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Introduction
The nature of this Handbook is philosophical. It is meant to encourage self-awareness, broaden wisdom and a sense of peace. Through personal growth, this Handbook helps us learn what it means to have soul and to share this sense of soul with others – building our communities, our nation and assisting our global neighbors. When our safety and stability are dismantled, for whatever reason, we can learn to remain balanced and exhibit measured, moral behavior. This Handbook offers a guide for discussion and thought. The Handbook reflects best-practice, trauma-informed ideas from an applied philosophy perspective. Joycee Kennedy, August, 2018 |
The Empowerment Program Inc. is a licensed mental health and drug treatment program providing trauma-informed and gender-responsive outpatient services. We believe that participants benefit most from a holistic approach, where many types of treatments are available to meet individual needs.
Wellness spreads and when you take time to focus on your wellness you are also taking time to increase the resiliency of your family and community. If you are interested in reducing harm to your body by addressing substance use and mental wellness this is a great place for you to start.
Wellness spreads and when you take time to focus on your wellness you are also taking time to increase the resiliency of your family and community. If you are interested in reducing harm to your body by addressing substance use and mental wellness this is a great place for you to start.
WE ARE HERE FOR YOU.
Stage One: Safety and Stabilization - Overcoming Dysregulation
As a first step, you must first learn to comprehend the effects of trauma: to recognize common symptoms and to understand the meaning of overwhelming body sensations, intrusive emotions, and distorted cognitive schemas. The achievement of safety and stability rests on the following tasks:
- Establishing bodily safety: e.g. abstinence from self-injury.
- Establishment of a safe environment: e.g., a secure living situation, non-abusive relationships, a job and/or regular income, adequate supports.
- Establishment of emotional stability: e.g., ability to calm the body, regulate impulses, self-soothe, manage post-traumatic symptoms triggered by mundane events.
The goal of this stage is to create a safe and stable "life in the here-and-now," allowing you to safely remember the trauma, rather than continue to re-live it.
Stage Two: Coming to Terms with Traumatic Memories
At this stage, the focus is to overcome the fear of traumatic memories so they can be integrated, allowing appreciation for the person you have become as a result of the trauma. In order to metabolize (not just verbalize) memories, you may make use of EMDR or other mind-body therapies. Pacing ensures that you don't become "stuck" in avoidance or overwhelmed by memories and flashbacks. Since "remembering is not recovering," the goal is to come to terms with the traumatic past.
Stage Three: Integration and Moving On
You can now begin to work on decreasing shame and alienation, developing a greater capacity for healthy attachment, and taking up personal and professional goals that reflect post-traumatic meaning-making. Overcoming fears of normal life, healthy challenge and change, and intimacy become the focus of the work. As your life becomes reconsolidated around a healthy present and a healed self, the trauma feels farther away, part of an integrated understanding of self but no longer a daily focus.
Funded by SAMHSA
Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration
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