Rapid Resolution Therapy: A Brain-Based Approach To Trauma Therapy

By Melinda Paige, Ed.S, LPC, LMHC, NCC

and Courtney Armstrong, LPC
Master Certified Practitioners, Rapid Resolution Therapy

Painful exposure techniques are not required to clear the emotional charge of a traumatic memory. All that is required is keeping the client "emotionally present" as she describes the details of the event. This concept was introduced by trauma clinician and founder of Rapid Resolution Therapy, Dr. Jon Connelly, Ph.D, LCSW. Current neuroscience and trauma research by Bessel van der Kolk, MD and Dan Siegel, MD have also reached similar conclusions.

Why does this work? According to Master Certified Practitioner Courtney Armstrong, LPC, it works because when we keep the client emotionally present, we are helping to prevent the amygdala from activating the fight/flight response. The problem is when the amygdala and fight/flight response go into high gear, the brain inhibits the function of the hippocampus and parts of the pre-frontal cortex. The hippocampus and certain aspects of the pre-frontal cortex are responsible for integrating memory and tempering emotional responses. If these parts of the brain are "off-line," then the memory stays seared into the deeper brain as a non-verbal, implicit, felt memory. When a memory stays in this implicit form, associated sensory details like smells, times of year, sounds, and visual images can trigger the same feelings of terror as the original event. However, these triggers are often "unconscious" to the client.

One goal of any trauma therapy is to integrate the traumatic memory into conscious, explicit memory. To do this, we have to keep the hippocampus and pre-frontal cortex open and on-line. If you have the client emotionally re-live the event then you inadvertently activate the fight/flight response right there in the session and cause the hippocampus and pre-frontal cortex to go offline again. According to Connelly (2011), in order to facilitate client recall of a traumatic event without abreaction, effective trauma therapists ground clients in the present by providing experiences in session that require them to respond emotionally to the present situation or "what is happening."

Connelly also suggests providing opportunities for clients to be in a "power position" while retelling the trauma narrative so that the client has a resolution experience which is the antithesis of the often disempowering traumatic event. This process allows the client's central nervous system to remain within the "window of tolerance" (van der Kolk, 2010) for reintegration of the previously traumatic memory within normal memory.

Another Rapid Resolution Therapy Success Story!

I work in a community mental health agency in Pasco County, FL. Today I was booked from 8 am to 6 pm....including an Anger Management group! At noon, my schedule was blocked for 120 minutes....my morning was running behind as I tried frantically to be fully present and get the paperwork done. My noon client hadn't checked in so I reviewed the file. This client was a woman I had met one time in her home through our Veteran's initiative grant at the request of the therapist working through this grant. My schedule was blocked, but I was supposed to be at her home, not in the office and it was pouring rain. It seemed like a good way to get out of the office at the time!

I rushed to the appointment and met the primary therapist there. The client is a 40-plus year old woman who had been sexually abused by her father and uncle from the age of 6 until she escaped the house at 16-years old. She is married and has an adult son, however the impact of the trauma was getting increasingly worse for her.

My client was able to identify a specific incident from when she was 6-years old. She remembered being forced to perform oral sex on both her father and her uncle in the presence of her 3-year old sister. The threat was do it or she and her sister would be killed. Using Rapid Resolution Therapy I stepped her through the events that occurred and her symbol was the wind. The wind was able to blow the meaning her mind had placed on the event away. Her mind of course showed her the perfect symbol! At the end of the session she reported, "I don't feel anything about it now....my nightmare is over."

I am so grateful for the RRT skills I have learned and the opportunity to use them with people who many times have given up hope that the trauma will ever go away.

~ Elizabeth Dillon, M.Ed

Heal Trauma and Grief with Storytelling

By Courtney Armstrong, LPC
Certified Practitioner, Rapid Resolution Therapy

Sometimes people are so disturbed by the way someone died that they focus more on the deceased person's "dying story" than they do on the person's living stories. Yet reflecting on our living experiences with the deceased is an integral part of healing.

When I interviewed grievers for my book, they consistently stated one of the most healing experiences is hearing stories about their deceased loved one. Yet, people are often afraid to mention the name of the deceased to the bereaved. Please know that the majority of grievers enjoy reminiscing about their deceased loved one and want to remember their life, not their death. A reader recently wrote me about this stating:

"I read your book and thought it was fantastic! I have tons of memories [of my deceased mother], unfortunately all of the ones I remembered or chose to remember were painful. After reading your book, I started looking through my photos and videos and I found myself laughing and remembering how that laughter came about. My memories of my mom now have some laughter in them, and so do some of my dreams...You helped me to see a section that I have been missing, thank you."

