The Neurobiology of Attachment
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with Dan Siegel, MD ;
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with Dan Siegel, MD; Ruth Lanius, MD, PhD; Allan Schore, PhD; Bessel van der Kolk, MD; and Ruth Buczynski, PhD
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This is a learning community for practitioners. We can’t wait to hear what you’re going to use with your clients
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I will be more aware of the client feeling over-exposed during the first visit. I would consider psych. education and laying out a map as Ron Siegel suggests.
Absolutely wonderful program. As the victim/victor (I was listening) of early childhood attachment trauma, much of what was discussed – aside from the neurobiology – I have worked on incorporating into my life. To hear such genuine, caring, and wise professionals speak about healing from trauma, etc. was very encouraging. Thank you very much to everyone who contributed to this program. Can’t wait to watch episode three.
Interesting that being nice to Clients i.e. a softer place to land/contain their thoughts + feelings, could also lead to re-traumatization depending upon their previous experiences & perspectives. Liked concept of using dialog between Vulnerable Wounded Inner Child with more Mature Protective Adult Self to help heal Attachment Issues. Also, using Animal Therapy – even Imaginary whilst engaging the Client’s Senses, to progress them from steadfast rejection of any meaningful human interaction into a more relaxed & trusting state of real connection.
My biggest takeaway is to honor people’s innate intelligence in healing themselves. I really liked the different ways of demonstrating choice- from letting the client choose where to sit to letting her decide where she wants to go when cocreating a psychoeducational map. I am also grateful to better understand backdraft, and will keep in mind that kindness can backfire. Thank you so much for this.
Great session-many gold nuggets-my take away…the epigenetics of intergenerational trauma, fetal trauma via cortisol and HPA axis, left brain communication (literal) vs right brain (emotions, imagery, subtext) and that we can’t possibly know what is triggering to a person’s nervous system without engaging their inherent wisdom. Their nervous system is the expert in the room. If we are attuned to this wisdom, we can guide the client/patient to attune to their inner knowing/inner felt sense with deepening awareness- eventually leading to new discoveries, better self care, self compassion, stronger relationships, integration and healing. Thank you!
Struck by:
Strengths and resources, absolutely, the moment by moment way we would work to build health professionals’ capacity to listen, in the London Professional Support Unit. ’
And, my two children: the first, I had extreme experiences at the beginning of the pregnancy and re- understand the effects on her. The second, the cortisol-producing experience was at the end, with effects on my now recovering son. How he has been helped by that safely held affirmation of returning to himself. .
I want to hear more about pre-natal trauma. While a highly stressed mother clearly impacts the fetus, what about multiple pregnancies where there is a single sole survivor? or a fetus that experiences the abortion of the other fetus sharing the womb space?
I am opening a location for teens facing hopelessness as the first leg of my healing immersion center. I plan to utilize this information in integration with my previous trainings to further understanding& implementation of best practices. These resources continue to assist myself & volunteers to develop safe spaces for individuals to heal from trauma.
I believe Pat Odgen’s sensory approach is revolutionary. It was important for me to hear how her approach is different now than it was back in the 70’s. Let’s also update classrooms and give teachers the tools to give children choice, mindfulness and body’s communication. Her approach for me is the biggest take away and those are elements that I will build into my curriculum.
Thank you so much. I study rehabilitation counselling but never heard of the possibility that empathy and kindness can be seen as problematic or leading to or reactivating hurtful memories. It makes so much sense. Thank you. I will keep this in mind from now on.
You spend a lot of time sharing techniques from someone who touches her patients, something that as a Clinical Psychologist I am not allowed to do. It’s a waste of my time and doesn’t help me to see how to integrate with other techniques.
JT, I am sorry the teaching frustrated you. If you are open, I have a couple questions below that may allow you to expand your thinking from your initial response. If not, please just receive my intention that you will allow the brilliance from within see the answers you need.
is there a way to allow your clients to mirror self touch that you use as an example? Is it possible for you as the practitioner to use a tool between the two of you so no human touch occurs but the sense of support is still understood? I believe when we come up against those fears, it is because a solution is there just out of your known comfort zone of solving problems. I imagine you are excellent at your profession & there would be ways in which to adapt the teachings that is suitable for you work.
