Free Event about Relational Trauma

[Hope67]

Hi everyone,
There is a free event on 30th September 2021 between 1.30pm and 3pm CENTRAL timed by Janina Fisher & Frank Anderson, called "A Dialogue on New Treatment for Relational Trauma & Emotional Numbness.

Here is a link if you want to have a look and register for that online event:
https://landinghub.pesi.com/en-us/bh_w_058585_fisherandersontrauma_sq?utm_campaign=058585&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=159746413&_hsenc=p2ANqtz--oylvg-Fgp8SmCG8i-palbbtoYdPHWeL6RSBRB2SXm_MDTOpU0aNffcvFsm0k9DAZ2ZcQ2uliJpXwZjRM45EfLxxSkkx0TKZRIsbAL0-8MddkHxQY&utm_content=159746413&utm_source=hs_email

Hope 

[Kizzie]

Tks for posting this Hope! 

[Armee]

Thank you hope this looks so perfect!

[Hope67]

Hi Kizzie & Armee,
I hope you were able to watch it, if you wanted to. 

Kizzie - I'm going to put some notes about it here, but please feel free to move this if it's not in the right place.

Notes taken during talk:
Free event on 30th September 2021 between 1.30pm and 3pm CENTRAL timed by Janina Fisher & Frank Anderson, called "A Dialogue on New Treatment for Relational Trauma & Emotional Numbness.

My notes might not make sense, but here they are (Frank = Frank Anderson and Janina = Janina Fisher)

Very challenging for therapists to work with a client who numbs. 
Numbness 'absence of' 'emotional numbing'
Why is it so?
Young attachment issues - lost and abandoned, triggered by numbing.  Frank had to work on his own young attachment issues.  Janina admitted that her family roots included some disconnected numb intellectualising, and she was more comfortable with it.
Stuck in numbing - therapist also feels stuck.
?feel like stuck.  Prevented from helping.

Frank associated numbing with neglect.
Other root causes.
Janina - somatic perspective.  Frank - parts perspective.

Fear of remembering = Fear of feeling.
Dangerous to put things into words  Fear systems engage.
Survival responses block emotion.
Fight, Flight, Freeze, Submit or feign death, Cry for help.
Submit - body and emotions are numb.
Trauma responses - reactions protect from emotions.
How the body avoids.
Numb, dissociates - tells us how the client survived.

The body tells the story.

In abusive families, emotions are dangerous.  Result: a body organized to prevent access to anger and sadness or any other 'dangerous' emotion.
Relational trauma - any emotion can be dangerous.

Throat constricts to hold back speech.
Chest tightens
'I don't cry'

(I really related to the last couple of paragraphs)

Client can feel threatened by the therapists' 'unsafe' agenda to explore emotional responses AND traumatic memories.

Janina's body had learned to avoid crying.

Each part is driven by a different survival instinct.
Left-brain - keep on keeping on.  Calm, compassionate, connected and other 8 C's. 
Healing = self-healing, not therapist.

* Schwartz - self-energy.  Essence, core, internal wisdom.  Traumas can help block access to it.

Question asked: About chronic pain - related to unresolved trauma.  They talked about a study on Rheumatoid arthritis - caretaking self as opposed to others.  Locking up joints in the body.  IFS.

Ref of Study: Nancy Shadick and Nancy Sowell "A Randomized Controlled Trial of an Internal Family Systems-Based Psychotherapeutic Intervention on Outcomes in Rheumatoid Arthritis: A Proof-of-Concept Study: Website: www.ifs-institute.com

Janina mentioned a book: "The Body Bears the Burden" by Robert Scare

Another Question: Trauma - a response and an emotion.  Do they not FEEL the emotion?
Difference in physiological reaction.  Window of tolerance.
Janina mentioned deepening without 'deepening'
Feeling memory and parts rather than events.  Acknowledge rather than discuss the traumatic events.  Help clients develop 'emotional muscles'
Ask permission of protector parts.

Work backwards
Use the body
Let go of your need to deepen (therapist)

Trauma survivors and their parts are sensitive to other people's agendas even if unexpressed.

Numbing is tough.
An extraordinary accomplishment.

A client has a right to be stuck.
A client has a right to be numb.

(The above had been Janina's presentation, with interjections by Frank, and the below is Frank's presentation with interjections by Janina)

Frank showed a diagram showing Trauma blocking Love, and Love healing trauma and spoke of a cyclical mantra.
Talked about the challenges of numbing.

Mentioned Ruth Lineas and Stephen Porges work.

Blunted PTSD
Numbness, dissociation and parasympathetic hypoarousal
High cognitive suppression.
Low emotion
Low physical sensation.

Amygdala activates ventral striatum in extreme conditions, and activates the escape and avoidance pathway.

Notice the energy of the client
Assess how shut-down they are
Pushing makes it worse
Empathy = more useful than compassion.
Warm and fuzzy, not pushy.
I'm here with you, I care.
No access to pre-frontal cortex

IFS - direct access: Speak directly to the part, i.e. with the numbed out part.

Janina added: If client is completely shut-down, she says "Can you nod your head for yes and shake your head for no".  Primitive movement.  Then series of 'yes' and 'no' Questions.  Can unlock the shut-down.  Bringing system back on-line from bottom-up.

Switching parts, more common in DID (dissociative identity disorder).
Parts in conflict.
Noticing brain (observer self) holds self-energy.

