Emma's Journey with Dissociative Identity Disorder
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Posts tagged Defense Mechanism
Guest: Dr. Dan Siegel
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Daniel J. Siegel received his medical degree from Harvard University and completed his postgraduate medical education at UCLA with training in pediatrics and child, adolescent and adult psychiatry.  He served as a National Institute of Mental Health Research Fellow at UCLA, studying family interactions with an emphasis on how attachment experiences influence emotions, behavior, autobiographical memory and narrative.

Dr. Siegel is a clinical professor of psychiatry at the UCLA School of Medicine and the founding co-director of the Mindful Awareness Research Center at UCLA. An award-winning educator, he is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and recipient of several honorary fellowships. Dr. Siegel is also the Executive Director of the Mindsight Institute, an educational organization, which offers online learning and in-person seminars that focus on how the development of mindsight in individuals, families and communities can be enhanced by examining the interface of human relationships and basic biological processes. His psychotherapy practice includes children, adolescents, adults, couples, and families. He serves as the Medical Director of the LifeSpan Learning Institute and on the Advisory Board of the Blue School in New York City, which has built its curriculum around Dr. Siegel’s Mindsight approach.

Dr. Siegel has published extensively for the professional audience.  He is the author of numerous articles, chapters, and the internationally acclaimed text, The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are (2nd. Ed., Guilford, 2012).  This book introduces the field of interpersonal neurobiology, and has been utilized by a number of clinical and research organizations worldwide. Dr. Siegel serves as the Founding Editor for the Norton Professional Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology which contains nearly seventy textbooks.  The Mindful Brain: Reflection and Attunement in the Cultivation of Well-Being (Norton, 2007) explores the nature of mindful awareness as a process that harnesses the social circuitry of the brain as it promotes mental, physical, and relational health. The Mindful Therapist: A Clinician's Guide to Mindsight and Neural Integration (Norton, 2010), explores the application of focusing techniques for the clinician’s own development, as well as their clients' development of mindsight and neural integration. Pocket Guide to Interpersonal Neurobiology: An Integrative Handbook of the Mind (Norton, 2012), explores how to apply the interpersonal neurobiology approach to developing a healthy mind, an integrated brain, and empathic relationships. The New York Times bestseller Mind: A Journey to the Heart of Being Human (Norton, 2016) offers a deep exploration of our mental lives as they emerge from the body and our relations to each other and the world around us. His New York Times bestseller Aware: The Science and Practice of Presence (Tarcher/Perigee, 2018) provides practical instruction for mastering the Wheel of Awareness, a life-changing tool for cultivating more focus, presence, and peace in one's day-to-day life. Dr. Siegel's publications for professionals and the public have been translated into over 40 forty languages.

Dr. Siegel’s book, Mindsight: The New Science of Personal Transformation (Bantam, 2010), offers the general reader an in-depth exploration of the power of the mind to integrate the brain and promote well-being. He has written five parenting books, including the three New York Times bestsellers Brainstorm: The Power and Purpose of the Teenage Brain (Tarcher/Penguin, 2014); The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind (Random House, 2011) and No-Drama Discipline: The Whole-Brain Way to Calm the Chaos and Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind (Bantam, 2014), both with Tina Payne Bryson, Ph.D., The Yes Brain: How to Cultivate Courage, Curiosity, and Resilience in Your Child (Bantam, 2018) also with Tina Payne Bryson, Ph.D., and Parenting from the Inside Out: How a Deeper Self-Understanding Can Help You Raise Children Who Thrive (Tarcher/Penguin, 2003) with Mary Hartzell, M.Ed.

Dr. Siegel's unique ability to make complicated scientific concepts exciting and accessible has led him to be invited to address diverse local, national and international groups including mental health professionals, neuroscientists, corporate leaders, educators, parents, public administrators, healthcare providers, policy-makers, mediators, judges, and clergy. He has lectured for the King of Thailand, Pope John Paul II, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Google University, and London's Royal Society of Arts (RSA). He lives in Southern California with his family.

You can see his website HERE.

The website for the Mindsight Institute is HERE.

The parts of the brain video referenced in the podcast is here:

Uploaded by Dr. Dan Siegel on 2017-08-09.

Guest: Susan Pease Banitt, LCSW
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It was a profound experience for us, specifically for Dr. E in confronting her own diagnosis directly for the first time, and to be received with such compassion and understanding. It was the exact opposite of shame, which we have been talking about and studying recently. Our deepest gratitude to Susan Pease Banitt, for just being her.

Susan Pease Banitt, LCSW, is a social worker, psychotherapist and author who specializes in the treatment of severe trauma and PTSD. She has worked in the field of mental health for more than four decades in diverse settings: inpatient, outpatient, and medical with adults and children, and trained in the Harvard medical teaching hospitals in Boston, MA. She is a Reiki Master, Kripalu trained yoga teacher, and shamanic healer in the Celtic tradition. Susan’s book The Trauma Tool Kit: Healing PTSD From the Inside Out (2012) won several awards including; the Alumni Media Award for Written Work by Simmons College School of Social Work, and the Silver Nautilus Award for Health and Healing.  Susan speaks internationally on the psychological and holistic treatment of PTSD. She lives and has a private practice in beautiful Portland, Oregon with her husband and a menagerie of pets. Her second book: Wisdom, Attachment and Love in Trauma Therapy: Beyond Evidence-Based Practice (2018) has just been released!

You can read her blog HERE, and she has podcasts HERE.

The 8 F-Words

If you listened to episode seven of season two, you heard Sasha talk about being in four sessions of group with The Crisses from Liberated Life Coaching. We are excited that they will soon be a guest on the podcast!

But one thing we mentioned in this episode was that The Crisses had identified EIGHT panic responses to trauma or other triggers. Most people know about fight, flight, and freeze. Fight means dealing with it head on, and flight means running away from it, and freeze means hiding in some way.

Some people are also now getting more familiar with the fawn response (being “too good” in hopes for safety).

But The Crisses have also identified four others:

Follow - going along with the abuser or trigger, like joining in with them for safety;

Fortify - making higher “walls” and stronger defenses than before;

Fabricate - changing the story so it’s not so scary (including denial);

Facilitate - empowering yourself for positive change and healing in even little ways.

These are amazing! CLICK HERE to listen to their podcast about the 8 F’s!

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