Therapy

Systemic therapy

If you are seeking therapeutical support, I offer sessions in systemic therapy. Together we can find solutions for the questions and problems that are bothering you and for the changes and crises that you have to face at present (changes in your professional life, in your relationship, within your family, changes of place, separation, loneliness, death and bereavement).  My aim is to support you in finding a new stability in times of crises and to assist your personal growth.

Session: 60 minutes – 80 Euros/ 90 minutes - 120 Euros*

*I also offer sessions online

Trauma therapy

I offer sessions in creative trauma therapy and in body-focussed trauma therapy. For trauma therapy to be successful it is necessary to come regularly and over a longer period of time. However, this is worth its while! The gain is more vitality, a greater ability to connect, and a growing joy for life.

Session: 60 minutes – 80 Euros / 90 minutes - 120 Euros*

*I also offer sessions online

My therapeutical approach

My approach to therapy is threefold. I am deeply influenced by the systemic approach of Virginia Satir, which is the foundation of my therapeutic training. Later, when I started specializing in trauma therapy, I integrated the knowledge and methods of two major approaches of trauma therapy into my approach: creative trauma therapy as developed by Baer/Frick-Baer, and body-focussed psychotherapy by trauma therapist Dami Charf (SEI®).

Trauma and why trauma therapy?

Trauma (from Greek, literally ‘wound’)

In the field of psychotherapy, the word trauma is used to refer to emotional wounds. Trauma usually results from an incident experienced as too sudden and too severe, overwhelming the coping strategies before they have a chance to respond. We distinguish between shock trauma / acute trauma resulting from a single event such as an accident, an operation or a natural catastrophe, and chronic trauma resulting from a repeated and prolonged series of events, very often experienced during childhood (childhood trauma). As a rule one can say: the earlier in life the trauma has been experienced, the more serious its impact, and also the closer the person inflicting the injury is to the subject, the deeper its impact.

How does the body respond to a traumatic experience?

When experiencing a threatening incident, your body has the following reactions: First of all, there will be a moment of shock. You are tensed and hold still, all your senses are in alarm, scanning your environment in order to identify the threat. Your body activates everything necessary for fight or flight. The result is a high arousal of your body's nervous system. If neither fight nor flight are possible, this high state of arousal remains in the body. If the threat continues, the body freezes or goes into a state of tonic immobility, also called feigning death or playing possum. Animals do this to survive when there is no chance of fleeing the predator. When animals have survived the threat, they come back to life gradually, for example first by moving their jaw, then they shake their whole body in order to release the high levels of energy activated by the fight or flight response. This way they completely shake off the experience and continue unharmed with their life. In case of an enduring threat when fight or flight are no longer possible, the same happens to us humans: We freeze: that is, the reflex of feigning-death (Totstellreflex) is activated. Our body activates the same energy aroused for fight or flight, but very often this energy remains stuck because we do not find a way to release it following a traumatic event.

After a traumatic experience, people may remain in a state of hyperarousal which may lead to physical symptoms such as insomnia, anxiety or inability to concentrate. On the other hand, they may remain in a state of hypo-arousal, leading to symptoms such as chronic tiredness, numbness and exhaustion.

The feelings of being overwhelmed and helplessness experienced in the traumatic event often lead to a disoriented self-image, and a disoriented view of the world. Apparently paradox feelings such as shame and guilt may ensue, and sensory impressions may trigger flashbacks in which one is hauled back into the traumatic experience. As a consequence, the traumatised may get the impression that they are going insane. But it is not the subjects who are becoming crazy: the craziness lies within the experience they have suffered.

Many traumatised persons describe their emotional state as a “fallen-out-of-the-world“ feeling, or as “living-under-a-glass shell”.

Knowledge about trauma can be helpful. It may help to understand what is going on with “me” and may give some relief but it doesn't replace therapy.

Why trauma therapy?

• to regain a healthy way to deal with stress and emotions, instead of being overwhelmed by them

• to re-establish a good bond with myself and my body, instead of feeling numb and cut off from my body and my emotions

• to establish good relationships, instead of falling into the same traps over and over again when making contact and establishing relationships

Thesis for good trauma therapy

• Talking about trauma is not the best way to deal with trauma (talk therapy is therefore insufficient)

• Trauma is a bodily experience, and trauma therapy therefore needs to be body-focussed

• Stabilization alone is not sufficient because it doesn't lead to a better quality of life

• The encounter with traumatic experience needs to take place gradually, and in a safe setting

