our families, with each time that something doesn't work, we feel like we have ended up right back where we started. The only difference being, of course, that this time we have something else to feel stuck about: another failed resolution.
So why is it that so many of our good intentions only end up bringing us full circle back to the same place, leaving us feel s...
The Difficulty of Making Change Stick
For many people, the ability to make changes comes naturally, depending on the nature of the change. Trying a new food, learning a new task, making a new friend, starting a new job...these may just be part of daily life. For the most part though, we are merely changing what we are doing, where we are going, and it's not too difficult.
What if, however, the change that needs to happen, is one on the inside? A change within the fabric of our being, and change in how we see ourselves in our core identity? Then the issue of change is difficult, even if we don't like ourselves.
For one reason or another, we carry around an image of ourselves that is, for the most part, fairly stable and unchanging. If it is a pretty positive image of ourselves as confident and capable and worthy, then there probably won't be much motivation or incentive to change. And of course, why should we?
But on the other hand, what if that self-image is one of incompetence, incapable, and unworthy? Perhaps this des...
Self-limiting thoughts giving your power away?
In my line of work as a therapist, I see most often that people struggle with their self-limiting thoughts and beliefs. Over the years I’ve started to put a list together of the beliefs I hear that, for each of the people saying them, indicate the ways they have been giving their power away to change their lives for the better. See how many of the following you can identify in your own thought patterns, so that you can shed a little light on how you are holding yourself back.
1. I have to ask others what I should do
2. I think a higher power decides who should get what
3. I don’t deserve to have dreams
4. I have to pay my dues before I get what I really want
5. I have to fix the details before I can pay attention to the big picture
6. There is only one person out there who will make me happy
7. If I say what I really want from people, they will reject me
8. I have to know what is going to work before I take action
9. If only they would change, then I could be happy
10. I don’...
New Tele-series “Beyond Abuse: Powerful Living”, with Dr. Lisa Cooney, MFT
You know your clients have been abused and suffered severe trauma, drama and gore. Their lives have already been limited to that past event, so why not bust that reality and facilitate creation of the one they love to live? This Tele-series is about powerful living vs. living the restriction and constriction of the past that keeps limiting your clients. Create and generate the unfathomable and fantastic living you know you can facilitate with your clients. This Tele-series is for both personal and professional growth.
To learn more visit: http://lifeempowermentinstitute.com/lei/?page_id=2388
*This Tele-Seminar is valuable for both holistic practitioners and consciousness seekers in healing and transformation. Participation is confidential.
Child Molester or Pedophile - Is there a difference and what drives them?
Sexual abuse of children is not a new problem, nor have the statistics changed. “1 in 4 girls is sexually abused before the age of 14; 1 in 6 boys is sexually abused before the age of 16.” (Hopper, J. (1998). Child Sexual Abuse: Statistics, Research, & Resources. Boston, MA Boston University School of Medicine.) This issue is as old as time, but we are finally paying attention to it in a new way. Whether it is in the church, sports, boys clubs, schools or families, there have always been environmental pockets in society that foster these deviants. Whether it is about sex or power, children have always been the most vulnerable segment of the population, and their rights need to be more conscientiously protected.
Pedophilia is a psychological disorder that is thought to be caused by a combination of genetic and environmental factors and may run in families. That latter fact may be the result of genetic defects or because pedophiles often were victims of sexual abuse them...
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