She also talked about giving them choice, mindfulness and their pets. Perhaps you might want to explore all of these other brilliant aspects of her work which are just as valuable and can still use without touch.
As usual – Great stuff. Keep it coming. But I will be a broken record on my platform: This needs to be translated ASAP and put to practical programs that help 24/7 parents (like me) BE with, and help highly reactive, dysregulated kiddos with C-PTSD. This focus on the therapist ONLY for this juicy stuff is just NOT good enough. It’s almost criminally negligent for this information not to be freely available to front line parents dealing with these issues. My race, background and education give me an entitled ability to be here and take this in. What about those who cannot be here to listen? NICABM, please consider PARTNERING with someone who CAN turn this into a parent education program.
I second that. I actually watch these videos and transform the information in digestible bites that I can use on my day to day life and then I teach others about them.
I’m grateful for the professionals and I look forward to the day we don’t need them.
Lisa, as an educator and a philosopher with a lot of experience working with children with PTSD, I can assure you that some of us are doing so. I have developed a curriculum and training for parents and educators with mine and my husband’s life-work of Philosopher’s Clubs and Socrates Cafe. I believe Socratic Inquiry type of dialogues, mindfulness and conscious movement (all of which I am certified and have long experiences ) are a great platform to build positive environments for children and their families.
Lisa, I love this broken record stuff! I hope to be a partner in educating laypeople in communities so the vast majority of people can facilitate trauma informed approaches in day to day life and have excellent resources at their fingertips to acquire the help needed to live a life of joy & excellence. I am in the very beginning stages of the Vision coming together, but this is an aspect of overall Vision on my heart.
Yes. I’m am also visualizing accessible easily digested basic trauma knowledge and crisis intervention for anyone who themselves are suffering from C-PTSD (and might not even be aware of it), because you won’t get that from the general or mental health system (you might get lucky if you can afford a private therapist). I’d love to put that together, and the parent part would definitely be a great addition to it. I just have to get myself out of my exhaustion-no money-homeless situation first. C-PTSD can really put you through the wringer… (but once you’re all chewed up, you don’t have much to lose on the other hand)
(if anyone here feels called out to assist me, in either the trauma knowledge and crisis intervention project, or the project of getting me back on my feet, please feel free to reach out)
I agree that these skills need to be shared with family carers and networks who are doing so much of the daily support. How can we work to ensure this?
It would be ideal to have this information reviewed with family physicians and OBGYNs who are aware of possible trauma in their patients so that the parent is aware and if they can, seek out help for trauma, and knowledge of how to parent with those considerations (epigenetics, behaviour adaptations, attachment styles) in mind.
I am the RN on a CMHC coordinated team for young adults. I will carry in mind the that my client’s may be looking to elicit responses from me that match the styles of caregivers who were not meeting their needs. I also know of a recent awkward situation with a client who I later learned had suffered the trauma of his abuse not being acknowledged by the parent. He was living with.
Thanks for this.
Very interesting. Having been an Upledger trained CranioSacral therapist since the early 1990’s (and a PhD. in Anthropology), I have often wondered why/how behavioral psychologists and clinical psychologists had seemingly missed the ‘body’ connection. I had many years of psychotherapy myself which were hugely beneficial and even some sessions of “where do you feel that in your body? What is happening in your body?” etc. etc. Without the entire back story, I ended up having CranioSacral therapy and working as a CranioSacral therapist – I was initially skeptical of and in fact, judgmental (internally) of clients’ emotional responses. Then… after about 2 years receiving therapy (being well-defended), I had what seemed to me to be an uncontrollable emotional reaction (what CST therapists call SER – somatoemotional release), after crying for hours, I angrily returned to my therapist and said, “Are you kidding me – after thousands of dollars and years in therapy, all I had to do was lie on this table and connect with the emotions in my body???” Obviously, life changing for me. CST is a ‘hands-on’ therapy, although many of its principles are precisely what was discussed today. The best CST therapists are well trained in A & P, especially neurobiology/anatomy, epigenetics, brain plasticity, fetal development, etc. One of your therapists today discussed Inner Wisdom – this is a concept that is presented on the very first day of the very first CST class, and fundamentally guides our practice. What was most useful for me today, was the idea that empathy, kindness, or a smile can be a trigger. We are told to greet our clients in ‘neutral,’ but neutral for me, now, may have to take on an expanded quality. The use of imagery and dialogue along with light palpation, can facilitate adult/child – self-compassion. The significance of these techniques has been enhanced for me today, as well as the significance of the mother’s emotions during pregnancy, and even trauma from previous generations. Thanks very much for this series. Miranda Warburton, PhD. Sedona, AZ.
