Similarly, therapists may be reluctant to talk directly and in detail with the client about the traumatic experience, because they are afraid to “open up a wound” that they will not be able to close. Thus, they ask themselves difficult questions, such as: “How can I best prepare the client for this work?”, “How can we work with the trauma story?”, “How many times should we go through the sequence of events?”, ” Are we going too fast?”,” Do we have to go through the whole story every time? “. There are no clear answers to these questions, but one way we can help people to process a traumatic experience, is by using the trauma narrative as therapeutic intervention.
”It’s not like I’m going to walk out of here like an open wound?”A case description of the therapeutic work with the trauma narrative
Glad, K. A. (2013). "Det er vel ikke sånn at jeg kommer til å gå ut herfra som et åpent sår?" En kasusbeskrivelse av det terapeutiske arbeidet med traumenarrativet [”It's not like I'm going to walk out of here like an open wound?”A case description of the therapeutic work with the trauma narrative] Norwegian only. Tidsskrift for Norsk Psykologforening, 50, 1171-1177.
Clients who are struggling with posttraumatic stress reactions, are often reluctant to talk in detail about their experiences. They are afraid that this will evoke painful memories and strong reactions - and that they will walk out of the therapy session like "an open wound".