tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8753418862245773183.post875735978745513219..comments2024-03-27T08:31:51.433+00:00Comments on Powys Mental Health Blog: Exploring Mental Health and Trauma: Books To Get Us Thinking .... Jackie Nhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05293038655478909058noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8753418862245773183.post-2828093232462306392014-05-13T19:11:01.404+01:002014-05-13T19:11:01.404+01:00Nice one Jane, it's good to know about the wor...Nice one Jane, it's good to know about the work of people who can offer this kind of therapy. The picture is always a bit different with the right kind of therapy and additional support, you're right. <br />The question or issue for discussion I am wondering about now is the whole NHS or private availability thing; in general terms as in how a national economy could be enhanced by more talking therapy, and in particular terms in my own personal goal to ditch the tablets one day.Philip Mhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00763574899321214561noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8753418862245773183.post-91177827363736436302014-05-13T15:33:51.592+01:002014-05-13T15:33:51.592+01:00Hi Phil - great to read your thoughts - & soun...Hi Phil - great to read your thoughts - & sounds like the potential for hours of interesting discussions, seminars, etc - hope those can happen … <br />Just to pick up on your last point though –(& I’ll use ‘you’ – but in the general sense –not meaning to mean you in particular!) the work of Peter Levine & others (eg Babette Rothschild) is that by following their approaches your nervous system gets to realise that the events are in the past -they are memories - they are not happening in the present - that might still leave work to be done about the event(s) – how come it happened, what are the lasting effects – e.g. not trusting, or entering damaging relationships, or avoiding some things etc etc – but by working first with the nervous system, gently and systematically to show it that it no longer needs to keep your traumatic experience/s held in the present it becomes possible, in time, to talk about the traumatic event(s) without re-experiencing the terror and sense of overwhelming danger and threat to life and survival, along with all the sensory overload of hearing, feeling, smelling whatever was originally present and associated with the event/s. So this is very different to forcing yourself to ‘face up to’ something that a large part of you ‘knows’ is imminently life-threatening. That will lead to being re-traumatised, keeping those nervous system responses still active (potentially things like nightmares, flashbacks, panic attacks, sweats and tremors, spacing out, hearing, smelling etc things that others say aren’t there etc etc or finding some everyday things and experiences unbearable) What I'm saying is that this means things can be felt as painful and sad, etc but not experienced as a 'nightmare' -it's not about an act of immense will - that can't work - it's about letting the nightmare take it's place in the past <br />The medication issue, as many people reading this will know, is difficult. My view is that a good support system that includes those you live with, friends and others who know you (& I’d remind you that the ‘you’ here is ‘any-reader’) etc as well as the mental health system, from GP to psychiatrist, depending on who does the prescribing and who you see, should support someone to reduce medication whilst going through this kind of therapy and support them in daily life when it becomes very difficult to experience reactions to the medication not being in your system as well as any emotional responses that have been blunted by the ‘pharma-drug fuelled haze’ that you (you!) describe here. It may be that some form of medication becomes a positive, informed choice once therapy is over. In my view it’s not much of a choice though if it’s pretty much all that is on offer and is given because of a ‘diagnosis’ that takes the understandable responses to trauma and turns them into ‘symptoms’ of an ‘illness’ for which there is no scientific evidence. <br /><br />Janenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8753418862245773183.post-41625579532953814402014-05-13T13:43:50.099+01:002014-05-13T13:43:50.099+01:00There are some interesting videos featuring Peter ...There are some interesting videos featuring Peter Levine on the web... Jane tipped me off, I took a look... Plenty to choose from, but for starters try this one, just click the link and scroll down the page on our website for the video <a href="http://www.powysmentalhealth.org.uk/beyond-medical/other-resources.html" rel="nofollow">Trauma, Somatic Experiencing and Peter A. Levine PhD</a>Jackie Nhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05293038655478909058noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8753418862245773183.post-33533676302886295192014-05-12T17:43:48.183+01:002014-05-12T17:43:48.183+01:00Cheers Laura, always read this blog. Might try the...Cheers Laura, always read this blog. Might try the books too! Best wishes, PhilPhilip Mhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00763574899321214561noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8753418862245773183.post-44468218617333586062014-05-12T17:42:34.412+01:002014-05-12T17:42:34.412+01:00Thanks Jane, my tuppence worth of emphasis on this...Thanks Jane, my tuppence worth of emphasis on this is that it seems micro-sociology and the subject matter of neuroscience are interwoven to the extent that some things are now irresolvable without probing macro-sociological relations and the political. <br />In any individual, separating out brains, nerves, muscles and so on might possibly work for some in terms of treatment, but separating one individual from their interactions with others over time, and then further from the currents of gender, class, ethnicity, nationality, sexuality etc that affect us all could be, and is, taken to absurd lengths by mainstream services.<br />Keep up the good work-- maybe one day the message will get through and my/our local consultant will be in a position to agree that not being currently 'in severe crisis' means that a person is still worthy of having some resources deployed to overcome enduring issues in such ways as approaches like yours could and would do.<br />I risk going off on one, but on the practical terrain and in my little life I just can't see how taking a few prescribed magic beans each and every day (powerful medication- the only treatment for many) can or will ever alter a good proportion of what led to the presentation of original and then recurrent 'symptoms'. <br />Your approach and those it is aligned to sound great. Just to be awkward though, I appreciate that you say it's not about re-living trauma or facing up to things - but to what extent is there a practical caveat there for people like me who don't want to stay in a pharma-drug fuelled haze that wanting to 'live the dream' in the not-too distant future does in fact mean 'embracing the nightmares’?Philip Mhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00763574899321214561noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8753418862245773183.post-83837079876806419962014-05-12T15:46:17.465+01:002014-05-12T15:46:17.465+01:00Hi Phil – glad you found it interesting – there is...Hi Phil – glad you found it interesting – there is a lot of interest in the therapy world in the neuroscience – and an increasing recognition of the impact of many ‘smaller’ events –not only psychologically but on the nervous system –causing it to ‘think’ that life/survival threatening situations are always ‘live’. We know so much about trauma and the impacts and yet as a society we continue to describe the very impacts/reactions/thoughts/ etc that we know are a reaction to trauma, as symptoms of illness, evidence of illogical thought patterns, evidence of ‘badness’ in some way (let alone the way we let these ideas feed into assumptions and prejudices about gender, class, ethnicity, sexuality etc). Trauma -oriented ways of working enables the person themselves to let their nervous system ‘stand down’ rather than being on constant alert. Jane Cookenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8753418862245773183.post-27494465579762367042014-05-11T18:54:19.945+01:002014-05-11T18:54:19.945+01:00Hello Phil - great to hear from you. Glad you fou...Hello Phil - great to hear from you. Glad you found this interesting. I am sure Jane will respond as well. Thanks for reading ... LauraAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8753418862245773183.post-7818795564311928042014-05-11T18:50:00.860+01:002014-05-11T18:50:00.860+01:00Very interesting, the bit about the effect of even...Very interesting, the bit about the effect of events, even if not catastrophic ones, being lodged in the nervous system is enlightening. Philip Mhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00763574899321214561noreply@blogger.com