Retraumatization

I, personally believe, that to insist on keeping an object or anything that is obviously triggering for my client, and in so doing retraumatize them, reveals only that I have a control issue, my own agenda and the erroneous belief I can change in the mind of my client the memory that object reminds them of.

Whatever memory a trigger taps into, the patient relives that memory as though it were today. It is the sad delusion of some therapists to think they can erase a memory by attaching a new meaning to the trigger object.

NOTHING can replace the memory. It is the MEMORY that needs working through, not a substitution for it.

This applies to ritual dates. It is futile for a therapist, however well meaning, to think they can change the meaning of a date to something better, safer or different. For one thing, a therapist cannot change ANYTHING. Change comes from within the client with the help of their counselor.

Trigger dates whether ritual ones or anniversaries of trauma such as rape, murder, accidental death and so on, require the therapist to remember when such dates occur. To schedule session, activities or other events on trigger dates is retraumatizing - willfully so if the dates are remembered and still kept as a scheduled plan. I am notoriously bad at remembering anniversaries and birthdays but I try to keep up with the tramatizing dates of my clients and be sensitive to special needs surrounding them.

The vital lessons here are:

a) Do not MISS the trigger through preoccupation, lack of observation, insensitivity, or having ones own agenda. b) Explore what the trigger is connected to if possible. If the client is not ready to process whatever the original trauma was, file it away and return to it later. Never force a recollection of a trauma tiggered that does not come into consciousness without fear. If the connection is recognized and accepted then it can be worked through.

c) Work through the memory and don't try to "make it better" or substitute another experience.

d).Remember at all times that mishandling of triggers is retraumatizing.

2. REENACTMENT

We, as therapists, have a great responsibility and task in our commitment to our clients. They teach us, criticize us, commend us, frustrate and anger us, bring out the best and the worst in us. .But it is easy to look only from

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