I’m writing this in 2021 from a remarkable and privileged viewpoint. As a trauma therapist, I see people completely and profoundly heal from past experiences. I am trained in multiple modern approaches to help clients heal and I am fortunate … Continue reading Why is Actual Healing So Rare?
You do not need to tell the story of your trauma to someone to heal. You don’t ever have to find the right words in the right order. Much of trauma is nonsensible and unspeakable and learning to speak it … Continue reading Twelve Things Most EMDR Trauma Therapists Understand Deeply
The debate continues about the working mechanism of EMDR therapy. Dr. Shapiro’s original theory that EMDR may be similar to processes in REM sleep is less compelling when we consider the wide range of other highly effective forms of bilateral … Continue reading Is EMDR 30 Years Old?
[Invited message for Mental Health Sunday delivered on 5/20/2018 at First Federated Church, North Jackson, OH. Message follows reading from Ezekiel 37:1-14: The Valley of the Dry Bones.] Good morning. I’m Tom and I’m a trauma therapist. When I started … Continue reading Faith, Hope, and Recovery
All memory is individual, unreproducible – it dies with each person. What is called collective memory is not a remembering but a stipulating: that this is important, and this is the story about how it happened, with the pictures that … Continue reading Regarding the Trauma of Others
There is a strange place in post-traumatic growth–after most of the hard work is done–that gratitude may start to settle into. Not gratitude just for having survived it. Or, having recovered from it. Gratitude for having experienced it. That emotion … Continue reading Post-Traumatic Growth
This is a fantastical story. I probably wouldn’t believe you if our situations were reversed and this were your story. Still, let me tell you a little about what I see every day in my work as a mental health … Continue reading What Healing Looks Like
Lord, I’ll take the good. I’ll take the good all day long. This world will give it. Perfect is always on that distant horizon, always almost here. You can swim in good, build your house on top of it, smell … Continue reading Mindful: A Meditation After Recovery
I have seen enough deep healing to recognize the irony. It’s not until you can heal enough that you no longer need anything from them that you can get what you’ve always needed. Developmental trauma is the other trauma. It’s … Continue reading Healing Developmental Trauma: A Meditation
The idea that the mind and body already know about healing is incredibly liberating. It frees me from the burdens of excessive doing and allows more intentional being. Suddenly, I don’t have to prescribe, or conjure, or orchestrate. There is … Continue reading Sunshine
I transit the underworld every day in the work I do with severely traumatized clients. If you do this work, it’s helpful to be personally familiar with the terrain. It’s equally important that you have–for the most part–found your own … Continue reading Underworld Railroad
Go With That 