Our therapists offer PTSD & trauma therapy in Blacksburg, VA

There are many ways to approach PTSD/trauma therapy. My go-to approach is to use a combination of cognitive behavioral therapy, narrative therapy, mindfulness, reality therapy, and solution-focused techniques. I prefer using a combination of different therapeutic approaches, as everyone will be at a different place with their traumatic past than others and it's best to be flexible, meet a client where they are at, and be willing to go at the pace that they are comfortable with in order to help them feel a sense of control.

I teach cognitive behavioral therapy techniques such as identifying and challenging cognitive distortions or mindfulness techniques like nonjudgmentally identifying and sitting with uncomfortable emotions and reality therapy and solution-focused techniques that essentially help clients identify the presence of something positive they want to increase in their life rather than the absence of something negative that they don't want. For example, think of questions like, “If you weren't feeling [unpleasant emotion] in this particular scenario, how would you want to be feeling instead? How would you be able to tell you were feeling that way? What would be different?”

I can tell that a client is making meaningful progress in PTSD/trauma therapy when they are more comfortable talking about something that happened to them without becoming overwhelmed. Sometimes, clients will barely be able to touch on the subject at first without wanting to change the subject. I can also tell a client is making progress when a client's narrative has shifted about what happened to them.

Clients can supplement their time in PTSD/trauma therapy by working on skills learned in therapy, journaling, using mindfulness techniques, etc. They can also supplement their time by finding things in their life that give them value, meaning, and joy (so not necessarily a specific therapeutic skill, in other words!).

Preparing for PTSD/trauma therapy may depend a bit on the specific interventions you are going to do (such as EMDR). In general, I would want clients to feel safe and in control dictating what they feel like discussing and when. I would also want to acknowledge that it can feel uncomfortable to discuss traumatic events, but that is a normal part of the process and may not always feel as intense as later it may initially (assuming someone is talking about their trauma for the first time).