- It's about strengthening the healthy structures in the client, says trauma therapist Marta Thorsheim in this interview. Marta Thorsheim is interviewed by Eva Svendsen, Senior Adviser at the National Center for experiential competence in mental health.
Marta Thorsheim works privately at her own institute and is a trained trauma therapist IoPT and gestalt and psychosynthesis therapist. She has a master's degree in change management. She has her own IoPT therapy practice and trains trauma therapists in Norway and also holds courses in many countries.
-What is identity-oriented psychotrauma therapy (IoPT) about?
- This is an approach that is based on knowledge from recent trauma research and from attachment theorists. It is about strengthening the healthy structures in the client. We work individually in groups with a client's theme or individually with a therapist. By becoming aware of how our experiences shape us and how the protection and coping strategies build up so that we can handle life's challenges, the healthy parts of us become stronger.
Difficult life experiences such as abuse, bullying, abuse, insecurity and neglect in early childhood, whether personal or inherited from previous generations, leave traces and are often behind pain and illness in adulthood. By exploring our intention, the cause of the problems will emerge, and it will become clear if there is trauma behind it. We then use the method to process the traumas, so that they can let go of us and open up new ways of life and insights.
-How does this form of therapy differ from other public forms of treatment for trauma disorders?
- I am not aware of any of the public offers starting from the client's statement of intent and working from this. Research and experience show that traumas are inherited if they are not processed, and thus our challenges can have their origins in traumatic events that our parents, grandparents and great-grandparents have had. And our children's challenges can also be rooted in events that lie further back in the family. IoPT takes this seriously. Working with a statement of intent provides a safe and good framework for the work. The trauma therapist supports the client in this process. Trauma-survival strategies can loosen the grip: the healthy psychic structures get more space and energy stored in the traumatized structures can come to the surface.
-Is this type of treatment approach being researched?
-IoPT is therapy and theory in development, and both the therapy's founder, prof. dr. Franz Ruppert as well as several hundred therapists in many countries practice IoPT daily, but no formal research is currently being done. The therapy is documented in six specialist books, three of which have been translated into Norwegian. The latest book My body, my traumas and my self. How to get out of trauma comes out in Norwegian spring 2018. All the books have been translated into many languages.
-What can a treatment session look like?
-A person who wants to work therapeutically with themselves considers the following at the start of the class: What do I want to achieve with the therapy? What is my goal? What do I want to look into? What is the next step for me in therapy? These are four considerations that the client is invited to dwell on before coming to therapy. We call what they have come up with a statement of intent. It can be any sentence that the patient expresses as a need to investigate more closely. Example: I want to process a trauma, I want to be myself, how was the birth for me? Why do I have migraines? I want to sleep well. I want to have a better relationship with my children. When the intention is ready, the client writes it on a flipchart. Maybe she wants to change it after a little more reflection, until she is satisfied and knows that yes, this is how it should be, this is what I want to work on in my constellation today. The intention, which is now visible to all, is the framework for today's constellation. The clients choose group participants to represent or resonate with the individual words in the sentence. The representatives and the client follow the impulses resulting from the resonance and express what comes to them both bodily and in words. In individual therapy with therapist and client, it is the therapist who represents the various words. In order to integrate the process with the client, the session ends with the therapist and client talking. The constellation itself can last between 1 and 1.5 hours. And the course of therapy lasts as long as the client feels it naturally.
-Can it stand alone, or is it preferably used together with other forms of treatment?
-Trauma therapy stands alone as a form of treatment. It does not need to, but can also be used together with other forms of treatment, as long as they support and strengthen the client's resources. If the client cannot take care of herself, a plan is needed around the client that can support her during the time between therapy sessions.
-Who is it suitable for?
-Trauma therapy is suitable for anyone who wants to investigate and treat violations and trauma, and formulates their own intention for the treatment. It can be complex traumatisation, developmental trauma, sexual abuse in childhood or later, abuse within psychiatry or another treatment institution, such as forced treatment, with medication or other coercion, accidents or other abuse and traumatisation. We also see that trauma can be repeated for generations and then sorting is needed to separate mine from that of previous generations. Both the theory and the method are also suitable for those who do not know what trauma they have been exposed to, but who have symptoms of, for example, PTSD and/or where the protection mechanisms express physical or emotional pain. Violations and trauma affect the person affected both physically and psychologically, and healing takes place in the whole person.
-Who is this not suitable for and why?
-Trauma therapy is not suitable as compulsory treatment, nor together with heavy medication. The client must have access to his feelings and sensations. IoPT requires that the client is reality-oriented and is motivated for treatment.
-Memories are complex processes and both conscious memories and the unconscious/implicit memories come up in the process. In IoPT, it is not the experience itself that is focused on, but what the experience has led to for the client. And it is up to the client whether she wants to investigate what has happened to her, if she has no conscious memories of what has happened, or perhaps has fragmented memories. My experience is that it provides security for the client to proceed step by step and thus become familiar with their trauma biography and integrate implicit and fragmented memories. Recognized research builds up under IoPT and shows how important it is that the trauma is processed.
-What are the disadvantages of this treatment?
-There are no hospitals or institutions that, as of today, have made arrangements for IoPT treatment as a routine. Trauma therapists must be hired or hired for those clients who want such treatment. And the clients must seek out and pay for the treatment themselves.
- Do you have to have prior knowledge or special experience to make use of the offer?
- You do not need any prior knowledge/special experience to make use of the offer. Any trauma therapist will explain to the client what the therapy is about, whether the therapy takes place individually in a group or in a one-to-one setting with the therapist. Central to the treatment is self-management and the client's autonomy, with the client's own intention in focus.
- How can I get such treatment?
-There are trauma therapists all over the country and you can find an overview of registered trauma therapists online: www.traumeterapeutforeningen.no .
Article from experiential competence.no - National center for experiential competence in mental health
(reproduced with permission)
