3-Step Rewind
For Birth Trauma
Was your birth, pregnancy or post-partum period not as you’d hoped, traumatic even?
Trauma, difficult feelings about an event or upsetting memories, however you label it, is/are invariably determined by how an individual perceives an experience rather than the type of birth they had (in this instance) or what actually happened during an event or over a period of time.
As induvials, the way we define ‘trauma’ is entirely personal and where one birth may look ideal to outsiders, to the person involved it could feel entirely different. And those feelings are entirely valid.
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What is Trauma?
When we are in distress, our fight or flight response is triggered in our amygdala (the part of our brain that processes fearful and threatening stimuli).
This cuts off our neocortex (thinking brain).
Usually when we realise we’re no longer in danger, the connection with our neocortex is re-established and we are able to return to the opposite state - rest and relaxation.
When a traumatic event occurs however, this reconnection is hindered and the function of the hippocampus (the part responsible for processing memory) is also blocked.
This results in the emotions experienced at the time of the distressing event becoming inextricably linked to the memory of the event, which is unable to be processed and properly stored in the brain.
Often any reminder of the event triggers the fight or flight response again and causes the event to be relived.
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Consider your brain a large office building with lots of departments.
The traumatic event enters the foyer of the building but remains there, rather than being filed into the long-term memory department.
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Constant replaying or flashbacks of the event, anxiety, actively avoiding the memory, hyper-vigilance, trouble sleeping, emotional distress and irritability can deeply affect a person’s confidence and resilience and even get in the way of having more children in the future.
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Would you like to release those uncomfortable feelings and move forward?
What is The 3-Step Rewind?
The 3-Step Rewind was developed from the Fast Phobia Cure (a simple yet highly effective NLP technique) and subsequently broadened into a trauma resolution process.
Neutralising the strong emotions associated with the 'difficult memory', this gentle and effective technique works in a way that enables you to keep the narrative of what happened whilst releasing those overwhelming, uncomfortable or distressing feelings.
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The technique can provide relief of trauma symptoms, persisting months or even years following an event, after 2 or 3 sessions, with many reporting a significant reduction or total elimination of troubling feelings.
The process is divided into three sessions delivered over three weeks, in person or via Zoom.
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3-Step Rewind Session Content
Session One
Laying the Foundations
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I will start by explaining the technique and then invite you to tell your story should you wish (this is entirely optional, I do not need to hear it and we can work just as effectively, content free).
We will then work on eliciting a goal state (how you'd like to feel about the event) and finish the session with a guided relaxation.
This session is designed to help you feel comfortable and relaxed with me and to evoke feelings of relaxation to avoid enforcing feelings of trauma.
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Session Two
The Rewind
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After checking with you following the first session, we will complete the rewind component of the process during which I will regularly check that you are feeling calm and safe.
I will guide you through a relaxation to experience a large TV/Film screen in which you will “play” the memory on the screen forwards and backwards, from 3 different perspectives (double-dissociated, dissociated and associated). There will then be an opportunity to ‘release’ or ‘let go of’ that old version of the memory within the visualisation after which we will work on future pacing into the desired goal state as discussed in Session One.
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Session Three
Reframing and Building the Future
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This session is usually the shortest session and will start with me checking how you’ve been feeling since the rewind session ensuring you’ve achieved the changes you desired.
I will then lead you in a guided relaxation to help strengthen those positive changes for the future using reframing and future pacing.
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