Category: Transforming Trauma Podcast

In this episode of Transforming Trauma, our host Emily is joined by Kirsten Timmer and Jens Heidegger. Kirsten Timmer is a licensed psychologist, psychotherapist, co-founder, and CEO of TransParents and Jens Bode is a licensed doctor, lead course facilitator, trainer, and supervisor at TransParents. TransParents is a platform for parents and professionals who are committed to creating meaningful relationships with children while respecting and preserving life processes. With a focus on the importance of the parent-child relationship, their work lies in strengthening that connection by utilizing a trauma-informed approach. 

In their training, they invite curiosity by employing tools like puppets and roleplay for parents to see how they can relate to their children in a more supportive, playful way. As Jens shares, “We have them play themselves and another participant plays their children. And then we have them swap roles so they can step into the shoes of their own children and feel how it feels on the inside. What the needs may be, what the deeper reasons may be, and what the parenting styles feel like.” In this act of playful discovery, there is a heartfelt openness that can strengthen parent-child connections.

In reconnecting to her own childhood and raising a son, Kirsten came to understand the importance of how attachment impacts how we relate to ourselves and others. She describes becoming a parent for the first time as “an invitation to life, to grow.” She reflects on how we want to parent versus how our baggage and the “old identifications” from our childhood disrupt the connection to our children. Kirsten and Jens support parents in a shift from shaming themselves to developing deep curiosity for themselves and their children. Jens says, “The cause of it is that you develop more freedom, more possibilities, more agency, that are then helpful for the kids.”

We hope you will enjoy this episode with Kirsten Timmer and Jens Heidegger. We deeply are grateful to be joined by members of the international NARM community and for the pair sharing about their work and how they use NARM to enrich their organization, TransParents.

We invite you to listen to the full episode and follow Transforming Trauma in Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app.

About:

Kirsten Timmer is one of the founders and CEO of TransParents. She is a psychologist, psychotherapist, and parenting advisor. She was trained in Client-Centered Therapy by Carl Rogers and in NARM® by Dr. L. Heller and has her own practice. She is also a senior student of Thomas Hübl, a contemporary spiritual teacher and mystic. Jens is a specialist in psychosomatics and psychotherapy trained in Behavioral Therapy at IVB Berlin and trained in NARM® by Dr. L. Heller. Jens is one of TransParents’ lead course facilitators, trainer, and supervisor of the mentor team.

Learn More:

www.TransParents.net

In this episode of Transforming Trauma, our host Emily is joined by Crystle Lampitt, LMSW.  Crystle owns her own private practice, CL Wellness LLC, and is a former TV Journalist and model that has lived all over the world. Crystle has a unique perspective of coming into the field of trauma from a background in media and modeling, and bringing a wealth of lived experience from her international experiences and biracial background.

Crystle brings a first-hand understanding to living a multi-ethnic identity, facing significant life transitions, and being in a highly visible career – out in front of the world. Crystle shares her experience being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease during her career as a daytime news anchor.  She recalls questioning, “What is this toxic stress doing to me?” Through a deep dive into her health and identity questions, Crystle discovered the link between trauma and autoimmune illnesses, and the need for hope and validation for being fully human, which led her to pursue a graduate degree in social work. 

Crystle realized she was living deep in hustle culture, experiencing toxic stress that had become normalized. “The message we get is that if you’re not hustling then you’re doing something wrong or you’re not going to be successful.”  Crystle’s growing awareness of these objectifying social realities, and her own health challenges, led her to learn more about the body-mind effects of trauma.  “I see the emergence of my autoimmune illnesses as also a big signal, my body going, ‘You didn’t listen to me when I whispered, so now I’m going to scream!  And I’m going to make you pay attention! And what better way to do that than to make your hair fall out! Which is linked to your appearance, which is linked to your livelihood. Now you’re going to pay attention.’” 