As someone who is a patient of various types of therapy for over 10 years, this session has had a remarkable breakthrough experience for me. My answer is about how will todays session help me work with me. It revealed why am i still being stuck in trauma patters of living ( well i might be forever) but at least now i know) why this is so. All these years, time, energy and money I spent, its only now that I have finally come to a higher knowledge that opens up a lot of doors for me into a future way of relating to my trauma. There are no words of gratitude to express how todays intellectualizing basic human key to a better life session has helped me. Thank you!
Loved it, disappointed I missed last week. This came at a great time for me as I am not only a therapist but a wife, mother and a sister who have been traumatised. Thread from my own trauma. We auve all attended therapy to unpack and explore it all except my sister..I experienced going into my own survival brain, I regulated and came back ro my left brain. Tonight was great it just put theory to all of this making sense of it all so I can be more effective for her as she has no one understandably. I will focus on her moments of strengths and I have done some inner child work with her, I will bring her back to this. Typically I would not do anything like this with family or friends buy when they refuse to enter therapy or professional help I think its a must. Integrate the Victor and victim, empowering. I also took as a play therapist how powerful our approach is. Our belief is the child has the answers internally and if we are non directive, we facilitate them in self discovering answers. The mindfulness we do through metaphor. Im really looking forward to next week. Thank you all so much for providing this training.
Thank you so much. I´m gonna use the brain and hormone explanations and integrate this additional knowledge to highlight benefits of brain hemisphere-informed learning to left-brainy people with at same time pointing out the tools that help face the danger and suspicion of “going there”. This is just one aspect. It helps me to understand better what I am already offering in terms of personal skill set (inclination to work like Pat Ogden does) and make that more approachable and attractive to left-brainy people who often see their own coping strategies as desirable “having become mature adults”. This will allow me to go back into practice sooner than I might have had I not been offered the opportunity of this training.
I found the points about working form the cleints strength, tha tbought them to therapy, and holding, up regulating the positive ability an encouragin point.
The knowedge that the person holdsin the body, as described by Pat Ogden, and using the idea of prts, , one part supporting the other, just as developing and adult to inner child dialogue of compassion, is very helpful
Takig things at the pace of the client ( maybe slowing them down even) and sharing psychoeducation, letting the client say what is safe and what is not, is empowering and creates safety and trust.
Personally, I found the idea of a client telling their whole story, perhaps through the need to get it all said, and then not returning for further therapy sessions, makes sense of my adoptive son’s experience. He would not going back for a second session of therapy- he had slept after the session and felt exhausted. I think he perhaps felt overexposed.
I was extremely interested in the impact of maternal trauma and the passage of cortisol to the developing infant. I have worked with parents who have had prematures births and have had cortisol injections to develop the lungs.The mother often experiences guilt shame and trauma when a premature birth occurs and this exhacebates the impact on the parent child relationship and increased anxiety in the infant and child. It is tragic to witness this as in the UK parents rarely get trauma support during or post na
Thank you so much for such an interesting and informative session. I am not a practitioner at the moment but have dealt with family trauma throughout my life. I’m now supporting my elderly abuser and find learning about the brain and how terrible trauma affects childrearing helps me to find compassion and strengthens my somatic journey and healing. Thank you again
I’m a UK social worker working with clients.Who self neglect and hoard. The information provided.will support and help.guide my interactions with clients.Who decline support.services.but who will speak with workers.
