WHAT IS TRAUMA FOCUSED CBT

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome to the Psychological Theories podcast,and this podcast will take a journey into
the human mind with one psychological theoryat a time. So let's begin.
Welcome back to everybody. Be talkingabout trauma focused CBT or TFCBT. It's
an evidence based treatment approach, whichmeans has been studied quite a bit,

(00:22):
specifically designed to help individuals, particularlychildren adolescents who've experienced trauma and are dealing
with the psychological consequences. Now,evidence based treatment is the new thing because
it's being tested. However, wealso need to know how it's being tested
to determine if they're being goods,if there are good studies showing the efficacy
of it, and there have been, but it gets a little bit more

(00:42):
complicated, and we'll get that ina second. So again, it's designed
to help individuals, adolescents and childrenwho've experienced trauma or dealing with the psychological
consequences, and it integrates principles fromCBT with trauma focused interventions. Though some
of the key components are psycho educationproviding information about trauma, it's act and
common reactions, and can help individualsunderstand their experiences and normalize their feelings.

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Very CBTs, and this is nota bad thing. Relaxation and stress management
skills, Teaching relaxation techniques and copingstrategies help individuals manage anxiety and distress associated
with the traumatic memories. They alsodo something called cognitive restructuring. Identifying and
challenging unhelpful or distorted thoughts related tothe trauma can help individuals develop more adaptive

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it accurate beliefs. Before they dothis, they actually start what they're called
the narrative development. Especially with children. It encourages individuals to tell their trauma
story and instructured and safe manner thatcan help them gain a sense of mastery,
process their emotions, and integrate theexperience into their broader life. So
when children are taught to do this, they taught to write it or draw

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it out. This also helps themdistance themselves from the actual traumatic salient memory
that can trigger a physiological response.They're trying to get them to understand the
emotions that are went on during thatpoint and identify them and explain them.
And by the way, TFCBT wasmore effective when according to the studies,
with children than with adults. Anotherthing they'll do is exposure therapy gradual and

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controlled exposure to trauma related memories,thoughts, and reminders. Again, this
is helping them reduce the avoidance andfear responses that are triggered with traumatic memories.
In addition, and one of themore powerful things I think of it
was parental skills and involvement. Incases where children or the recipients of TFCBT,
involving parents or caregivers is crucial.Parents are taught strategies to support their

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child's healing process and are address theirown emotional reactions. Now, some of
you may be thinking, what happensif it's the parent who's abusive, Well,
obviously they're not going to be calledin. Even if it's one parent
out of the two. Let's sayit's the dad or who whatever, he's
the one who's been an abuse abuser, he will not participate. It'll be
the mom. Now he may gettherapy and when if they feel that he's

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at a point where he could beand the child can handle that as well,
well, it may reintegrate it.But most of the time they're not
part of it. It's the otherparent that was not involved to help the
child. And I think this iswhat makes it the most effective. It's
because you're having a strong support system, which we know is very important.
They also have safety planning. Creatinga safety plan helps individual drills develop strategies

(03:19):
for managing triggers and coping with distressingsituations. Again, gradual exposure of trauma
reminders, and of course enhancing socialsupport. This is one of the most
I think there's three things that arereally important for people. Coping skills,
teaching ways how to deal with theseevents like they just mentioned here, also
resources if you need them, andthe final one, the third one,
is going to be support system TFCBTis typically delivered over course about twelve to

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twenty five sessions, depending on theindividual's need. And it's important to realize
that this is different than just CBTalone and has trauma focus interventions and it's
similar to other trauma focus theories.Before you get to the CBT component,