If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. CS Lewis
The Early Trauma Protocol - Hearing the Whole Story
Healing Attachment Wounds
Oftentimes the first part of a counseling intensive includes the early trauma protocol.
Is the Early Trauma Protocol a fit for you?
As a baby and/or a toddler:
1) Were you neglected?
2) Were you physically, sexually or emotionally abused?
3) Were you adopted?
4) Are you aware of trauma or stressful events during pregnancy, childbirth or as an infant/toddler?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, the Early Trauma Protocol may be right for you.
“Our sensory world takes shape even before we are born. In the womb we feel amniotic fluid against our skin. We hear the faint sounds of rushing blood and a digestive track at work, we pitch and roll with our mother’s movements. After birth, physical sensations define our relationship to ourselves and to our surroundings... A cacophony of incomprehensive sounds and images presses in on our pristine nervous system. These events are shaping us, even as we don’t recall them.”
Bessel Van Der Kolk .
“The Body Keeps the Score”
Attachment Wounds
The early trauma protocol focuses on the developmental stages of life from 0-2 years old. Attachment patterns (the way we bond and connect with others) are often developed in our first 2 years of living, reinforced from 2-12 years and reenacted from 12 years forward. I have found it beneficial in healing attachment and early trauma wounds, to begin our work together using this EMDR protocol.
"Attachment wounds are a certain type of trauma that occur when parents (or caregivers) fail to adequately meet your needs. Examples include parents being neglectful, rejecting, invalidating, unsupportive or emotionally unavailable. Or, when certain important things were absent in your childhood, such as love, understanding, nurturing, protection, and connection. Attachment wounds create deficits or gaps in your development, which can lead to present day challenges, such as feeling unlovable, insignificant, inadequate, unsafe, and powerless."
Four Step Protocol
The EMDR Early Trauma Protocol, developed by Katie O’Shea and Sandra Paulsen, Ph.D., is an EMDR Protocol that focuses on early (pre-verbal) trauma and neglect.
The steps in this protocol include:
- Containment - Creating a mental space to contain all experience yet to be “learned from or sorted through,” to leave a clear “emotional desktop” for the work to take place
- Resourcing - developing a felt sense of safety as a starting point for the work
- Clearing/Resetting Affective (Emotional) Circuits
- Early Trauma Processing - clearing the early trauma, which happens by processing small time periods, beginning with a time before conception, then moving on to conception, gestation in the womb, birth, and on through the first two years of life.
*Please note that there is substantially more involved in the treatment than is described in this brief summary.
Is this approach what I need?
When preparing for a counseling intensive and/or engaging in the early trauma protocol, we will explore together whether or not this approach would be helpful and appropriate.
Diagnostic assessment involves looking at the following: 1) your present safety and stability; 2) your capacity for experiencing emotion and body sensation 3) any internal conflicts that may complicate or block trauma resolution 4) medical concerns; 5) substance use
Biographical assessment, which is done through verbal and written history taking, covers areas of your history such as work, education, military service, nutrition and self-care, basic family history, spiritual and cultural experience, etc.