Constructing stories is valuable for another reason. Frequently after a traumatic event, feelings, sensory information, and implicit memories of the event are typically left hanging in fragments that researchers believe are mostly processed and stored on the right side of the brain. Yet, the logical, linear-oriented left side of the brain has a drive to make sense of these fragments and put them into some kind of logical order. Building a coherent story based on your memories incorporates these fragments, bringing context and structure to them, which can help you heal.

Courtney Armstrong is a Licensed Professional Counselor who specializes in trauma therapy and has a practice in Chattanooga, TN. She leads workshops for mental health professions in Rapid Resolution Therapy and other creative therapeutic approaches. To contact Courtney, visit her website at http://www.courtneyarmstronglpc.com/. Visit Courtney's blog at http://traumatherapyalternatives.com/.

Welcome! New Rapid Resolution Therapy Mentor Program!

Calling all Certified RRT Healers!

Remember the first day of your Level 1 Training? Baffled, confused, and excited; unsure of what was going on. Even so, you stayed in your seat and now are ever so grateful that you did. You did it by sheer will power (and you wanted to see what Dr. Jon would say next!); but now we want to make that transition easier for the next Level 1 students by providing each with a "welcome" sponsor/buddy/greeter/translator. This RRT volunteer would telephone an incoming student with just a few words of wisdom and advice to prep them for class eg., welcome to our family/community; be prepared to experience a profound change in your practice and your life; fasten your seat belt and get ready for an exciting roller coaster ride; this is not your grandmother's class with power points slide and death by hand written notes (note taking is prohibited, you will get a workbook at the end); let yourself relax, absorb and experience this revolutionary healing process!"

We recently piloted this process quite by accident! It started with a phone call from a potential student during our RRT August 2011 retreat. She had poured through the RRT website and just wanted to talk with someone about the training and treatment process ("Is all of this really true?"). She went through our list of certified therapists and contacted the one who lived closest to her; it turned out we are neighbors. We chatted just before her training weekend and I shared some of the above thoughts with her. She left me a telephone message the very first night after her training; she was flying high with excitement. We finally met face to face the next day and she shared that had I not "prepped" her, she might have left training the first day: "It was so different and I was so lost, I didn't know what I was doing. But I remember you said to hang in there and sure enough by Sunday I knew this is what I wanted to do." Personally I had been blessed to have had Dr. Jon as my RRT healer before I went to my Level 1 training. I had no problem staying in my seat during my first training; I just wanted to lean so I could give someone else the gift that I had received.

But, if you haven't experienced an RRT session, remember what it was like that first day of class. Remember those feelings and vow right now to help smooth the transition for an incoming Level 1 student. If you can spare a few minutes to call and welcome someone, please send an email to me at drsrichie@earthlink.net and we will set it up. Thank you to those who have already volunteered to send in your experiences as an RRT healer and your RRT client stories. If you have not done so yet, it is not too late. Send me your thoughts and ideas for our Book of Hope so you can be listed as a book contributor (great marketing tool for you!). Another big thank you to our RRT volunteers who have offered to speak to military groups in their community. I just returned from the annual Wounded Warrior Symposium in Wash., DC and witnessed some powerful and profound speakers. The program title said it all, "The Journey Back: Helping Wounded Warriors and Their Families Transition [back to their communities]." Clearly they need our help to heal and get back to their communities. Again, email me if you want to join this growing military interest group of RRT healers and speakers. In next month's issue, look for new details about the completion of RRT Study I and preparation for RRT Study 2. Until then, know that I am so very proud to be taking this healing journey with each of you!

Dr. Sharon Richie-Melvan, Ph.D., is a Certified Rapid Resolution Therapist. Dr. Sharon also co-authored the book, "Angel Walk: Nurses at War in Iraq and Afghanistan," with Dr. Diane Vines, Ph.D, Certified Rapid Resolution Therapist. Within the book, Dr. Sharon recommends Rapid Resolution Therapy as a PTSD treatment approach (p. 97). To purchase your copy today, please click here.

Certified Practitioner Courtney Armstrong Interviewed On National News!

Courtney Armstrong, LPC, Interviewed on Coping with the

9/11 Anniversary

As this year marks the tenth anniversary of 9/11, many individuals are reminded of their friends and family who were lost that day. Dr. Steve Salvatore of WPIX-TV New York's "Dr. Steve Show" interviewed Rapid Resolution Therapy Certified Practitioner Courtney Armstrong, LPC, last month about coping with traumatic grief.

During the interview, Dr. Steve highlighted Courtney's recent book "Transforming Traumatic Grief." Courtney shared her insight on how to stay in the present, how to cope, and how survivors can still feel connected with their loved ones.

Click here to listen to this wonderful interview!

Post-Traumatic Growth

By Mark A. Chidley, LMHC, CAP
Certified Practitioner, Rapid Resolution Therapy

Recently on National Public Radio, three trauma experts discussed what we have learned in the 10 years since 9/11. Two of them, professors, remarked on developing a fascination with Post-Traumatic Growth. The term refers to the fact that some people who go through a trauma of seismic proportions move out of their grief rather quickly, take stock of their priorities, and redirect their effort and commitment in an all-encompassing way. They do so in a way that clarifies identity and direction, stabilizes emotion, and makes them stronger for the future.

