Tools to Help Those Triggered by the Harvey Weinstein Case
By: Dr. Denise Renye
The recent news regarding Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein could potentially retraumatize sexual assault or sexual violence survivors. In late February, a jury convicted Weinstein of felony sex crimes and rape, more than two years after the first allegations against him emerged. Judge James Burke ordered him to be held in custody until the sentencing hearing on March 11, at which point he was sentenced to 23 years in prison. So the potential for retraumatization continues.
What happens with trauma is the self splits off into different fragments, leading to dissociation. The embodiment techniques (described below) helps those parts come back together to integrate into the wholeness of a person.
Psychologist and philosopher Dr. Eugene Gendlin sums this up nicely when he wrote:
“What is split off, not felt, remains the same. When it is felt, it changes. Most people don't know this! They think that by not permitting the feeling of their negative ways they make themselves good. On the contrary, that keeps these negatives static, the same from year to year. A few moments of feeling it in your body allows it to change. If there is in you something bad or sick or unsound, let it inwardly be and breathe. That's the only way it can evolve and change into the form it needs.”
Fragmentation could even happen secondhand, when reading about the Weinstein case for instance. Many events in this world (at large and in one’s personal world) are traumatizing, and there are tools and techniques to help with that. I invite you read about them and to try them. While I suggest working with a well-trained psychologist who has in-depth training of dealing with trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), panic disorder, anxiety disorder, and depression, some of the tools and techniques explained below can be used for self-healing in conjunction with professional help and/or on your own.
If a person is retraumatized, or feels the potential for retraumatization, there are certain things they can do to take care of themselves. As a licensed clinical psychologist and certified clinical sexologist, I recommend several things to people who find themselves in that situation. One approach is to make sure the person talks about the Weinstein case with their therapist and attend support group meetings.
I also recommend journaling, making time to be in nature, and engaging the right brain in activities like drawing, singing, or dancing. This may be challenging when a trauma response is activated. I find meditation can also be very helpful for some people. For others, sitting meditation may be too much to bear if someone suffers from PTSD. If this is the case, I suggest conceptualizing meditation beyond the sitting variety. Meditation can take the form of walking meditation, body movement meditation, and even dishwashing meditation. These are ways for people to experience a deeper sense of embodiment – a presence in the body rather than presence in the mind.
A key component for sexual assault and sexual violence survivors is to remember they are safe in their bodies, in this space and in this present time. In my private practice, a way that I encourage a feeling of safety is to follow the direction of the patient/client, especially with sexual assault or sexual violence survivors because there is such an out-of-control feeling that comes with trauma. I allow the client to set the speed in our sessions and I don't want them to feel like I'm making them do something. Instead, I use language such as “invite” rather than give explicit, terse instructions. The invitation is ever-present for the return to the body, and a reminder of that is essential for each person to know they have the capacity for healing. For instance, I invite them to come back to their breath and be present in their body. Oftentimes dissociation happens in the mind and a person can feel like they're back in that traumatic moment instead of in their body where they are presently.
An exercise I like to use with my patients/clients is to invite them to slow down because oftentimes thoughts may begin racing when a person is remembering or reliving their trauma. I may say to them: “Could you notice your breath?” If they're still feeling distraught while noticing their breath, I say: “Can you bring your attention of your body to the couch (or chair) and all the points where your body is in contact with the couch (or chair)?” This tool of noticing provides a space for being in the present moment.
Trained as a yoga therapist specializing in restorative yoga, I use a technique called yoga nidra, which was first described in the sacred Hindu text the Upanishads. In part, I take the person through structured embodiment exercises. Once they've given me a description of their body – heavy, solid, etc. – I suggest or guide them: “You're doing a great job feeling the heaviness (or solidness, etc.) of your body. Can you go into that a little bit more and describe it in great detail while using your breath, noticing your inhalations and exhalations?” These are great techniques that can be done with your therapist and also on your own. True healing occurs within, and the therapist is a facilitator for a person's own deep self-healing.
I may also invite them to describe the fabric of the couch or chair for me. This allows for the sense of tactile perception to bring them into the here and the now. Additionally, I use another yoga nidra technique and ask them to identify the sounds they can hear, starting with those farthest away (for instance, car horns or birds chirping). And then I'd invite them to notice the sounds inside the room like the sound of my voice, and then finally the sound of their own breath, their own heartbeat. The breath and the heartbeat are always present, even if survivors cannot readily experience them at the beginning of their journey of healing. It takes practice and patience.
If the breath or heartbeat can be identified somatically (through the sense of the body) I may say: “Would you stay with that? As you stay with that, can you notice anything else that's happening in your body right now?” They might say something like, “My chest feels tight.” I'd ask them to use their breath and bring attention to whatever is tight and breathe right into the tight spot. I check in with them after they've done so and ask them what they notice now. This technique draws from Gendlin’s work on something he coined as “Focusing,” a way to work with the bodily felt sense and the living process.
If the client still feels afraid, I'd ask: “How is the fear showing up in your body?” If they answered they felt butterflies in their stomach for instance, I would ask them: “Do you have a picture of them in your mind? What are they like?”
Once the client answers with a description, I'll ask: “How does it feel when you see them?”
Oftentimes a client may arrive at a space wherein they say they feel peaceful seeing the butterflies (as an example). Once they arrive in that space, I would tell them: “Your body can remember this sense of peace that you experience right now. Notice how it shows up in your body.”
They might say they feel at ease or expansive. I would invite them to expand that sense of ease or expansiveness out to a few inches beyond their body, or a few feet. I'd invite them to expand it out to the size of the room, to the size of the building, the size of the block, inviting them to take up more space energetically. Taking up space is something that typically diminishes as someone is working through trauma from an initial traumatic event or a retraumatization, such as witnessing news of the Weinstein trial (or even the recent death of basketball legend and alleged rapist, Kobe Bryant).
Then I might say: “I invite you to remember that the sense of expansiveness is something you can continuously come back to because it exists within you.” Healing is an inside job. I am merely a facilitator of helping people to realize their own healing potential.
I like to close deep healing trauma work sessions with a request that the person be gentle with themselves and not rush or put pressure on themselves to be somewhere they're not or feel something they don't. For instance, thinking they “should” be over the trauma or feel safer than they do. Instead, I invite them to be where they are and allow themselves to feel what they feel. To be the most “them” they can be. The healing journey is a migration from who a person wishes and hopes, and maybe even thinks they are, to a place of feeling safe enough moving to a deep knowing of who they really are.
To work more deeply one-on-one or to get information about offerings, click here.
Resources
Gendlin, E., 2007. Focusing. New York: Bantam Books.
Saraswati, S., 2003. Yoga Nidra. Trust/Munger/India: Yoga Publications Trust.
Dr. Denise Renye, www.wholepersonintegration.com
Licensed Psychologist, Certified Yoga Therapist, Certified Sexologist