Question: Numbness (trauma) vs depression/anhedonia.  How do you differentiate?
Frank said he used an IFS perspective.  Depressed part.  Trauma response, portion of a part.  Part vs emotionally rooted.  How much is serotonin related.
Parts are great at sharing information.  80% us and 20% something else (biological)
Biological parts affect all system.

Janina spoke of many kinds of depression.  Many symptoms and overlap.  Treat depressions as a part, regardless of its cause.
Depression: Hopeless rather than numb.  Self-doubt.  Low self-esteem.  Not the same as numbing.

Frank: Depression as a feeling/emotion = parts related.  Symptom related - biologically based.
Janina - loving positive relationships to all parts.

Frank: Complexity of systems.  DID dissociation realm.

Parts Mapping: Multiple extreme parts.  Several parts involved in daily life.  Hidden exiles carrying similar or multiple traumas.
Functional and extreme parts

IfS - Self energy.
Container theory (Frank's)
More trauma - more parts to protect and small space for self.

(At this point in the presentation, Frank's screen froze, so there was a pause and a Question was asked):

Question: Impact of Covid. 
Spoke of triggering, global trauma.  Living and experiencing phases in real-time.

Frank was back again (unfrozen)
Mentioned access to self-energy depending on degree of trauma.  Self is preserved and can be accessed.

Janina mentioned that the pre-frontal cortex shuts down, and gives the self some protection and that parts and the body endure the trauma.

Frank then presented a slide entitled 'Clients with Shame & Neglect'
Highly intellectualised and perfectionistic parts
Difficult time making decisions and sensing what feels right.
Struggle with loss and letting go
Tendency to share more personal experiences

(I found I related to a lot of that slide)

His final slide was entitled: 'Clients with DID' (DID = dissociative identity disorder)

Clients with DID
Numerous parts, many of them extreme
Highly evolved self-like parts
Multiple polarization
Parts that collude and form alliances
Parts that hide, exaggerate or are dishonest
Crisis driven systems
Parts that present symbolically
Rapid eye movements are common
Parts often hate the self
The self is marginally accessible

Janina said that there are numerous studies suggesting that DID is under-diagnosed.  She mentioned that Borderline personality disorder - third of them have symptoms that may suggest DID. 

They concluded at the end of the talk that attention should be paid to numbing.

(I hope those notes are helpful - I realise it's difficult to read someone else's notes, but I wanted to share them, incase they were helpful, and I also wanted to keep the notes somewhere safe - and feel that this is a safe place to keep them. 

Hope 

[Armee]

This is super helpful Hope. I had intended on attending but didn't.

The thing that really felt reassuring to read was that a client has a right to feel stuck and numb and the past about chest tightening and not feeling dangerous emotions.

What does "deepening" mean?

[Hope67]

Hi Armee,
I think they will be replaying the session, so if I see a link for that, I'll let you know about it.

Regarding 'deepening' - Janina said that the client wants to feel better whilst the therapist wants to 'deepen' into the emotion, but that 'deepening' entails the client's willingness to feel vulnerability.  She went on to say (in a handout) that "the client can feel threatened by the therapists' unsafe agenda to explore emotional responses AND traumatic memories.  The therapist is threatened by the client's reluctance or resistance to 'deepen'  Her final point on that handout slide point was "A struggle ensues: we push to deepen, while the client passively resists the 'deepening' agenda."

Deepening was also mentioned in another slide, where she said:

"The therapist begins to feel threatening to the client leading to increasing tension and guardedness.  Clients then have less access to emotion, not more. 
The more we push the client to deepen, the harder s/he must fight against that agenda.  But, because the process is so unconscious, neither party realises what is happening.
To the client, "deepening" does not feel like a path to healing.  Because emotions feel 'threatening' and because 'not feeling' is a body response to threat, the client cannot simply comply with our wishes to deepen."

I hope that's helpful Armee, in adding a bit to the concept of 'deepening'.

Hope 

[Blueberry]

The thing that really felt reassuring to read was that a client has a right to feel stuck and numb

It even caught my eye earlier on today making me think "Yay! They've got it!"

Big thanks from me too Hope. These notes are so helpful. It looks to me as if it would be helpful for me to read more of Janina's work. I've never read her before although I know you've mentioned her a few times. If they do a replay I'd love that information too.

Also thank you for the long explanation of 'deepening'. In retrospect it makes a lot of sense to me why so many Ts in the past would provoke me till I went berserk and/or give up on me, even trauma-informed ones. It shows me they weren't trauma-informed enough - they didn't know about the deepening struggle. 

[BeeKeeper]

Hope, many thanks for this link and your notes.

FYI everyone, this is still available as a recorded YouTube presentation today, Saturday, 9:00AM EST. Access is gained by submitting name and e-mail address.

Here is a link to the handouts. There are 21 pages, but the action starts at page 8.
https://ce21.blob.core.windows.net/global/s9lonvvd0emamtcmgmq7fg.pdf

[Hope67]

Hi BeeKeeper,

That's great that you've linked to the handouts! 

I've also found the recording on U-tube and here is the link for anyone who wants to watch it:

Janina Fisher & Frank Anderson's talk:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtGpI7FWKT4

Hope 

[Armee]

Thank you, Hope and Bee. I really appreciate you finding these for us all to watch and read.