It rather amazed me that this was considered a new concept. The Chinese character for crisis is a combination of the words for "danger" and "opportunity," the possibility of two roads leading out of trauma. China has been around a long time. So who could argue that civilizations have experienced, from the earliest times, traumatic blows that challenge their very existence, and advance, or not, depending on how well they are able manage the opportunity side of the equation? Post-Traumatic Growth is no new thing either for a person or society.

So what is Post-Traumatic Growth? To put a human face on it, I saw an interview leading up to the 10-year mark with former mayor of NYC, Rudy Giuliani, who walked New Yorkers and much of the country through the hell of those days. The reporter asked him how 9/11 changed him. He paused a long minute. You could tell he didn't have a prepared response.

And then he said, 9/11 had changed him in just about every way a person could be changed.

Spiritually, as he learned to pray at his time of greatest need and got the answers he sought, enlarging his faith forever. He had awareness of his mortality. He realized we all, sooner or later, will face a situation that dwarfs the resources, skill, or strength we can bring to it. Or, as jazz great Wynton Marsalis once put it, "Life has a paddle for every behind." And it stretched Rudy Giuliani into a greater grasp of his life's work and the call the hour had placed upon him. It was as if history itself had put a hand on the middle of his back and pushed him onto the stage to lead the people of New York through their darkest hour. He discerned that his message on behalf of all New Yorkers had to be this: that though buildings may come down, New Yorkers would not be cowered by terrorist acts. That their answer had to be they would not live in fear, scared into a despair that would make them relinquish the freedoms we live by. Being the voice of that message and getting it out in those days following the attacks took him into territory he never knew he could travel. The look on his face told me this was no mere flag-waving by a veteran politician. He meant every word. He really had been stretched. He had experienced Post-Traumatic Growth.

What to notice is this: Post-Traumatic Growth turns on getting a sudden glimpse of the direction life wants you to go. It is not about being brazenly over-confident or well-prepared. No one is. You may wonder, "Wow, am I strong enough for this?" People interviewed after a disaster usually admit to such thoughts. But they also say they just did what they had to do; they couldn't have done it any other way.

As one moves into Post-Traumatic Growth, mind is shifting into HD mode and getting a picture, a vivid model of how to function optimally, for that moment and future moments. There is no division in the mind, but a rapid winnowing out of what no longer matters, and sudden clarity about what matters most and what one needs to do next. The mind seems to zero in and see the bigger picture all at once; it brings to awareness what is most beneficial and possible. So there is an economy of thought and of action for that particular context. It is a transcendent moment that may be over in a flash, like the passengers who rushed the cockpit of United 93 to save the lives of people they would never meet. Or it may reshuffle things for a lifetime, like the widow of a fireman killed in the line of duty, who started a national foundation to benefit the kids of all fallen firemen everywhere.

One gets a vivid model of the self they are meant to be. The mind accelerates toward it, getting on all levels how most of the rules, roles, and messages that pertained to one's former life are no longer relevant. One sluffs off a skin that no longer fits and moves ahead with a unified identity and mission. The energy that is thrown off in this metamorphosis is palpable to those around, the difference in strength - unmistakable. As it expands, this energy can connect with others and take them in. On the anvil of humanity falls the hammering blow of trauma that life deals out. Some metal shatters and breaks off as slag. But some metal is tempered, made stronger as its atoms rearrange, and are fashioned into a whole new instrument, capable of more.

Mark A. Chidley, LMHC, CAP, a fully licensed mental health counselor and certified addictions professional, offers counseling services at his office Kelly San Carlos Executive Center in Fort Myers, Florida.He has been in private practice since 1997. He holds certifications in Rapid Trauma Resolution (2010), Imago Relationship therapy (2001), and now specializes in the treatment of couples as well as individual trauma recovery and anxiety issues. He brings rich experience from a combined 26 years of hospital work and mental health counseling.

Thank You To The IRRT Community!

Thank you to RRT Certified Practitioners Tara Dickherber, Tamara Ashley, Melinda Paige and Alicia Dorton for assisting Jon at this Atlanta training. Participants at the September Atlanta training had the following to say about their experiences with Dr. Connelly:

"Not what I expected, and I wouldn't have changed the outcome. Perfect!" ~ Vicki VanDeiler, LPC

"Complete paradigm shift on many levels. This training shifted my entire perspective of the therapeutic process. To continue with my old ways of doing therapy would be completely unethical."

~ Deborah Blanchard, LPC

"Undoubtedly the best training I have attended! It will change the way I think about and conduct therapy."

~ Barabar Keown, Ph.D., LPCwth