Chronic Traumatic History Recap Copy

CCT Phase 2 began with the life timeline and trauma narrative(s) created in Sessions 4–5. 

The life timeline maps out all the events from the child’s life in order to place their traumatic events in the context of their life and to help them understand their allostatic load.

The trauma narrative(s) focuses specifically on the child’s traumatic experience(s). The child shares their traumatic experiences in a story format to help them process and organize them so that they can be transferred from the more primitive, emotional part of the brain to the more sophisticated, cognitive part. Initially, the therapist acts like a reporter, prompting the child to tell the story but refraining from intervening too early. Later, the therapist clarifies missing information to elaborate on emotions, cognitive distortions, cues, and filling in memory gaps.

Further elaboration and processing of the emotions and the cognitive distortions identified within the trauma narrative(s) will occur in Sessions 6–7. The cues identified will be addressed during exposure in Sessions 9–12.