Healing assessments and interventions from disparate areas of knowledge such as art, nature, and storytelling. There are many ways to help children and families heal from trauma. Leaning on our ancestral wisdom of healing through play, art, nature, storytelling, body, touch, imagination, and mindfulness practice, Janet A. Courtney helps the clinician bring a variety of practices into the therapy room. This book identifies seven stages of therapy that provide a framework for working with client’s emotional, cognitive, somatic, and sensory experiences to heal from trauma. Through composite case illustrations, practitioners will learn how to safely mitigate a range of trauma content, including complicated grief, natural disaster, children in foster care, aggression, toxic divorce, traumatized infants diagnosed with neonatal abstinence syndrome, and young mothers recovering from opioid addiction. Practice exercises interspersed throughout guide practitioners to personally engage in the creative expressive and play therapy techniques presented in each chapter, augmenting professional self- awareness and skill- building competencies.

Nature-Based Play and Expressive Therapies addresses a wide range of healing modalities and case studies that can be used in both indoor and outdoor environments. Each chapter includes vignettes to support the interventions and approaches presented. Readers will find a diverse array of helpful handouts and topics explored, including tips for creating outdoor healing gardens and labyrinths, guidelines for using nature to address trauma, working with sandplay and storytelling in nature, adapting nature-based interventions via telehealth, and much more. Chapters focus on work with young children and teens in individual settings as well as work with families and groups, making this book an important read for a wide range of mental health professionals.

Infant Play Therapy is a groundbreaking resource for practitioners interested in the varied play therapy theories, models, and programs available for the unique developmental needs of infants and children under the age of three. The impressive list of expert contributors in the fields of play therapy and infant mental health cover a wide range of early intervention play-based models and topics. Chapters explore areas including: neurobiology, developmental trauma, parent-infant attachment relationships, neurosensory play, affective touch, grief and loss, perinatal depression, adoption, autism, domestic violence, sociocultural factors, and more. Chapter case studies highlight leading approaches and offer techniques to provide a comprehensive understanding of both play therapy and the ways we understand and recognize the therapeutic role of play with infants. In these pages professionals and students alike will find valuable clinical resources to bring healing to family systems with young children.

Featuring in-depth case presentations from master clinicians, this volume highlights the remarkable capacity of traumatized children to guide their own healing process. The book describes what posttraumatic play looks like and how it can foster resilience and coping. Demonstrated are applications of play, art, and other expressive therapies with children who have faced such overwhelming experiences as sexual abuse or chronic neglect. The contributors discuss ways to facilitate forms of expression that promote mastery and growth, as well as how to intervene when play becomes stuck in destructive patterns. They share effective strategies for engaging hard-to-reach children and building trusting therapeutic relationships.

Rich with case material and artwork samples, this volume demonstrates a range of creative approaches for facilitating children's emotional reparation and recovery from trauma. Contributors include experienced practitioners of play, art, music, movement and drama therapies, bibliotherapy, and integrative therapies, who describe step-by-step strategies for working with individual children, families, and groups. The case-based format makes the book especially practical and user-friendly. Specific types of stressful experiences addressed include parental loss, child abuse, accidents, family violence, bullying, and mass trauma. Broader approaches to promoting resilience and preventing posttraumatic problems in children at risk are also presented.

Touch in Child Counseling and Play Therapy explores the professional and legal boundaries around physical contact in therapy and offers best-practice guidelines from a variety of perspectives. Chapters address issues around appropriate and sensitive therapist-initiated touch, therapeutic approaches that use touch as an intervention in child treatment, and both positive and challenging forms of touch that are initiated by children. In these pages, professionals and students alike will find valuable information on ways to address potential ethical dilemmas, including defining boundaries, working with parents and guardians, documentation, consent forms, cultural considerations, countertransference, and much more.

This classic volume, now completely revised, has helped tens of thousands of therapists integrate play therapy and family therapy techniques in clinical practice. Eliana Gil demonstrates a broad range of verbal and nonverbal strategies for engaging all family members--including those who are ambivalent toward therapy--and tailoring interventions for different types of presenting problems. Numerous case examples illustrate ways to effectively use puppets, storytelling, art making, the family play genogram, drama, and other expressive techniques with children, adolescents, and their parents. Gil offers specific guidance for becoming a more flexible, creative practitioner and shows how recent advances in neuroscience support her approach. Photographs of client artwork are included. New to This Edition *Incorporates 20 years of clinical experience and the ongoing development of Gil's influential integrative approach. *All-new case material. *Discusses how current brain research can inform creative interventions. *Heightened focus on personal metaphors, complete with detailed suggestions for exploring and processing them.

Healing assessments and interventions from disparate areas of knowledge such as art, nature, and storytelling. There are many ways to help children and families heal from trauma. Leaning on our ancestral wisdom of healing through play, art, nature, storytelling, body, touch, imagination, and mindfulness practice, Janet A. Courtney helps the clinician bring a variety of practices into the therapy room. This book identifies seven stages of therapy that provide a framework for working with client’s emotional, cognitive, somatic, and sensory experiences to heal from trauma. Through composite case illustrations, practitioners will learn how to safely mitigate a range of trauma content, including complicated grief, natural disaster, children in foster care, aggression, toxic divorce, traumatized infants diagnosed with neonatal abstinence syndrome, and young mothers recovering from opioid addiction. Practice exercises interspersed throughout guide practitioners to personally engage in the creative expressive and play therapy techniques presented in each chapter, augmenting professional self- awareness and skill- building competencies.

