Trauma & PTSD
Trauma can stem from various causes and sources. It can be personal tragedy, a natural disaster, a violent event, or any other type of unusual event. Trauma can take an emotional tole on the individual regardless of age. While it should be emphasized that there is no right or wrong way to feel after a traumatic event, there are strategies that can help. It is important to recognize and acknowledge feelings of pain, fear, and grief to regain your emotional balance. Whether the traumatic event happened years ago or yesterday, we aim to help you find a way to heal and move on with life.
BIRRT
BIRRT is a technique designed to decrease or eliminate the symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The original IRRT (Imagery Rescripting and Reprocessing Therapy) was created by Mervin Smucker, Ph.D. from the Medical College of Wisconsin. Bob Stahn has reduced the process to its essentials and calls it Brief IRRT or BIRRT. With BIRRT, there is good news and bad news.
The Good News
The technique is brief to administer. It generally is done in one two-hour session per traumatic incident. That’s right, ONE two-hour session. We have used BIRRT more than 800 times.
BIRRT is very effective. In our follow-up surveys, we have found that clients who have completed the homework after the session continue to enjoy relief from most, if not all, of their PTSD symptoms.
Trauma has a way of welding together the emotions (what was felt) and details of the event (what happened). So each time something triggers a memory of an event the emotions must be experienced with it! BIRRT effectively breaks that trauma weld.
There is no hypnosis, touching, tapping, specific eye movement, or holding of objects with BIRRT. The technique uses imagery only. During the process, the client closes their eyes and talks as the therapist listens to and talks with the client. That’s it.
The results are immediate. The client does not need to wait for weeks or months to feel the benefits of the process. At the conclusion of the BIRRT session in our office, most clients report a feeling of relief and relaxation. Immediate results. But relief and relaxation are not the only benefits that are experienced. From that moment on, there is a reduction if not elimination, of nightmares, flashbacks, intrusive thoughts, hypervigilance, high anxiety, etc from the PTSD. Also, the issues connected with the trauma can now be addressed without being hijacked by the emotions of the event.
BIRRT is not supportive therapy. It is designed to break the weld between the event and the emotions, not resolve issues or provide ongoing support. However, it opens the door so issues can be much more easily addressed. Many clients report that they can work through the issues quite simply after the issues are free of traumatic emotions.
The Bad News
BIRRT is event-specific. Each dissimilar traumatic event must be dealt with individually. For example, if the client had three different experiences with trauma throughout their life, then they would need to go through three separate sessions for PTSD. Each traumatic event being addressed in its own session. However, if a client went through years of childhood sexual abuse where the abusive incidents were in essence the same abuse by the same person only a different day, then all of those traumatic events would not need to be processed individually.
Step 1
The process is not easy. There are three steps to the BIRRT session. The first step is the hardest for the client and for the therapist because the first step is experiencing the essentials of the trauma again. Initially, it may appear unreasonable because the client has spent a lot of energy since the trauma purposefully avoiding anything that reminds him or her of the event — and now we are going to invite the trauma to be re-experienced? It may not make sense to purposefully go through the trauma again but it is an essential part of the process.
Going through this step requires the client to trust the process, the therapist, and him/herself. (In order to feel more comfortable, if the client prefers, the client may invite trusted friends or family members to accompany and support the client during the session — as long as the guests do not detract from the experience.) If history holds true, the negative emotions experienced in the first step will not be felt again in connection with that specific event. When the weld is broken, the emotions of the event that caused PTSD are gone for good.
Step 2
The second and third steps are much more enjoyable. The second step starts as the first step did but before any strong negative emotion is felt, a perfect ending is spliced onto the beginnings of the event through imagery. The perfect ending includes 1) keeping the client safe, 2) preventing the trauma from happening, and 3) holding any abuser accountable for the abusive behavior. The results are wonderful!
Step 3
The third step consists of nurturing the individual who went through the trauma. For example, if the client went through trauma at age 6, then again through imagery, we would spend time comforting and nurturing the six-year-old. We create an environment where the client of today educates, nurtures, and comforts the young client. The outcome is deeply satisfying.
There is homework. Assigned homework from the BIRRT session includes rehearsing the “new ending” twice daily and spending time nurturing the younger client also twice a day for a week. Nearly every BIRRT client reports that the homework is very enjoyable and is not difficult to do. In fact, most clients look forward to doing the homework in order to experience again those wonderful emotions felt during the session. Doing the homework is essential to make sure the weld stays broken. After one week, the new images are deeply enough planted in the mind that it is not necessary to continue rehearsing them for the disconnection between emotion and event to be permanent.
Another long-lasting benefit is the ability to use a rehearsing of the new ending to decrease negative emotion — regardless of the cause — or replace the unwanted negative emotion with a desired positive one.
All told, the BIRRT process is not easy but it is very much worth the effort. Generally, clients are not eager to go through the process but are eager to be through the process. The results are very much worth the effort – just ask anyone who has experienced it.
We know of no quicker or more effective PTSD treatment technique! This is only available through clinicians at Well Spring Counseling or those who have been trained by Well Spring clinicians.
Call our office today at (208) 522-4885 to see if BIRRT might help you.
