A Unique Approach to Healing Through Neuroscience: A Brain-Based Approach
Like most therapists, my initial training was what is commonly referred to as "talk therapy". Talk therapy has been shown to be effective but I always believed there must be something else; something more effective. Early in my career I was introduced to the research by Bessel Van Der Kolk, a world-renowned doctor, researcher, and expert in trauma and how trauma affects the brain. I began reading his books and research and was fascinated. For the entirety of modern psychology, the focus has been on our thoughts. This body of work turned this concept on its ear, and began my exploration of the human brain and how brain pathways and brain chemicals largely influence traumatic stress, anxiety, depression, anger, and our own self-image. I found myself constantly studying all of the best research I could find.
Years later, I would find my own study culminating in the formation of Hope Renewed Counseling and EMDR Therapy. I find it most rewarding to see my clients finding healing after years of suffering with trauma, chronic pain, crippling anxiety and depression, lack of motivation, sleep impairments, and other issues that make life difficult.
What Makes Hope Renewed So Unique?
While traditional therapy focuses on our thoughts, Hope Renewed Counseling and EMDR Therapy shifts the focus to the central nervous system, the endocrine system, and how these two systems interact, form distinct neural pathways, and heavily influence our mood, health, and functioning. This is more than a simple shift in focus, but a radical shift in the way we see mental health in general! Oftentimes, I have had clients tell me that they have been in traditional therapy for years with no appreciable improvement. They often tell me that they feel like they are either being blamed for their thoughts, or are somehow defective for having depression, anxiety, or trauma. This is because traditional therapy often sees the primary issue in mental health difficulties as maladaptive thinking patterns, rather than neural circuits in the brain that often operate below the level of consciousness. It is more often brain circuits, and associated neurochemicals, driving the thoughts, rather than a conscious decision to feel stressed, anxious, or depressed! Our brain was "fearfully and wonderfully" created by God to keep us alive! These neural pathways have most often formed as a survival mechanism, designed to help us survive circumstances that are completely overwhelming! When these pathways are repeatedly activated, these neural circuits become well entrenched and tend to activate much more easily, creating chronic and unexplainable depression, anxiety, and reactivity. What we once were able to tolerate or try to ignore, we now react to with significant emotions!
Evidence-Based and Neuroscience Centered Therapy to Facilitate Healing
When a client comes seeking healing, a therapist MUST provide evidence-based treatments. Hope Renewed Counseling and EMDR Therapy relies wholly on evidence-based treatments that are focused on healing the central nervous system. Below are a few examples of the treatments used in our practice.
EMDR (Eye Movement, Desensitization, and Reprocessing)
EMDR has been demonstrated to be safe and effective for many issues, but was originally developed for the treatment of trauma. EMDR is a brain-based therapy that helps to deconstruct neural pathways that correspond to danger in the brain and develop new, more adaptive networks that help prevent dysregulation and restore peace and calm. When choosing an EMDR therapist, it is normally best to find a therapist that is at least certified in EMDR. You can search EMDR therapists in your area at https://www.emdria.org/find-an-emdr-therapist/. If you would like more information about how EMDR may help you, please feel free to contact us or visit https://www.emdria.org/about-emdr-therapy/ .
Resource Therapy
EMDR is one of fastest and most gentle ways to treat traumatic stress and many other issues. Still, occasionally clients get "stuck" due to dissociation, excessive fear, or avoidance. It is at these times, we have to change make shifts in our approach. One of the best methods (that I am aware of) is Resource Therapy. Resource Therapy was developed by Alan Gordon and has been proven to be an effective treatment for childhood traumas.
Resource states (sometimes still referred to as ego states) are generally formed in childhood and early adolescence in response to frustrating or traumatizing events. Resource states are literal neural pathways formed in the brain in response to these events, and provide a coping strategy to help us survive these "un-survivable" life events. A very crude and general example might be an adult that strong reactions to anything that might even resemble rejection. This person may over-react to criticism from a manager at work, a spouse, or in business. When this person was a child, they may have been neglected or rejected by a parent or caregiver. They eventually learned coping methods to learn to live with the abuse. The brain formed distinct neural pathways that, when they are activated, cause the adult to react in the same ways that the child reacted when rejected. Resource Therapy provides a way to safely heal these "child parts" (neural pathways", resulting in less reactivity and more calm.
Clinical Hypnotherapy
When you hear the word "hypnotherapy", what is the first thing that comes to mind? If you're like most people, images of people on a stage pretending to be tables, animals, or doing things that might be considered completely humiliating and, otherwise, out of character for the person.
Clinical Hypnotherapy is not only different, it is not even in the same universe. Clinical Hypnotherapy uses hypnosis to help our clients regain control over their lives. Hypnosis is not a mystical state of losing touch with our minds or bodies. In fact, when we are in a state of hypnosis, we are in absolute and complete control of the entire process. A hypnotherapist cannot make you do or think anything in hypnosis that you could not do or think otherwise. Hypnosis is a normal part of being human! Have you ever been so engrossed in a book or a movie that you just lost yourself in the story line. I have often been travelling and gotten lost in thought to the point I missed an exit on the interstate. These are both examples of hypnosis. In fact, and by definition, hypnosis is just a state of profound relaxation and hyperfocus! I've had clients describe this as "I felt like I went on a vacation" or "I feel like I can breathe!". Clinical Hypnotherapy is not only helpful but very relaxing and calming.
