Working with Childhood Memories and Avoidance in Trauma Counselling by Mikhailouskaya, Kate;

Short description:

Advocating for the active exploration of childhood memories and the natural avoidance that accompanies them, this book provides a clear entryway into complex and childhood trauma work, particularly in cases where tangled histories and overwhelming symptoms make it challenging for both counsellor and client to prioritize focus areas.

Long description:

Advocating for the active exploration of childhood memories and the natural avoidance that accompanies them, this book provides a clear entryway into complex and childhood trauma work, particularly in cases where tangled histories and overwhelming symptoms make it challenging for both counsellor and client to prioritize focus areas.

Childhood history often serves as a record and a preliminary foundation for therapeutic work, yet childhood memories rarely become substantial material for ongoing exploration. This leaves childhood ‘ghosts’ hidden, unattended, and unexplored, yet powerful drivers of psychological symptoms that keep individuals stuck and make trauma difficult to treat. To address this, Mikhailouskaya offers a trauma counselling framework built on two key pillars: working with early memories and actively engaging with the avoidance that naturally arises around them. Filled with actionable insights, strategies, and case examples, the text provides a roadmap for addressing hard-to-reach trauma cases and resolving key therapeutic dilemmas, such as balancing client choice with therapeutic expertise and navigating the tension between avoidance, clinical judgement, and the guidance needed to support recovery.

Designed to transcend any single therapeutic approach, this book is an engaging read for psychotherapists, counsellors, and mental health practitioners seeking to enhance their practice with a deeper understanding of the role memories and avoidance play in trauma recovery.

'This beautifully written, accessible book is an important addition to the literature on Complex Trauma. It highlights the importance of finding the impact of hidden trauma in many clinical presentations. It carefully navigates the reader into how such an exploration can be sensitively and therapeutically achieved. Emphasising the role of understandable avoidance in managing the trauma Mikhailouskaya clearly articulates, through many clinical examples, how the clinician can both appreciate and work with this avoidance. She describes how to release the ‘ghosts’ that can be buried in many of the presenting problems that are encountered in the consulting room. This is a must-have book for any mental health worker dealing in the delicate yet debilitating area of complex trauma.'

Peter Blake, child and adolescent psychotherapist, author of Making the Conscious Unconscious 

'Kate Mikhailouskaya writes fluently, clearly and directly about the challenges and rewards of assisting clients to work through their childhood trauma. Her style is direct and personal--essential for today's world in which students and beginning counsellors are often inadequately equipped to read complex professional material that is full of specialised (and sometimes pretentious) language. For those raised with the internet and 'reading' confined to short videos and a page or two of text online, Kate's writing will bridge the gap and conveys the essence of its challenging content without disguising it in jargon. Her willingness to draw upon her personal experience as both a therapist and a client is welcome. She does not shy away from difficult issues and the challenges of client resistance to 'going there', but by the same token, she offers reassurance and comfort to her reader. 'I have learned how to do this work effectively, and so can you!'

Hugh Crago, psychotherapist in private practice, formerly Senior Lecturer in Counselling, School of Social Sciences, Western Sydney University and author of Entranced by Story (Routledge, 2014), The Stages of Life (Routledge, 2017) and The Circle Unbroken (Allen & Unwin, 1999)

Table of Contents:

About the Cover

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Part 1: Childhood Focus: Exposing Hidden Trauma.

1. The Haunting Echoes of Childhood Ghosts

2. How Can Childhood Memories Be of Service?

3. The Invisible Trauma of ‘Unremarkable’ Childhoods

4. ‘What if?’ Keeping Ghosts in Their Closets

Part 2: The Power of Remembering: Working with Childhood Memories

5. Elusive Ghosts: Reporting Versus Zooming In

6. Pulling Ghosts from Their Closets

7. ‘What if?’ The Risks and Rewards of Remembering

Part 3: Avoidance Unmasked: How to Identify, Understand, and Respond Therapeutically

8. Humans and Their Natural Avoidance

9. The Taboos

10. Fear of Loss

11. Desire to Move On

12. ’What if?’ The Hidden Intelligence of Avoidance

Part 4: Therapy as a Chance to Heal. Give it your best shot! (Counsellor’s Role)

13. ‘Judge Judy’

14. Counsellor as an Active Participant

15. ‘What if?’ Exploring the Practitioner Responibility

Part 5: Therapy as a Chance to Heal. Give it your best shot! (Client’s Role)

16. Mental Health Services and Consumers

17. Raising a Capable Self-Parent

18. Counselling That Goes Beyond Appointments: Central, Not Sideline Task

19. ‘What if?’ The Heavy Demands of Trauma Work

20. Conclusion

Index