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Somatic, Relational Therapy for Medical Trauma Processing
Relational therapy is an extension of psychodynamic therapy; it utilizes the therapeutic alliance between the therapist and the client as the mediator of change. I think of this quote from Carl Rogers when I think of Relational Therapy:
​“In my early professional years, I was asking the question, How can I treat, or cure, or change this person? Now I would phrase the question in this way: How can I provide a relationship which this person may use for his own personal growth?”
–Carl R. Rogers
You tell me what's happening in your
body and being, and I believe you.
Then, I join you in grounding, exploring, excavating and processing.
The concept is that as humans, we (and our experiences) are shaped interpersonally. Thus, a strong, affirming, safe and trusting therapeutic relationship has the power to be pivotally corrective for those who have been adversely impacted by relational or systemic harm. I find this to be especially true for those with medical trauma, who have survived medical gaslighting, the isolation of chronic illness, or adverse healthcare experiences. I’m here to provide a reparative or corrective experience in a healthcare setting, where you are heard and affirmed, and your own wisdom and “knowing” is honored and trusted.
“Shame dies when stories are told in safe spaces.”
An affirming therapist that is informed and educated on a client’s complex chronic illness, and believes their client, can be profoundly reparative for those who have felt gaslit, neglected or ignored in medical settings. Building a therapeutic relationship where a client feels like a whole person to be supported, rather than a problem to be solved, can be reparative for those who relationally feel treated like a burden or an issue. You are not a problem to be solved; you are a person to be loved and supported. Truly seeing and honoring a client, and the multitudes of parts of them and their life, can remind them of who they are when they feel lost in their own experience. This is especially true for clients who feel as though they’ve lost parts of themselves to illness or their medical experiences.
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When we move from building therapeutic rapport and move into somatic work, somatically oriented therapists often ask, “and where do you feel that emotion in your body?”
For a client with complex chronic illness, the inquiry is often far more complex than that, and takes nuanced navigation.
When a client lives with chronic illness, processing emotions about chronic symptoms can be helpful in regulating despite their presence. For example - say we run into anger about the ongoing presence of rib pain. If we process that, we’re not assuming we’re changing or healing the rib pain, but we’re hoping to change the client’s relationship to the rib pain. We’re creating more space for noticing it rather than the nervous system going to battle with it. For those with chronic health issues, one’s own inner terrain can feel like a battlefield. In somatic work, we’re attempting to interrupt the internal war and facilitate embodied peace, despite all elements that may still be physically present.
Or, if the somatic symptoms are related to medical trauma, past traumatic lived experiences, or harbored unprocessed emotion, we can differentiate that from chronic symptoms related to their medical condition. We can process those lived experiences and develop tools for regulating and de-senstitizing the trauma-rooted somatic sensation.