Clinical hypnotherapy does a lot of fascinating things. We've all heard about hypnotherapy for smoking cessation or public speaking, and while these are common, clinical hypnotherapy offers so much more! First, it helps lower the natural, "learned resistance" to the brain to accept positive suggestions. Many of us struggle with a negative self image. For example, if a client has been told their entire childhood / adulthood that they are somehow inferior or defective, the brain learns to accept this. Clinical hypnotherapy helps rewrite this script to something more realist and helpful.
Mindfulness Training
While Mindfulness is not a model of therapy in itself, it is integrated into most evidence-based therapies. For example mindfulness is included in CBT, DBT, EMDR, ACT, Clinical Hypnotherapy, and others. The truth is that if we only learn one thing, mindfulness would be a great place to start! Mindfulness has shown to help regenerate and heal neural damage caused by trauma, anxiety, depression, and chronic stress. Specifically, mindfulness helps create new neural pathways in the prefrontal cortex, the hippocampus, and the anterior cingulate cortex among others. At the same time, mindfulness helps "shrink" the amygdala, the fear center of the brain, and all of this in as little as 8 weeks of consistent practice. This happens through a process called neuroplasticity. Our brains change throughout our lives, adjusting to our environment and our behaviors! Mindfulness helps facilitate new and more adaptive neural pathways. The end result is less reactivity, a calmer mood, and reduced depression and anxiety.... AND with NO drugs, and no nasty drug side effects!
If this sounds interesting and you would like more information on how you or someone you love can experience healing from trauma, burnout, anxiety, depression, or other emotional issues, please feel free to contact us for more information.
Christian Worldview
My greatest fear in therapy is the fear that I may be helping to make a client comfortable just until they meet God in judgment. As a believer in Christ, I know that life can be healthy and rewarding, both now, and in the next life! Please note, I NEVER attempt to force Jesus on a client, but as a believer, and someone who has been rescued and regenerated by his love and grace, my worldview is heavily influenced by my relationship with Christ. If you would like your Christian faith integrated into your therapy that will be helpful.
My Professional Background
If you're suffering with a mild case of daily stress or need some direction in your career, I may not be the therapist for you. On the other hand, if you've been hurt and badly damaged by relationships or just by harmful and damaging life events I can help. If you've experienced life events in the past that are causing you problems living in the present I may be able to help. My training and experience has centered entirely around trauma, chronic pain, anxiety, grief, and depression - the things that most often result in major life disturbances. I am trained and certified in EMDR (Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing), DBT (dialectical behavior therapy), and Clinical Hypnotherapy. My training and experience as a multi-state licensed and certified psychotherapist allows me to quickly and effectively facilitate healing from the damaging effects of major life issues. I am currently licensed in Tennessee, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Utah, and Washington.
I have years of experience working with troubled adolescents, victims of sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, abandonment, and neglect. Many of my clients have fallen into drug and alcohol abuse, sexual promiscuity, self-harm, and suicidality in a desperate attempt to cope with the blows life had dealt them. There are many ways of working with complex trauma and dissociation. Some of them are highly effective and others may cause more harm. If you or your loved one is suffering with the results of childhood trauma or maltreatment, please seek the help of a competent and caring professional, trained in gentle and effective methods of healing the wounds, stigma, and shame of trauma. Traumatic stress and PTSD normally don't just go away on their own, but remain stuck in the "fear center" of the brain until they are processed into long-term memory centers. Trauma is not a life sentence and there is hope and healing available.
A Word About Adolescent Trauma
When young people experience traumatic experiences, things can get out of control fast! The brain does not completely develop and "wire" until we are in our mid to late 20s, leaving traumatized children afraid and confused. This fear and confusion most often presents itself as ANGER AND RAGE. This is not a conscious decision on the part of the child or teen, but a result of incomplete development of the neural structures in the brain and activation in the amygdala, or "smoke alarm" of the brain. Left untreated, this trauma results in a "mis-wiring" of the brain. The child "learns" that the world is a dangerous place. The challenge for the child or teen is how to respond to what seems like a dangerous and potentially harmful life. As parents it's easy to see the anger. We live with it daily. What's harder to see is the fear, frustration, and confusion the child feels, but does not know how to deal with it. The child often dissociates many of these traumatic memories, and may even deny childhood abuse, neglect, or abandonment. It's not uncommon for children who have been abused to claim that their parents were good people and it was they that caused the abuse. Abandoned children often swear that their parents love them and want to be with them, blaming their parents' abandonment on others - family, courts, law enforcement, anyone but the parents who abandoned them.
All of these things can result in severe dissociation (blocking out). This dissociation complicates therapy and can slow progress or even cause harm to the child if not properly treated. This is why EMDR or any single therapy is often unable to heal "complex trauma". The traumatized child or teen must have all "parts" feel safe to allow healing to take place. Other models of therapy most often need to be incorporated into other trauma models to facilitate healing of complex trauma.
I am currently trained and certified in EMDR therapy. I am also an EMRDRIA approved Consultant and able to provide EMDR consultation services for those in the process of being EMDR trained or for those who are already trained in EMDR and pursuing Certification. Please feel free to contact me for more information.