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Conventional psychotherapy for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder typically involves several years of individual and group sessions. All too often the client becomes discouraged and drops out of therapy before they truly resolve their trauma and return to a normal life. A new form of therapy for this disorder has emerged over the last five years. The pioneering work of Dr. Eugene Peniston at the Veterans Administration Medical Center, Fort Lyons, Colorado and Dr. Carol Manchester, Cincinnati, Ohio has open a new range of power to those seeking to help clients with serious, persistent anxiety and depression. Specialized training in these methods is now available to health care professionals.
Using continuous feedback of information about the electrical activity of the client’s brain, the client is taught to allow themselves to go into a profoundly relaxed, yet quietly alert state. This is possible because certain patterns of brain electrical activity are known to correspond to this calm, centered feeling.
A computer is set up to record EEG (brain electrical activity) from flat, surface electrodes placed on the scalp. This is completely painless and comfortable. First, an assessment of the EEG activity is done. This allows the neurotherapist to determine the pattern of training that will be most beneficial for the individual. The computer is then adjusted so that it emits a pleasant chord of music as the person begins to generate more of the desirable brain rhythms. This “neurofeedback” literally guides the person to a more and more calm state. Clients begin to feel a tremendous sense of empowerment as they take back what they were deprived of by the trauma — a good night’s sleep, feelings of calm and confidence, and the knowledge that they can relax themselves at will.
As the client learns to allow themselves access to this powerfully calm state they learn how to let go of the constant anxiety and vigilance that characterizes Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The client also learns to utilize the power of their unconscious mind, by directing the unconscious to create certain desirable effects. The unconscious is thought of as capable of acting on the conscious instructions of the person to “resolve the conflicts,” or to “make me a more mellow, less irritable personality.” Traditional cognitive therapy techniques like “mental rehearsal,” and “stress inoculation” are combined with neurofeedback, their effects being enhanced by the deeply calm state.
Neurotherapy for PTSD typically consists of approximately thirty-five training sessions. During the course of these sessions, the client often spontaneously begins to recall more detail about the traumatic events that caused the disorder. Presumably this is the result of accessing the improved emotional resilience and calm offered by the neurofeedback experience. These experiences may be very vividly relived. The person can tolerate this spontaneous, unprompted recall, however, because they now have the direct knowledge that they are able to calm themselves even in the face of the worst memories.
It is a common experience among trauma survivors that relaxing a little or trying to fall asleep may trigger flashbacks. This results in difficulty falling asleep, disturbing dreams, and a tendency never to allow oneself to relax out of fear of having flashbacks. Once the achievement of accessing a profoundly relaxed calm state becomes a conscious skill, however, the individual loses the fear of their traumatic memories. Because of the relative precision with which the state of consciousness can be controlled during the neurofeedback process, the speed and intensity of recall can be regulated to a significant degree. Nonetheless, an individual going into neurotherapy for PTSD must resolve to be brave and persistent.
The results of controlled studies, as well as clinical experience with this therapy have been tremendously encouraging. People who have been suffering from PTSD for ten and twenty years are often completely relieved of their symptoms. Psychological tests have shown that the person becomes dramatically less anxious, less depressed, and more comfortable and relaxed. As memory is regained, the traumatic incidents can be discussed with others, grieved over, and finally put aside as sad, but no longer terrifying or threatening memories. As this occurs the person can normalize their social and individual life and go about the business of living without the fear, anxiety, and depression which was previously a constant companion.
