Years ago, when I read Elaine Aron's The Highly Sensitive Person, I could recognize the HSP people around me with the innate ability to sense, revel in, or be overwhelmed by their external and internal worlds. These folks (I'm not one) are the best cooks, among the most creative artists in any field, and make
Dr. Richard Friedman in "Why Are We Drugging Our Soldiers" shows the correlation between Ritalin and Adderall prescriptions and increased PTSD. He cites several studies showing that these drugs enhance the memory of fear-provoking events. Scary and makes all kinds of sense. Read it!
A great article about why we have aggression towards "the other" and how to cultivate identification and peace inside and outside of us. The Wolf of Hate by Rick Hanson on mentalhelp.net
I was interviewed by Stan Emert on his cable TV show, "Public Exposure" a few weeks ago. Here is the YouTube link to the show: http://youtu.be/KsFoHFQxx4o Topics include trauma definitions, PTSD, EMDR, Ego State Therapy, and a minute of traumatic grief. Due to a neck injury, I've been unable to spend more than a few minutes
National Public Radio wrote and spoke about the "Battle Over the Science" of Tricare not paying for cognitive rehabilitation therapy (CRT) for Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) "despite pressure from Congress and the recommendations of military and civilian experts, the Pentagon’s health plan for troops and many veterans does not to cover” cognitive rehabilitation therapy —
Fascinating article, The Insanity Virus, in the November online Discover magazine describes studies that show that schizophrenia and MS may be from viruses that trigger the Toxoplasmosis and CMV viruses that most of us already carry. It's a long read that got more interesting (for me) on pages 3 and 4. This article makes personal
Here's a 6 minute video of a Gulf War soldier's PTSD diagnosis with brain scans and then treatment with EMDR. He had a scary childhood, fear for his life in combat, and then was retriggered by witnessing a horrible accident.
My copy of the new book arrived today. Here is what Diana Fosha says about it:"This is a thorough, accessible, and very practical book, filled with resources and sound ideas, filtered through the intelligence and experience of a savvy, compassionate, down-to-earth, and very experienced clinician. It is like a travel guide to the land of
Kathy Steele, cocreator of the Structural Dissociation Theory, patiently defends the existence of Dissociative Identity Disorder to Ira Flatow and Numan Gharaibeh (a clueless psychiatrist) on NPR's Science Friday. Worth a listen: http://www.sciencefriday.com/program/archives/200911133 I've run into this blindness before, mostly in analytically trained psychiatrists, despite all evidence.
There was a great series on National Public Radio this week about the neuroscience of spirituality. I'm going to post links to all 5 days. You can read about it and then play the pieces if you want. They're by Barbara Bradley Haggerty and each is 7 to 9 minutes. 1. Is there a God
I escaped the conference yesterday, and am typing in the dark this morning beside my snoring husband. I can’t see my notes, so let me tell you my impression of the conference: Trauma impacts the right hemisphere of the brain. Helpful trauma therapy targets the right brain. Left brain cognitions and interpretations don’t have much
Daniel Siegel: A System's View of Disintegration & Integration (He's still cute, he's still brilliant, he speaks in easy-to-remember aphorisms and he's still heartful. What's not to like?) "Integration is the linking of differentiated parts. The concept is useful for assessment, tx planning and therapy. . .Presence is absent in trauma survivors. Presence begins with
Stephen Porges, Demystifying the Mechanisms of Trauma: Maladaptive Consequences of Adapative Bio-Behavioral Reactions to Life Threat Stephen Porges knows how to connect. I could listen to him talk all day. I explain his Poly-vagal theory to every trauma client and every consultee. Today, after he answered a difficult question, in a most kind way, my
Day 1: Bessel van der Kolk is lovely. He's humble, he's funny, and he is the premiere researcher on the neurobiology and/or efficacy of trauma treatments in the world. And cute and brilliant, of course. Here are nearly random gems from 3 hours of notes: With trauma, there are no stories, only sensory experience: images,
The name of the workshop was "The Body Remembers: The Psychophysiology of Trauma and Trauma Treatment". The main point was: therapists do too much trauma therapy too early and should do much more preparation before they do the "memory processing" and should often do no trauma processing at all. She talked alot about helping people
WALL-E, the new Pixar movie, is the perfect anthropomorphic attachment story. It's also a great movie and funny as hell. The first half, and most of the rest is an amost silent movie. Our hero, is a trash compactor robot who lives with an indestructible and graceful cockroach for company. He watches "Hello Dolly" video
I'll be giving a lecture about trauma, PTSD, Structural Dissociation, the Polyvagal theory and the use of EMDR to impact PTSD on Saturday morning, May 17 from 9:30 to 12. Frank Kokorowsk will copresent with a dynamite multi-modal trauma treatment that he's been using with homeless people. There are 2 CE's for everyone and it's
Check out this amazing 18 minute video suggested by Kelli Sherine:http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/03/13/when-a-brain-scientist-suffers-a-stroke/
The Reading Group (Brena Lever and I) met last week to discuss Parenting from the Inside Out by Daniel Siegel and Mary Hartzell. At that moment Seigel happened to be meeting with the Dalai Lama, Dan Goleman, and some other child psychology types, about a mile from my house, to discuss how to grow compassionate
myshrink.com is a fantastic website/blog full of information about therapy, bodymind connection, anxiety, and depression. It has some of the most cogent explainations I've seen. It's a great resource for clients as well as therapists. It's written and overseen by Suzanne LaCombe, a therapist in Vancouver, BC. She writes clearly, has a sense of humor,
The book group discussed The Neuroscience of Psychotherapy by Louis Cozolino (W.W. Norton & Co. 2002). We liked it. Cozolino's book is easy to understand and moves along nicely. It is packed with information about the brain. Its case examples were great, though too few. Cozolino writes about brain structures--the triune brain (lizard, mammalian, human),
My husband, Doug Plummer, who is a wonderful professional photographer, interviewed me for a podcast about the neuroscience of "being in the zone" of taking good pictures. Given our interests, it's an ongoing discussion. Here's the podcast. It's about 15 minutes long, boiled down from about an hour. If you'd like to visit Doug's blogs