During graduate school Crystle began studying NARM.  Crystle shares about her journey through learning NARM and eventually the NARM Therapist Training, and how she integrates NARM principles into her work with others and with herself.  She finds NARM to bring great hope, saying “I’ve given myself more permission to be a human by utilizing NARM and using its concepts. I think by doing that I’m also helping to reinforce the agency that my clients have.”  

We invite you to listen to the full episode and follow Transforming Trauma in Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app.

About Crystle:

Crystle Lampitt is a former TV journalist, turned licensed therapist and speaker. After years of struggling with mysterious health issues, chaotic relationships, and job burnout, she decided to look inward, dig deep, and change everything about her life. She now has a therapy practice in Kansas City and enjoys supporting others on their journeys to heal trauma and lead more meaningful lives. As an Indonesian-American, she is particularly interested in supporting the BIPOC community during a time of great collective trauma and pain.

Learn More:
http://clwellnesskc.com
Crystle’s TEDx:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6J7NGwnNgng
http://instagram.com/crystlelampitt
https://twitter.com/crystlelampitt
https://www.facebook.com/connectwithcrystle

In this episode of Transforming Trauma we connect with professor, author, and renowned psychoanalytic psychotherapist Nancy McWilliams, PhD. Nancy teaches psychoanalytic theory and therapy at the Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology at Rutgers–The State University of New Jersey. Nancy is also a senior analyst with the Institute for Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy of New Jersey and the National Psychological Association for Psychoanalysis.

Nancy’s genuine curiosity for trying to understand and help people has led her to a rich 50-year career where she has become a pioneer in the psychoanalytic/psychodynamic field. Her influential book, Psychoanalytic Diagnosis, was created in response to the significant change of direction of the DSM IV and has become a standard text in many training programs for psychotherapists in the United States and abroad. She has also authored numerous articles, book chapters and books on personality, psychotherapy, psychodiagnosis, sexuality, feminism, and contemporary psychopathologies. 

In this conversation, Nancy shares some of what she has learned from not only her research in the field of complex trauma, but the profound lessons she has learned from the clients who have opened up their worlds to her. 

Nancy also shares her earnest observations and personal experience of what it means to her to be a psychotherapist, gracefully acknowledging the challenges that therapists face in modern psychology. Reflecting on the changing landscape of psychotherapeutic approaches, and her objections to the “so-called evidence-based treatments”, she highlights the humanity in the psychotherapeutic relationship that centers around meeting clients where they are. She says, “you can’t go in with a position that you know, you know what you to do, you understand this, you’re going to apply something. You have to tolerate uncertainty and not knowing – a kind of moral equality with the patient, where we’re figuring it out together.  I have to learn from you, I’m not here to apply something to you.”

We are so very grateful to this pioneer in the field of psychodynamic psychotherapy for joining us and for her sharing how she brings heart and humanity into psychotherapeutic work.  We hope you will enjoy this episode with Nancy McWilliams, PhD.  

We invite you to listen to the full episode and follow Transforming Trauma in Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app.

Learn More:

Nancy McWilliams, PhD., ABPP 

Psychoanalytic Diagnosis Text

In this episode of Transforming Trauma, our host Emily is joined by the CEO of PACEs Connection, Ingrid Cockhren. PACEs Connection is a social network that connects organizations, systems, and communities who are implementing trauma-informed policies and practices, and positive and adverse childhood experience (PACEs) science. Ingrid is currently an adjunct professor specializing in Black psychology, developmental psychology, abnormal psychology and personality theory at Tennessee State University. 

Ingrid Cockhren has almost two decades of experience working with children and families and has dedicated her career to educating the public about the connection between adversity and poor health outcomes, including depression, anxiety, criminal behavior and incarceration. Ingrid shares, “the changes to the brain and body when you experience high levels of stress for a long period of time, especially during sensitive periods like childhood, matter.” ACEs, the adverse childhood experiences study, highlighted 10 categories of adversity that are connected to chronic illness and social issues, while PCEs, positive childhood experiences, foster resilience and prevention of adversity. She highlights the “Urban focus” Philadelphia Expanded ACE Study, which brought in an understanding of racism and poverty as ACEs as well. 

