Visual Aids

Here are the visual aids that I use with my clients and consultees. Each of them is hand-printed in magic marker on a 2 by 3 foot piece of drawing paper. I often pull one out for a client, propped up behind me and say nothing about it. Sometimes, I will pick up a page and go through it step by step with a client. Two modalities can be more useful than one.

For the Anxiety Disorder types:

STAGES of GRIEF:
SHOCK/UNREALITY
ANGER/REGRET
HOPELESS/SAD
INTEGRATING
INTEGRATED
"READY FOR MORE PUNISHMENT" (after a breakup, according to Matt Groening)

RULES OF GRIEF

1.Grief always hurts more than you think it should.
2. It always hurts for far longer than you think it should.
3. Grief sucks and has nothing good to recommend it. 
It makes you tired: Sleep more.
It makes you cranky. Be mindful of the people you're around.
It makes you stupid. It's not permanent.
It can make you think that you suck or the world sucks. It's lying.
4. After a while, the acute phase passes and you merely miss the person.

STAGES OF HEALING AFTER TRAUMA:

SCARED/ASHAMED
ANGRY
SAD
MAKING SENSE OF IT
INTEGRATED 

SYMPTOMS OF PTSD:

ANXIETY
NIGHTMARES
JITTERS
CRANKY
HAIR-TRIGGER
AVOIDANT OF ANYTHING THAT REMINDS YOU
WEEPY
LACK OF TRUST
INTRUSIVE THOUGHTS, SENSATIONS and/or IMAGES

I also have a drawing of Onno van der Hart's chart about Sommatoform Dissociation, but I can't figure out how to show it to you. I'll explain it to you when I review his new book, The Haunted Self,in a few months.

If you have words or images that you find useful, please share them here. Comments are welcome.

Comments

[John in Cincy]

Robin,

I'll compensate for our friend Tom Cloyd's posting lengh by simply saying, thanks, for the visual aids:

Feelings ≠ Reality

and

Anxiety ≠ Danger

I'll be borrowing them at my next group.

[Robin Shapiro]

Thanks, John,
What kind of group do you do?
Robin

[Jonathan Kandell]

One that comes to mind I saw in my colleague's office:
DO YOUR ACTIONS SUPPORT YOUR THOUGHTS?

[Robin Shapiro]

Johnathan. I like that. I might make it shorter. "Let Actions Support Thoughts".
Thanks.