"Anyone who works with troubled children and their families should not miss this book. Healing the Fractured Child weaves together comprehensive theory and neurobiology that substantiate practical treatment guidelines for children and their families. The complexity of symptoms, diagnoses, assessment, use of medication, and a variety of innovative treatment approaches for stabilization, trauma processing and integration are explored and come to life through the clear, practical and touching clinical illustrations peppered throughout the book. Fran Waters has drawn on her vast clinical experience and thorough knowledge of current perspectives on dissociation and child therapy to write an integrative, readable, and immensely useful masterpiece, a gift to the field of child psychology and psychotherapy and to the many therapists, children and parents who will benefit from her wisdom." --Pat Ogden PhD, Founder, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute; Author, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Interventions for Trauma and Attachment "A skillfully written, comprehensive and remarkable volume. Well-grounded in theory and full of rich, practical applications and detailed case examples. Water's outstanding work will expand clinicians' capacity to understand and assess dissociation as well as to effectively accompany children in their healing journeys. An essential resource for therapists of all orientations working with trauma and dissociation." Ana M. GÛmez, MC, LPC, Author of EMDR Therapy and Adjunct Approaches with Children: Complex Trauma, Attachment and Dissociation "Healing the Fractured Child" provides an invaluable source of information for all professionals and non-professionals interested in childhood dissociation. Based on her many years of experience in this field, Waters takes us from an explanation of dissociation and related theories to the behaviors which may be noticed by a parent, teacher or doctor, through the assessment quagmire and the challenges of parenting, to the important work of emotional regulation and the identification of self-states, bringing in consideration of where medication can or cannot assist and describing the hard work of trauma processing, to integration, possible relapse, and back again to even stronger internal integration. The intricately described clinical examples provide a plethora of ideas for working with these children and offer readers the encouragement and hope so important for working with children who experienced trauma. Sandra Wieland, Ph.D., R.Psych. Illuminates the most promising treatments available for dissociative children Written by one of the nation's leading practitioners in the field of childhood trauma, abuse, and dissociation, this comprehensive resource fills a void in the literature to provide in-depth knowledge of current interventions for treating dissociation in youth. It describes a detailed, careful assessment process and creative, evidence-supported techniques for helping children and their families to heal from chaotic, traumatizing experiences. With both a theoretical and practical focus, the book offers proven strategies for successfully treating children and adolescents with varying degrees of dissociation and co-morbid symptoms. It also integrates adjunct therapies in environments beyond those of traditional psychotherapy, such as school, and describes how their strategies can be used effectively to augment therapy and understand dissociative children. Based on a model integrating five prominent therapeutic modalities, and underscoring the importance of attachment style, the book focuses on the neurobiology of trauma, a high co-morbidity of symptoms, specialized clinical interventions, psychopharmacology, and family intervention techniques. Also addressed are adjunct therapies in art, and EMDR. In addition, the book provides a window into the effects of traumatic events such as medical illness that may be overlooked, and safe techniques with dissociative youth who are exhibiting dangerous behaviors. Rich clinical examples demonstrate the various phases of treatment and offer a window into the internal world of dissociative children. This resource provides mental health clinicians, and other health professionals with a wealth of tools to effectively treat this troubled client population. Key Features: Describes theoretical conceptualization and specialized integrative techniques to treat dissociative children effectively Integrates psychotherapy with EMDR, art therapy, neurobiology and psychopharmacology Distills current research on neurobiology of trauma and how to intervene with specially designed treatment strategies Provides in-depth knowledge of the latest creative interventions for treatment across degrees and ages of dissociation, and co-morbid symptoms Sensitizes the therapist to often overlooked traumatic events, e.g. medical illness, that can exacerbate symptoms

"Psychological trauma can be a life-changing experience that affects multiple facets of health and well-being. The nature of trauma is to impact the mind and body in unpredictable and multidimensional ways. It can be a highly subjective that is difficult or even impossible to explain with words. It also can impact the body in highly individualized ways and result in complex symptoms that affect memory, social engagement, and quality of life. While many people overcome trauma with resilience and without long term effects, many do not. Trauma's impact often requires approaches that address the sensory-based experiences many survivors report. The expressive arts therapy-the purposeful application of art, music, dance/movement, dramatic enactment, creative writing and imaginative play-are largely non-verbal ways of self-expression of feelings and perceptions. More importantly, they are action-oriented and tap implicit, embodied experiences of trauma that can defy expression through verbal therapy or logic. Based on current evidence-based and emerging brain-body practices, there are eight key reasons for including expressive arts in trauma intervention, covered in this book: (1) letting the senses tell the story; (2) self-soothing mind and body; (3) engaging the body; (4) enhancing nonverbal communication; (5) recovering self-efficacy; (6) rescripting the trauma story; (7) making meaning; and (8) restoring aliveness"--