She shares that her own adverse experience as a survivor of childhood sexual abuse and her work with primarily black incarcerated youth brought her to complex trauma and historical trauma in particular. She entered academia with the question “Why do so many African American children end up in our juvenile justice system?” Considering black parenting styles, scientific colonialism, toxic stress, and intergenerational trauma, she makes the connection between adverse childhood experiences and the implications of historical trauma. Ingrid suggests that the solutions to the systemic issues are systemic as well. “Trauma and stress are baked into our system.” 

“As we talk about issues of race and poverty there is a definite push back on this narrative. (…) It has become political because of our past and it actually makes it harder for us to create positive environments in an equitable way.” Her work at PACEs Connection is centered around tracking outcomes of implementing trauma-informed practices within the justice system, healthcare corporations, schools, and governments. 

We invite you to listen to the full episode to hear more about Ingrid Cockhren’s work. We are deeply grateful for the opportunity to share a better understanding of nuanced and often polarizing concepts and how it relates to our work in healing complex trauma.

About Ingrid Cockhren:

Ingrid Cockhren graduated from Tennessee State University with a B.S. in psychology and from Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College with a M.Ed. in child studies specializing in minority and impoverished children. Her research areas are African American parenting styles, positive and adverse childhood experiences, historical trauma, intergenerational trauma, brain development, developmental psychology, and epigenetics. Cockhren’s experience includes juvenile justice, family counseling, early childhood education, professional development, consulting, and community education. She is currently an adjunct professor specializing in Black psychology, developmental psychology, abnormal psychology, and personality theory at Tennessee State University.

Learn More

www.pacesconnection.com
www.acestoohigh.com

“Our heartfelt desire is that the NeuroAffective Relational Model can support you and your clients and that this book will enhance the work you are all doing to heal our world.” – Laurence Heller and Brad Kammer, co-authors

In this bonus episode of Transforming Trauma, our host Emily is joined by NARM creator Dr. Laurence Heller and Senior NARM Trainer and Training Director Brad Kammer. Larry and Brad are co-authors of the new book, The Practical Guide for Healing Developmental Trauma: Using the NeuroAffective Relational Model to Address Adverse Childhood Experiences and Resolve Complex Trauma, which will be released on July 26th, 2022. 

Emily asks about the authors’ intention of writing the book. They share their intention is to help make learning about the NeuroAffective Relational Model more accessible to a greater number of people, for both clinicians and people learning for their own healing. Throughout their conversation, they share a sneak peek of what’s included in the book: self-reflective exercises, annotated session transcripts, and more. 

They share: “NARM is not just a clinical model for resolving complex trauma—it’s a blueprint for supporting relational health.”

Dr. Heller describes this new book as “the companion piece to the first book, Healing Developmental Trauma.” and shares that it focuses on the clinical aspects of the NeuroAffective Relational Model. 

Emily shares an endorsement from Dr. Gabor Maté, author of When the Body Says No: “This book, from two experienced and insightful practitioners, offers a thorough and clear guide to a modality of therapy far deeper than the prevailing cognitive and behavioral treatments. It is highly promising because it goes beyond the surface manifestations to the root causes and dynamics of human distress.”

We hope you will enjoy this episode with Dr. Heller and Brad sharing about their new book. We invite you to join us for the virtual book launch party to celebrate the new book on July 26th from 10 am – 11 am Pacific TIme. To RSVP, please go to www.narmtraining.com/booklaunchparty.

We invite you to listen to the full episode and follow Transforming Trauma in Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app.

About Dr. Larry Heller and Brad Kammer:

Dr. Laurence Heller is the creator of the NeuroAffective Relational Model (NARM), Senior Faculty member, International Trainer, and author. Brad Kammer, LMFT, LPCC, is a Somatic Psychotherapist and has worked in the field of trauma for over 20 years, specializing in working with Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD). 

Learn More and Pre-Order the Book!
http://www.narmtraining.com/books