Thank you for the insights.
I really love what you are sharing, it’s really informative, and helpful.
thank you
I was wondering when it was talked about client’s intelligence – what if there is no strong part of the client, what if the week part blames the strong/fighting part for not doing anything in the moment of trauma, what if fighting part feels guilty for not protecting the weak part of self. What help does it give to know now – after the terrible experience – you feel like fighting back?
I was not surprised to hear that cortisol in early pregnancy leads to low birth weight babies. What effect does continuous/late stage infusion of cortisol have? Does high birth weight indicate anything about cortisol in utero?
I really appreciated the emphasis on choice–not simply “being nice.” I’ve been thinking a lot about the importance of agency lately.
However, I had concerns about the left-brain/right-brain breakdown. As a leftie, I’ve learned that there is a reasonable chance my brain is not laid out in this fashion at all and it makes me sceptical when people start claiming this is a universal fact. It isn’t. While I appreciate the illustration of rational/intellectual vs emotional, I’m not sure the science supports this split-brain model as strongly as you seem to suggest.
Thank you, I had the same thought about brain laterality. I also think that our knowledge of epigenetics is too knew to do more that identify it as a possible contributor.
David, my husband & my son are lefties.
I have learned that being left-handed is a structural imbalance. I don’t have the research at my fingertips, but Dr. Carol Phillips would be able to obtain it for you. She can be found online.
I don’t know if that will assist you or not, but I do hope you find the balance you need as you absorb the information presented in this “drop” of information from the ocean of research out there.
My thoughts, too, after listening recently to an episode of Therapist Unscensored podcast that featured Jill Bolte Taylor who wrote a book on whole brain living, and just categorizing the brain into the two hemispheres seems too simplified.
Learning that kindness and empathy can be triggering is a new concept for me that I will make sure to pay attention to when working with my clients.
Is there any way the therapist can quickly recognise if empathy can be triggering for the patient/client?
What are signals?
I loved the way Pat used the support with the hands. I have a client I’m going to try this with.
Amazing course.
Thank you
Debbie
The presentation dropped out at 10 min after it started. Tried to restart and so far not successful. Also am now trying audio only. Not connecting.
If feeling like a victim is a conviction, how about helping the patient/client to get in touch with the underlying emotion?
Many thanks for an insightful session:
I work in a University in the UK, and currently support a number of students presenting with anxiety who are testing for ASD. I notice similarities in their experiences of navigating relationships throughout development years that clearly traumatise the client and become embedded in the psyche, causing further issues throughout life. Are ASD’s primarily the effects of parental cortizone levels passed on in utero, and is this why we are seeing an increase in such presentations ?.
If we can demystify the causes of these presentations in a clear way, clients may be more inclined to engage in interventions that offer choice, which was a crucial point highlighted in today’s session. I think many clients simply accept that the presentation is for life and, that little can be done to change their approach to managing it without acknowledging how traumatising living with the presentation can be. In an educational setting, working solely on one element of the presentation such as trauma management, may produce better outcomes for our students.
April.
Manchester (UK)
Thank you, to all the professionals who helped to create and present this program. I found the first session video so profound and rich, that after thinking hard about whether I could afford it I decided to go ahead and buy the Gold Subscription. There is so much compelling material in the first two sessions alone, I realise that being able to play and pause, play and reflect, is for me the optimal way to learn, and integrate what I have learned, into practise. An important and deciding factor for me about this course, is the presence of hope. That the many who have an insecure attachment pattern and historical trauma can nevertheless heal and grow. It is this optimism and the caring and wisdom of the practitioners featured that makes this course compelling.
NB I haven’t watched my downloads yet but am hoping that the sound and visual quality is better than in the streaming, where the distortion occasionally affects content!
