Full Course Description

COURSE OBJECTIVES

Examine the nature of traumatic stress, grief and loss and their sequelae.
Analyze the clinical application of theoretical treatment models for traumatic stress, grief and loss.
Evaluate traumatic stress, grief and loss from biochemical, psychological, & social perspectives in order to improve clinical outcomes.
Examine the clinical research that supports the efficacy of trauma treatment.
Identify appropriate treatment interventions to address the comorbidity of traumatic stress in other diagnoses, including personality disorders and Dissociative Identity Disorder.
Examine the research on the efficacy of self-regulation skills as preliminary treatment interventions for trauma.
Summarize psychoeducation and cognitive restructuring techniques for maximizing client engagement and participation in early stages of treatment.
Articulate the 10 core competencies of traumatic stress, grief and loss and specify the clinical application of each.
Incorporate clinical interventions and techniques for the initial assessment, safety and stabilization phase of treatment as well as the remembrance and mourning phases of trauma treatment.
Examine the potential clinical limitations and benefits of completing a needs assessment for better progress in treatment.
Develop clinical skills to support and facilitate recovery from complicated bereavement in clients.
Incorporate CBT skills to promote the development of stability, self-efficacy, anxiety management, and relational capacities in traumatized clients.

MODULE 1 OUTLINE

A Brief History and Evolution of Traumatic Stress, Grief & Loss

Systemic traumatic stress theory
Symptom review
Review of effective treatments
Tri Phasic model
Most commonly used instruments to assess traumatic stress

MODULE 2 OUTLINE

10 Core Competencies of Traumatic Stress, Grief & Loss Bio-Psycho-Social-Spiritual Factors that Produce Anxiety & Traumatic Stress

Precipitating events
Meaning making
Physiology of Trauma
Perception

Adaptive and Maladaptive Coping Behaviors

Trauma Adaptation
Systemic influences
Emotional & psychological stressors
Integrated theoretical concepts from stress, crisis & trauma theories
Information Processing Model
Psychosocial Model

The Biochemical, Affective, and Cognitive Impacts of Traumatic Stress

Affective volatility
The body keeps the score
Biology of traumatic stress

The Impacts of Traumatic Stress Over Time& Across & Within Developmental Stages

Epigenetics
Reactive Attachment Disorder
Adrenal fatigue

The Role of Traumatic Stress in Clinical Disorders such as Personality Disorders, Dissociative Identity Disorder, and More

Traumagenesis
Traumaddiction
Comorbidity

Conceptualizing a Framework of Healing for Survivors of Traumatic Stress

Systemic perspective
Strengths perspective
Survivor metaphor

Traumatic Stress Exists Across the Continuum of Systemic Levels

Systemic trauma theory
Community trauma

MODULE 3 OUTLINE

Self-Regulation

Interoception and Balancing the ANS
Self-Regulation Skills & Techniques

Assessment of Traumatic Stress Disorders

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the APA
DSM-5® changes
ACE & Developmental Trauma
Diagnosing PTSD with the PCL-5

MODULE 4 OUTLINE

Techniques/Interventions

Relaxation/Self-regulation
Grounding
Containment
Writing/journaling
Drawing art
Healing metaphors
Transitional objects

MODULE 5 OUTLINE

Demonstrations: Interactive Exercises/Application of skills

Narrative Exposure Therapy Technique
Thought Field Therapy (TFT)
Bilateral Stimulation

MODULE 6 OUTLINE

Review of Effective Treatment Interventions

Cognitive Behavioral Techniques (PE, CPT & SIT)
EMDR & Bilateral Stimulation
Thought Field Therapy (TFT)/Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT)
Sensorimotor

MODULE 7 OUTLINE

Desensitization & Integration

Trauma Memory Processing
Graphic Timeline
Narratives

Closure: Lessons Learned

MODULE 8 OUTLINE

Theories of Traumatic Stress, Loss and Grief

Information processing model
Psychosocial model
Contemporary thoughts

Bereavement and Adjustment Disorders

Supporting Normal Bereavement
Treating Complicated Bereavement

Copyright : 05/08/2016

Bonus: Overcoming Trauma-Related Shame and Self-Loathing with Janina Fisher, Ph.D.

Shame has an insidious impact on our traumatized clients’ ability to find relief and perspective even with good treatment. Feelings of worthlessness and inadequacy interfere with taking in positive experiences, leaving only hopelessness. This 60-minute recording was webcast live from the office of Dr. Janina Fisher and introduces shame from a neurobiological perspective—as a survival strategy driving somatic responses of automatic obedience and total submission.

Learn to help clients relate to their symptoms with curiosity rather than automatic acceptance, discriminate the cognitive, emotional, and physiological components of shame, and to integrate somatic as well as traditional psychodynamic and cognitive-behavioural techniques to transform shame-related stuckness.

Program Information

Objectives

Discriminate the clinical implications of physiological and cognitive contributors to shame.
Determine cognitive-behavioural, ego state, and psychoeducational interventions to address shame in clinical practice.

Outline

The Neurobiology of Shame

The role of shame in traumatic experience
Shame as an animal defence survival response
Effects of shame on autonomic arousal

Shame’s Evolutionary Purpose

Shame and the attachment system
Rupture and repair in attachment formation

Making Meaning of Shame

Feelings of disgust, degradation, and humiliation are interpreted as “who I am”
Cognition and the body
Internal working models predict the future and determine our actions

Working from the “Bottom Up”

The role of procedural learning and memory
Physiological effects of mindful dual awareness
Using mindfulness-based techniques to inhibit self-judgment

A New Relationship to the Shame: Acceptance and Compassion

Re-contextualizing shame as a younger self or part
Bringing our adult capacity to our childhood vulnerability
Healing shame through compassionate acceptance

The Social Engagement System and the Healing of Shame

Social engagement and the ventral vagal system (Porges)
The incompatibility of shame and social engagement
The therapist’s own social engagement system as a healing agent

Bonus: Trauma Defined: Bessel van der Kolk on The Body Keeps the Score

Researchers are increasingly finding that the body is the key to trauma treatment. Trauma is about the body becoming immobilized, feeling helpless or numb. Often traumatized people either don’t feel their body at all, or they feel it all the time.

In this compelling one-hour discussion, world’s leading trauma researcher and author of the The Body Keeps the Score, Dr. Bessel van der Kolk discusses his research and the influences on his life work with trauma. During the hour, he succinctly and descriptively draws the picture of trauma, the brain, and how various treatments work (and don’t) on the trauma client.

This hour will leave you, and those with whom you share this information, with the best understanding on the nature of trauma, its impact on the brain, how our brains work and most of all, the important new treatments that promise hope to those suffering from PTSD and trauma.

Bessel has spent 40 years working with and learning from traumatized clients. In this video, he shares insight into a bold new paradigm for healing from trauma. You won’t want to miss this personal account of Dr. van der Kolk’s work.

Program Information

Outline

The Latest Clinical Research Surrounding:

The impact of trauma on brain activity
Neurofeedback, EMDR and “body work” on symptom reduction
The effectiveness of movement, mindfulness and theater activities in trauma treatment

Objectives

Explain how trauma influences the activity of the key areas of the brain and how that dictates behavior patterns.
Articulate the clinical research surrounding the effectiveness of yoga, mindfulness meditation, and theater in healing trauma in clients.