• it is very important to focus on and mobilise the client's resources

Virgina Satir was one of the founders of family therapy. Her approach is part of humanistic psychotherapy. This approach focusses on the appreciation of the uniqueness of the human being and its self-worth, on the healthy aspects of human beings and their (re)enforcement, and on finding a new equilibrium when life's challenges have knocked us off balance. Satir was convinced that we carry the key to positive change within ourselves. This approach is based on working with resources and personal growth. It concentrates on what is needed in the present to achieve your aims, and to deal with the actual challenges of life. The therapist accompanies you in this process, offering support and a secure setting. It is a systemic approach, with individual not being seen as an isolated being, but rather being situated within the context of the systems it grew up in and is living in (such as family, school, work, society). We are who we are according to the experiences, beliefs, coping strategies and learned ways of connecting and being in relationships in our social surroundings. But we are also able to change these if they no longer suit us, or even hold us back in our personal growth. In order to do so, a view from a different perspective may help. Systemic therapy offers a lot of possibilities and methods, such as working with the different types of communication, with communication patterns, with dysfunctional or limiting beliefs or relationship patterns, or work with inner parts or “inner children”.

Problematic issues that you may want to work on can be explored using the methods of systemic constellations work. It is a holistic approach that integrates body, mind and soul. This can be done by working with figurines and symbols. Constellations work often gives a very clear and enlightening perspective. By changing the position of the figurines, adding resources that become visible during the process, and having the opportunity to ”try out“ new ways in an almost playful manner, clients get a deep and true feeling of what does and what doesn't feel right, what changes they want to initiate, and what is worth keeping or enhancing. This process may also bring to the surface older feelings of pain, hurt or anger that can be dealt with in this process: this time the older feelings can be examined in the presence of the therapist, bringing empathy, loyalty and support to help you to work through these feelings. Working with figurines instead of with real people helps the clients to keep their proper pace within the process, since they are more in control of how far they want to go in each individual sessions.

This approach is based on four major steps in working with trauma: the first two steps consist of creating stability and a secure relationship between client and therapist in order to be able to approach the traumatic experience, and to work through the feelings and associations connected with it. Since trauma cannot be resolved by talking about it (clients often cannot find words for it or, even worse, intensive talking about it may lead to a re-traumatising experience), it is often the creative methods which offer the best way to approach the traumatic experience (step 3) and to work through the feelings associated with it (step 4).

To be clear on that, it is not intended to completely re-enter the maelstrom of the traumatic experience, but to approach the traumatic experience in a mindful way, allowing the client to release the blocked energy and work through the feelings of helplessness, and of being overwhelmed, as well as those other feelings connected to it – with the goal of letting these feelings go. This time the client doesn't have to deal with all of that alone, but is accompanied through this process by an emphatic and mindful therapist. This leads to a new experience being memorised, one which helps the client find new ways to deal with new situations in his/ her life, and therefore leaves the client with new options and choices, instead of the old automatic patterns of reaction which had led to a repetition of the old problems. Furthermore, in using creative methods, the client has something to hold on to. As a result, the artefacts of the creative process are very often an expression and reminder of re-empowerment, and something clients can look at with pride.

According to this approach to trauma, the key to overcoming it comes via the knowledge of the body and relationship / bonding. The trauma is a bodily experience, trauma energy is trapped in the body and creates symptoms because of the high levels of energy which is being retained. At the same time, trauma is most often characterized by a breach on a relational level. Since traumatic experiences are memorized in the depth of our body, and cannot be released by a purely rational approach, pure talk therapy doesn't really help in dealing with trauma. On the contrary, detailed retelling of the traumatic experience may even lead to re-traumatisation.

A consequence of traumatisation may be that the traumatised person is no longer able to release stress and regulate his or her emotions. This may cause chronic stress, manifesting itself in sleeplessness, nervousness, restlessness or even high blood pressure. On the other end it may lead to tiredness, numbness, chronic exhaustion and depression. In order to find your way back to a healthy self-regulation, the traumatised person needs to re-establish a good contact with his or herself and with his or her own body.

Trauma also very often means dissociation from the body. As a result the traumatised often loses contact with the sense of his or her body.

But it is the body that holds on to the high energy levels caused by the traumatic experience. It is also the body which holds the key to releasing that energy. Only when the contact to the perception of the body is regained can this memorized energy which blocks the flow of living be released. To get there requires courage and good therapeutic support. When this is guaranteed, the rediscovery of old unpleasant and distressing feelings is no longer completely overwhelming, but can be felt in a bearable dosage, can be lived through, contained and worked through and finally integrated, What will be gained by this is the ability to self-regulate, more vitality, a greater ability to connect, and a growing joy for life.