experiencing secure attachment can make a huge difference for a person who's just been through a traumatic event in fact there's a physician who incorporated this into his treatment protocols his name is dr. Ari Shalev he's a psychiatrist who practiced at a major hospital in Jerusalem what he does at his hospital when people are injured in a terrorist attack he so the first thing he does is get the person's family there and that I thought was so striking that it has to do with attachment but if you have your support and your attachment figures there that's
going to prevent the escalation of the PTSD symptoms so you know it gets back again to to our attachment history and the support that we experience from our attachment cookies there's a lot of literature written about say sexual abuse that the first trauma is the actual abuse the secondary trauma is not having a parent to support you to it so that is almost as traumatizing really as the trauma itself that was dr. Pat Ogden you probably remember the great case study she gave in Wednesday night's session on the neurobiology of trauma her story illustrates a
powerful point attachment relationships can actually protect people from some of the harmful aftermath of trauma so much so that the lack of a secure attachment figure is kind of like a secondary trauma so what do we do when someone has had a weak connection with their caregiver growing up or perhaps not any connection at all how can we help to restore their capacity for secure attachment well let's talk about the most severe cases in these the patient may never have felt safe with another person they may have been so hurt by so many people that
it's nearly impossible for them to feel safe with anyone I think this is where interventions where you can use imagery for example with an animal imagery as well as having an animal can be extremely helpful for example I have a client who's severely traumatized with no you know healthy safe attachment figure at all in her background she never experienced love she has a complete inability to experience any positive emotion but she has a cat and so we worked with the cat and her being close to the cat touching the cat feeling the fur of the
cat feeling a sense of connection to the cat and this is the first time in her life when she was able to start experiencing some warm feelings in her chest some positive feelings and because she doesn't know what love is because she's never experienced love she began to think about that this is what experiencing love must be like so I think for a person like that you know I was working with an animal because humans were thinking about a relationship with another human being would be too dangerous working with an animal I think can be
very helpful so for people who don't feel safe with other people animals can play a key role in healing what are some of the ways you've worked with patients to rebuild secure attachment please let us know in the comments right below and thanks for watching [Music] you [Music]
