Trauma and Dissociation Informed Psychotherapy

A fresh look at the importance of dissociation in understanding trauma.

A new model of therapeutic action, one that heals trauma and dissociation, is overtaking the mental- health field. It is not just trauma, but the dissociation of the self, that causes emotional pain and difficulties in functioning. This book discusses how people are universally subject to trauma, what trauma is, and how to understand and work with normative as well as extreme dissociation.

In this new model, the client and the practitioner are both traumatized and flawed human beings who affect each other in the mutual process that the promotes the healing of the client—psychotherapy. Elizabeth Howell explains the dissociative, relational, and attachment reasons that people blame and punish themselves. She covers the difference between repression and dissociation, and how Freud’s exclusive focus on repression and the one-person fantasy Oedipal model impeded recognition of the serious consequences of external trauma, including child abuse. The book synthesizes trauma/dissociation perspectives and addresses new structural models.

“"Howell's distinctive blend of trauma-informed clinical compassion, academic and analytic questioning reaches a new peak here. She exposes the trauma caused by Freud's creation of the Oedipus complex and the damage of one-person psychology. At the same time she offers hope through comprehensive non-dissociative theorizing, backed as always by solid clinical evidence. Gently, authentically, and relationally argued this is a powerful seminal bombshell of a book--albeit an elegant one."”

At the heart of Elizabeth Howell's courageous thesis is the question: can contemporary psychoanalysis adapt to trauma and dissociation informed psychotherapy? She pulls no punches in offering scholarly yet confronting responses to offer a belated resolution to the 100-year trauma debate raging between Freudian 'repression' and Janetian 'dissociation.' Therapists and patients alike will greatly benefit from Dr. Howell's parsimonious definition of trauma as 'that which causes dissociation.' This radical reconceptualization has powerfully reshaped the future direction of trauma therapy as her clinically based discussions amply illustrate.--Dr. George Halasz, Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia, and child and adolescent psychiatrist

Elizabeth Howell, PhD, teaches at several institutes and is on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Trauma and Dissociation.  She has written three previous books on trauma, dissociation, and attachment, and over thirty-five articles. She lives in New York City.

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