Developmental Trauma and The Fear-Driven Brain: Applied Neuroscience to Provide Hope and Healing in Trauma Treatment

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Faculty

Sebern Fisher, MA, BCN Related seminars and products

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Sebern Fisher, MA, LMH, BCN, is an interntionally-recognized expert on the use of neurofeedback in the treatment of deveopmental trama and best-selling author of Neurofeedback in the Treatment of Developmental Trauma: Calming the Fear-Driven Brain. She has been working with traumatized people for over 35 years and has integrated Neurofeedback and psychotherapy in her treatment of developmental trauma in adults and adolescents for the past 20 years.

Prior to adopting Neurofeedback, Sebern was the clinical director of a residential treatment program for severely disturbed adolescents for 15 years. While there, she introduced the understanding of the impact of attachment rupture and was the first to implement DBT in a residential setting.

Sebern consults and trains on the integration of Neurofeedback and therapy, nationally and internationally.

 

Speaker Disclosures:
Financial: Sebern Fisher maintains a private practice and receives a speaking honorarium from EEG Learn. She receives royalties as a published author. Sebern Fisher receives a speaking honorarium and recording royalties from PESI, Inc.
Non-financial: Sebern Fisher has no relevant non-financial relationships.

Objectives

1. Establish how the multiple layers of connectivity between brain, body and self inform the clinical approach to trauma.
2. Assess how childhood trauma changes the developmental trajectory of the brain and explore the clinical manifestations of these impacts.
3. Articulate how insecure attachment at an early age can create a baseline of survival fear.
4. Specify how clinicians can help clients see emotional states for what they are: temporary.
5. Characterize the role of the nervous system and hyperarousal in trauma symptomology.
6. Communicate the role of affect regulation in therapeutic effectiveness.
7. Support how limbically driven emotions like fear and rage can impede the therapeutic process.
8. Assess the impact of transference on the therapeutic bond and communicate how clinicians can minimize intense transference.
9. Characterize how working with brain dynamics can relieve trauma without making clients actively re-experience the trauma.
10. Articulate how an EEG can be used to identify maladaptive patterns of firing.
11. Explore the process of inhibiting and rewarding frequencies associated with anxiety and over-arousal in neurofeedback training.
12. Specify ways in which clinicians can help clients whose lives have been defined by fear transition to a new identity as fear subsides.

Outline

Insecure Attachment and Developmental Trauma

• Neuronal patterns of PTSD
• The innate potential for relationship
• Unrepaired attachment disruption
• The inheritance of insecure attachment – the state of baseline survival fear
• Long-term consequences – void of self

The Fear-Driven Brain: Adverse Childhood Experiences and Trauma

• The traumatized brain
  • The autonomic and central nervous systems
  • The brainstem and hypothalamus
  • The cerebellum, hemispheres and lobes of the brain
• Neurodevelopmental consequences
  • Impaired brain development
  • Impaired emotional regulation and impulse control
  • Dysregulated stress response
  • Alterations in physical growth
  • Telomeres and cellular aging
• The firing and misfiring of neural networks
• Parasympathetic Nervous System shutdown and the vagal nerve
  • Polyvagal Theory in trauma practice - Porges
• The role of glial cells
• Accessing brain plasticity

Arousal, Reactivity, and Affect Dysregulation in Trauma

• Overarousal and affect dysregulation
• Primary, sub-cortical and right hemisphere affects
• The inherent limits of talk therapy
• Chronic baseline fear and self-reflection
• The role of affect regulation in therapeutic effectiveness

Stop Letting Fear, Shame and Rage Hijack Trauma Treatment

• Shortcomings of medication
• The relationship between fear and shame
• Cognition in “survival mode”
• Manifestations of limbically driven emotions
• Neurofeedback and the pulses of fear, shame and rage

Fear as the Core of Transference: Handle Transference and Counter-Transference Issues

• Critical interpersonal dynamics – a partnership in affect regulation
• Impacts on the therapeutic bond
• Minimize intense transference
• Cultivate presence and attunement
• Neurofeedback and quieting the alarm of abandonment

Neurofeedback as Applied Neuroscience in Psychotherapy: Essentials and Assessment

• The risks of treatment
• Shift the burden of affect regulation from the therapist to the training
• A new experience of homeostasis
• Firing, frequencies, and arousal
• Strengthen circuits
• State dependence – fear states dysregulate
• States to traits

Quiet Fear with Neurofeedback: Integrate Neurofeedback into Trauma Treatment

• When to talk and when to train
• Clinical assessment for neurofeedback
  • Attention, anxiety, depression, etc.
• Considerations regarding sexuality and medication
• Work with sensors, placements
• Identify maladaptive patterns of neuronal firing
• Using EEG – frequencies and amplitudes
• Adjust function - operant conditioning of brain waves
• Feedback - change the frequencies attributed to over-arousal
  • Inhibit frequencies you want less of
  • Reward frequencies you want more of
  • Reward disconnected areas to connect or overly connected parts to disconnect
• When training plateaus - lack of progress is not resistance
• How do you know when training is over?

Who Will I Be When I’m Not Afraid: Working with the Fear-Bound Identity

• A trauma identity inextricably bound to fear
• The healing paradox
• Treatment challenges when fear begins to quiet
• Transition clients to an unfamiliar identity
  • Integration of new state, new traits and new sense of self

Target Audience

• Counselors
• Psychotherapists
• Social Workers
• Addiction Counselors
• Marriage & Family Therapists
• Case Managers
• Nurses
• Other Mental Health Professionals