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“if your mind begins to doubt”
Trauma are the life events that impact us in a negative way, changing our perception of ourselves and our place in the world.
Trauma creates Secret Keepers.
Trauma is the incubator for addiction
Soothing, relief, release, the behaviors that saved us
Become our addictions
Trauma
• TRAUMA:
• IS VISCERAL, SENSORY, CELLULAR
• A SOUL WOUND THAT IMPACTS THE VERY CORE
OF WHO WE ARE, WHAT WE BELIEVE ABOUT THE
WORLD AND OUR PLACE IN IT.
• WE EXPERIENCE TRAUMA WITH ALL OF OUR
SENSES, TASTE, TOUCH, SOUND, SIGHT, SMELL
• AND OUR INTUITION, OUR 6th SENSE.
CELLULAR MEMORY
• Cellular Memory
• A complete blue print of your history,
• Your existence. An energetic expression
of you as a holistic being.
Tell Me A Story
Be a witness, hold space and listen
Tell Me A Story
Be a witness, hold space and listen
All My Friends
You are nobody until somebody loves you
Learn Learn Learn
How Do We Heal Trauma
• We heal at the visceral, sensory, cellular
level through experiential therapy,
somatic healing and importantly
• Telling the story in many, many ways
and then most importantly
• Rewriting the story
STORY TELLING
1. PROVIDES AN OPPORTUNITY TO RESOLVE FEELINGS OF GUILT, REMORSE, SHAME, FEAR, VICTIMIZATION, ANGER.
2. GIVES SPACE TO LET GO OF SECRETS.
3. HELPS TO DILUTE THE POWER OF LIFE EVENTS.
4. TO UNDERSTAND THE SOOTHING/COPING BEHAVIORS, AND ADDICTIONS, PROVIDING INSIGHT TO CREATE HEALTHIER BEHAVIORS.
5. TO UNDERSTAND AND REWRITE YOUR STORY.
Tell Me A Story
Be a witness, hold space and listen
THERE ARE MANY WAYS TO TELL
OUR STORY
WE ARE NOT BAD PEOPLE TRYING TO BE GOOD
WE ARE WOUNDED PEOPLE
TRYING TO HEAL
Tell Me Your Story
LEARNING HOW TO BREATHE,
I NEVER THOUGHT IT WOULD BE THIS HARD.
MY LUNGS ARE DRY,
MY LIPS ARE CRACKED,
MY THROAT ACHES WITH THE SCREAMS
I NEVER ALLOWED MYSELF
MY RIBCAGE BETRAYS ME AS I TRY TO SUCK IN THE WARM AIR THAT IS SUPPOSED TO GIVE LIFE TO MY FRAIL ORGANS.
HANNAH
EVEN MY TONGUE, A MUSCLE I ALWAYS DEEMED SHARP AND STRONG, LAYS FLAT AND UNMOVING IN MY ARID MOUTH;
AFRAID TO ORATE THE FEAR OF ATTAINING KNOWLEDGE SO EASILY BESTOWED ON OTHERS.
HOW IS IT THAT I, A GROWN WOMAN,
HAS YET TO KNOW THE FEELING OF TAKING A BREATH NOT SATURATED WITH RAGE.
STARVED OF OXYGEN,
THAT THERE IS NOTHING I FEAR MORE THAN
LOSING THAT PAIN, THAT PAIN
HAS KEPT ME ALIVE, BUT WHAT A LIFE I HAVE LIVED. NO MORE. I BRACE MYSELF.
WHITE KNUCKLED IN THIS UNFAMILIAR PLACE,
AND I BREATHE.
I BREATHE AND CRY LIKE SHARDS OF GLASS ARE RIPPING APART MY INSIDES.
I BREATHE MY FIRST REAL BREATH OF CHANGE.
I BREATH THROUGH THIS NEW PAIN
Burn Baby Burn
ZAC
Waking up everyday believing, since he
was an 8 year old little boy with a great
big secret, that
“It’s a good day to die…”
Today Zac wakes up everyday saying…
“it’s a good day to live”
Therapist, Heal Thyself
• Career began in the back wards of a state hospital
before deinstitutionalization took place, emergency
services, community mental health; 13 years in hospice
services, with a passion for the grief stricken, especially
traumatic loss.
Came to work The Refuge in 2008, with some trepidation
about working in residential addictions treatment. I was 30 years sober as well as years working on my own issues.
Read and absorbed Carnes, Van der Kolk, Peter Levine.
The Chameleon
• For much of my life I had no real idea of who I was. I distinctly remember walking around my various apartments and living spaces studying the pictures on the walls, the furniture and objects on them trying to see them through the eyes of others in order to see who I would appear to be. With people I was whoever they wanted me to be. Like a chameleon I would change myself to blend and fit in.
• When I was younger I would joke that I couldn’t have a aprty and invite all my friends because I wouldn’t know how to act. I didn’t understand why this was and I didn’t do it intentionally. I really didn’t have a sense of myself as a solid person and I certainly didn’t think anyone one would want to be around me if I was myself – whoever that was.
• There is an image in the center of the collage of a figure walking away from a mask on the ground. This symbolizes me finally coming into myself.
• This is a direct result of the work I did while I was in the forest.
My Addiction
• My addiction collage is a general snapshot of my years
lost to various substance and process addictions. There
is an actual photo of me at 18 on a road trip to New
York where the drinking age was 18. I had my first
blackout at 17.
• During those years I struggled with depression and ever growing shame. I sought relief anyway and anywhere I
could. It led me to some very dark places.
Rising From the Ashes
• Rising from the ashes is about getting sober and finding
a program of recovery. I was waking up out of a dark
and despairing landscape and at times I wanted to end
my life.
• Journal entry 1997, 6 months before I stopped drinking.
• I am in my office. This day will never end. I am sick- hung
over. My body is poisoned- my brain soaked. How long can I go on this way? I have to admit I am an alcoholic.
I have lost control over my drinking, I am ashamed and
embarrassed…
Somatic experience… an inescapable assault.
Trembling and shaking for the longest time and then I
scream…I’m alive! I’m alive!
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival
A joy, a depression, a meaness,
Some momentary awareness comes
As an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows, who
violently sweep your house empty
of its furniture,
The Guest House ~ Rumi
• Still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you
out for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice.
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond. ~RUMI~
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