Many thanks for an insightful session:
I work in a University in the UK, and currently support a number of students presenting with anxiety who are testing for ASD. I notice similarities in their experiences of navigating relationships throughout development years that clearly traumatise the client and become embedded in the psyche, causing further issues throughout life. Are ASD’s primarily the effects of parental cortizone levels passed on in utero, and is this why we are seeing an increase in such presentations ?.
If we can demystify the causes of these presentations in a clear way, clients may be more inclined to engage in interventions that offer choice, which was a crucial point highlighted in today’s session. I think many clients simply accept that the presentation is for life and, that little can be done to change their approach to managing it without acknowledging how traumatising living with the presentation can be. In an educational setting, working solely on one element of the presentation such as trauma management, may produce better outcomes for our students.
April.
Manchester (UK)
All content has been very valuable . Especially the interaction with the client’s body, and letting the different selfparts work and communicate together to help them integrate and unite. The epi-gen. transfer and brain-circuit wiring… from mothers utero and after birth caregiver. Nice topics. would like some research links
We need to observe how therapists actually work in session with clients. Otherwise, it is likely that we psychotherapists will not be able to apply many of the theoretical explanations you are giving us. At least 50% of course time should be allocated to actual clinical sessions.
I am really enjoying and appreciating the depth of the information you are offering and the practical explanations of working with clients.
Everything talked about is important and relevant, easy to understand and applicable to my clients. Very exciting seminar series! Thank you.
My name is Krishna, I am very fortunate to be introduced to this event by my friend. It was really a great session. I learnt a lot, I liked the technique to focus on uplifting the positive aspects in clients and I will always focus on good rather than focusing on negative.
thank you so much for providing it for free.
I knew hat stress during pregnancy can negatively impact the fetus however to what extent not so much. I found that part very interesting. The somatic piece was interesting as well. I can definitely see exploring more of the developmental history of my clients
As a mother to 3 adopted children who endured layer upon layer of trauma, I am working towards trying to understand how it physically impacts them and how to help re wire the brain (and understand it better)into adjusting, strengthening and empowering them to live fulfilling lives. this is incredibly useful information. Thank you so much for sharing.
Great presentation! Very helpful – Bill O’Hanlon’s approach to use the client’s current coping mechanisms as a focus in moving forward, even with their small steps. Relationship as key…allowing the client to help indicate what’s safe for them. Pat Ogden on trusting body intelligence in the present moment.
I believe I will integrate focusing more on the body response (noticing) during positive emotion (up regulating). I also will pay attention to prenatal experience. However, I would have liked more intervention ideas. Describing the process is good, however I always want successful intervention ideas
I’m not working in a Clinic at time, but I am a Certified Brain Health Coach with the Amen Clinics and I do Biofeedback. I am excited about hearing the importance of the right brain with trauma victims and how to better assist the client with regulation and patience.
I really appreciate you making this series available. The solution-focused part of Bill O’Hanlon’s presentation was a reminder there are exceptions to all problems and the work we do helps bring that to the forefront of our client’s world.
My experience working with male inmates and with sex offenders as a female clinician is that empathy and caring is often misunderstood as a sexual approach. It reminds me of my own cultural experience as a Portuguese-American woman working with Portuguese from Portugal or first generation that making eye contact between genders is not a sexual invitation. Maybe my first example could be conceptualized as a cultural difference.
I am new to the field and found this session helpful in deveolping a differnt perspective on how to interrupt my cleints reactions. Thank you for offering it free. Hopefully as my business grows I would be in a position to sign up as a gold member.
Warmests Regards
Carol Mason
Ontarion Canada
Thank you..Gives me understanding of how to proceed with a large portion of my clients
I am wondering if the mirroring/ or nonverbal communication occurs via Zoom as effectively as in person. Pat said I am looking into your eyes just as you are looking into yours.
I am appreciating the valuable content. The cortisol levels during pregnancy and the impact on the fetus were very interesting to me. Also, hearing Pat Ogden talk about the three ways to Eliciting Inner Wisdom.
Thank you!
I see the value of mindfulness in getting in touch. The beliefs that come out of trauma, about others, the world and self are another door to healing trauma.
Very difficult to understand Pat Ogden (microphone)…