If you are familiar with computers the Re-start name is a metaphor I use to help explain how counselling works. When you start your computer it reads through all the stored information. At some time most computers have crashed or frozen and then refused to work, this has happened because somewhere inside them, often not visible to the eye one of the files has become corrupted or misplaced.

Like the computer, if a traumatic life event, challenge or setback has happened to an individual, their brain (like the hard drive) gets stuck thinking about it. This can even be on a subconscious level so that the person is not even aware of where the problem is stemming from. Their brain will re-read it or misplace it causing the client to feel troubled; they may have flashbacks, nightmares, sleep issues, daytime intrusive memories and distressing internal voices.

Often with high end trauma the client is not able to name or externalize the event and so it essentially just keeps getting replayed inside their brain as it has not been mentalized or given a context. Neurologically these events have become stuck in the reptilian old part of the brain instead of being processed and stored by the higher mammalian brain. This can leave someone feeling too defeated, anxious or overwhelmed or too full of feelings to think clearly. It is this state that we can work through in a therapeutic setting. This is like restarting a computer and clearing the hard drive and reformatting the machine. The brain then begins to work more smoothly and function better.

For example if a person was in a room and a lion rushed in and ate the person next to them and then left, the person would probably suffer Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and be unable to name the experience going into shock every time they tried. They may also develop a phobia or panic attacks of things that are yellow like the lion, cats (like the lion) being in small rooms and maybe even doors and other things that were linked to the attack such as a blue carpet or a clock ticking.

After processing the trauma they may understand that for example that day one lion escaped from a zoo and this is how unusual tragedy occurred. Their brain will understand that it was a lion and their fear of factors attached to the attack scene will lessen as their rational mind also begins to think on it.

In trauma of this level, bi-lateral stimulation seems an important part of clients staying present in order to process not panic or go into flashbacks. This is similar to using EMDR except often in assault cases physical touch is not such a good idea as that also can act as a trigger to the client. CBT is prescribed as ideal for PTSD treatment in the NICE guidelines.

Using art materials including drawing, figure making and sand and a CBT technique approach called CATT , originally called Children’s Accelerated Trauma treatment but now also used for adults after being piloted on Rwandan genocide survivors. This helps name and explore high-end trauma like rape so that the client is not overwhelmed. After this approach the client can then have space to talk more conventionally and consider their thinking patterns and emotional reactions, sometimes going back to the artwork to explore or externalize new details often in the metaphor at first disclosure (i.e. “this figure is being hurt” – not naming self as victim). The clients can also often begin to name their own feelings that went suppressed or frozen in the attack and begin to accept the reality of events.

Obviously this requires a relationship between the client and therapist as precursors to these kinds of activities so that the client can feel contained and safe within the room.

The use of arts in therapy is an intervention that provides the opportunity for non-verbal expression and communication. Art is a non-threatening way to visually communicate anything that is too painful to put into words. Often victims of sexual abuse or other trauma have been lied to, threatened, or misled with words by their abusers or other adults whom they trusted. Words have become misleading and mistrusted, and strictly verbal approaches to therapy may meet with more resistance. Since most people are used to communicating in words and not images, their grasp of non-verbal communication is less sophisticated than spoken languages; therefore, they have fewer established defense patterns.

It is important to note that using art in therapy is not only useful for obtaining information, but it also plays a critical role in processing that information.

Freud in 1955 said, "Psychic trauma occurs when an influx of external stimuli breaks the stimulus barrier of the psyche. There is no possibility of preventing the mental apparatus from being flooded with large amounts of stimulus. Another problem arises then - the problem of mastering the amounts of stimuli that have taken in and binding them, in the physical sense, so that they can be disposed of ".

These techniques can work well with many difficult topics to explore them from new angles and it is not about being able to draw, merely exploring a different way to help the client express their feelings.

I have extensive experience of using these techniques with adults and young people specifically in the arena of sexual abuse and high levels of dissociation following long term work within MOSAC (working with sexually abused young people) One in Four (working with adult survivors of abuse) and both privately and for the Clinic of Dissociative studies.