Living As All of Me

[HannahOne]

Dollyvee asked about IFS and I wanted to share a bit about therapy. I've done every therapy that exists, I'm a professional therapy client. I knew I needed help to live a good life. I started in the late 90s with CBT, then moved on to the second and third wave stuff, DBT, ACT. Gestalt. Psychodynamic for many years. Some Jungian analysis. EMDR, Mindfulness based CBT, equine therapy, I got certified to be the equine specialist on the therapy team. and IFS. I found IFS to be the most helpful, but I actually quickly moved one to the second wave version of it, TIST. 

I highly recommend TIST, or just reading her articles. I find Janina Fisher's work to be the most helpful I've ever found, because it's based on parts as states, ie, the fight part, the flight part, the submit part, the attach part, the freeze part. Joanne Twombley tried to make IFS more accessible for people with dissociation and some of her tricks also help, ie the feeling proof soundproof room. I had a therapist who was able to put all of that together for me and that's what got me out of the 2-3 years of shutdown/bedbound behavior I was in. I was always able to get up and do for the kids, parent, seem ok... but as soon as they were out of the house, it's like the motor stopped or there was no electricity. So we started by using the "mothering part" to help me get moving again.

I was reading recently that the latest wave of therapy is trauma healing as movement/flow. IE equine therapy, yoga therapy, dance therapy. That the trauma isn't really "stored in the tissues," it's the nervous system that is replicating the trauma and the tissues of the body respond to that neuro-hormonal signaling. It's the brain stuck in prediction error.  I think that's part of why TIST was so powerful is that it includes the somatic piece that IFS and all those other therapies I tried leaves out. TIST focuses on where that feeling is in your body, what movement the feeling is prompting. Trauma is when you feel that impulse but it's not safe to act on it, or when you can't flow, you shut down. Healing is when you can feel and to some small extent at least act on these impulses in a safe container, ie with a horse or therapist, and experience attunement. That's the most powerful prediction error there can be, it's not just a prediction error in the mind. It's a lived physical experience between two people, or a person and an animal, the prediction error shows up in a movement, action, a change in physical reality. . The "moving" part is really important.

The most healing thing that helped me get unfrozen in the last year or two is PT and going to the gym. That led to all kinds of other movement, like going to dance class and moving with music with other people, yoga/Pilates with music in a room full of other people, getting into water and swimming, some time with the horse again in the ring. Like with the horse, "click click, trot," just keep moving and then you can shape the movement into something balanced and beautiful. So it's not so much that the body keeps the score as the body is the vehicle, the ground, the way for movement to happen again, for flow to return. That ease of movement informs the nervous system that the prediction error has happened, so the nervous system stops sending alarm to the tissues. I should find the name of the study and post it on the forum, it was really interesting.

So I guess I hesitate to suggest straight IFS for complex trauma because for us I don't think it's so simple as "unburdening the exiles." My exiles aren't just burdened with trauma, they're also unformed, arrested by what they did not get. That "did not get" is actually much harder to deal with than what happened. For me the neglect is much worse than the assaults, much harder to overcome, to grapple with. That's what I'm working on in this journal since day one, I've learned how not to be in abusive relationships... but learning to care for myself? To take care of myself? what that even means, what it looks and feels like, and how to tolerate it? SO MUCH HARDER. Feels impossible. How to go to the doctor when you notice something is wrong. How to even notice something is wrong. How to get regular screenings. How to eat and drink. How to exercise. How to feel my feelings. How to support myself in my goals. All of that is overcoming neglect, it's self-care. None of that involves unburdening an exile, it's something different.

I think TIST is much more comprehensive for CPTSD and developmental trauma, and includes the somatic piece that is essential because the trauma wasn't just to our minds, it was to our bodies--our minds are just part of our bodies. Words/thinking only go so far. It's also less of a formula/manualized modality, so it hits me better. I don't like being put through the paces of a manual and anything that feels like a protocol can feel like abuse again where I have to be a false self and put myself through hoops. YMMV, and so much depends on the therapist of course.