What is dissociation? Dissociation is a detachment from reality, it is a mental process where a person disconnects from their thoughts, feelings, memories or sense of identity. This is different to psychosis, which is a loss of reality or an experience of a delusional reality. You can find more in
Words matter because clarity in words is a part of clarity in thinking, and because some words carry great emotional and symbolic weight, and thus should be not used lightly.” —Jeffrie G. Murphy When is Trauma? Traumatic events are distressing, but not all distressing events should be thought of as
There is a lot of publicity about the benefits of mindfulness and meditation. But does it work for PTSD. Kearney and colleagues (2021) conducted a randomized clinical trial with 184 veterans with PTSD. They were assigned to group loving-kindness meditation or group cognitive processing therapy (CPT). The aim of the
Can you still treat someone with PTSD while they are drinking heavily? A common question from clinicians. Stefanie Lo Sovo and colleagues (2022) examined treating PTSD with CPT in heavy drinking military personnel. They examined the drinking and PTSD treatment outcomes for 127 service members participating in a clinical trial
Sex and Trauma Some trauma sufferers experience sexual arousal during a trauma. This can include: Many trauma survivors question these responses, sometimes concluding that it meant something about them, such as “I must have wanted it.” However physiological sexual response and desire for sex is not always connected. The technical
Artificial intelligence (AI) is in the news, and there is a lot of discussion. Some people are concerned about what it will mean. With headlines like “Meet ChatGPT, the artificial intelligence chat bot that could take your job”. How worried does a trauma therapist need to be? We thought we
Do you ever remember being a child and being taken to an ice-cream shop with 66 flavours? Inevitably with so much choice you just walk out with the one you know, vanilla or chocolate. Monitoring your clients progress during trauma therapy is a great way to ensure good overall outcomes.
Can I treat adolescents using CPT? This question has previously been approached with a specific form of CPT developed for adolescents D-CPT. In 2021 Stefanie LoSavio, and colleagues examined treatment of adolescents versus adults receiving cognitive processing therapy. Who – Sample Demographics LoSavio’s team examined adolescents aged 14–17 years. The
As any clinician would know Personality Disorder also means complexity and many cavets can apply during therapy. So too complexity applies to the research on comorbid PD and PTSD. Before discussing the review of the impact of comorbid personality disorders on psychotherapy for PTSD by Aishah Snoek and team (2021)
Therapists are always looking for the best treatment for their clients. The question of how do Prolonged Exposure and Cognitive Processing Therapy compare for the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was examined by a large team lead by Paula Schnurr from the National Center for PTSD (2022). The trial