Academic paper

Running head: THERAPY 1

THERAPY 2

Nisha Jasani

PSY-10000-14

Prof. Paul Coutinho

Date: November 7, 2021

Psychotherapy for Childhood Trauma Case Study

Part 1: Case Study

Benjamin is a young and troubled man whose life problems arise from the exceptionally challenging environment he was brought up. The trauma he suffered has consequently subjected him to experience low self-esteem. While Benjamin was still little, his family contributed to the increment in the mental challenges that he is suffering from today. For instance, Benjamin's mother blurred his view about women because she consistently dominated his father, and Benjamin was not an exception. As a result, Benjamin developed a negative attitude towards his father, and he described him as passive and weak, through which he could see his future life as a father who was going through the same thing. Also, during his childhood, Benjamin was never provided with an opportunity that he could use to explore his potential, and he lived under the shadow of his elder brothers and sisters. He was considered the black sheep of the family, and his parents, especially her mother, made it clear that he was the black sheep by using hurtful words that he says hurt him to date. As a result, the main cause of acceptance problems that Benjamin is experiencing can be blamed for what his mother did to him while he was little.

As he got older, Benjamin stated that the issues became even bigger and more compounded that he felt that they were running out of control. A good example is his ex-wife, who was extremely controlling and dictating, similar to what his mother was. Afterwards, Benjamin has come that he needs to be somewhere else at this particular point in his life and not the 25-year-old sophomore in college. Benjamin is always ready to go down in almost every aspect of his life, and he has all the motivation and encouragement he needs to continue moving on with his life. Still, he easily gives up and feels a sense of worthlessness whenever someone states something negative about what he was doing. Although he is appearing to get balance with his life by recovering from the actions of his family and the ex-wife, he still needs to recapture the old feelings that would act as the main hindrance to his current attempts to become a more pleasant and generally happy individual. Currently, he is also trying to find ways to love other people while holding the same amount of love for himself. Apart from that, Benjamin agreed to constantly abuse drugs and alcohol as they make him feel not alone. In reality, he says that consuming these substances has significantly encouraged him to develop destructive behavior. Benjamin has a business he terms as "Unfinished business", which comprises majorly of the feelings of resentment on how he treated and perceived his father. In reality, he was doing everything he could to bear his mother's over possessiveness.

To make matters worse, he is turning this resentment into himself, which have destroyed his inner self. In general, the blame he puts on himself has made him feel dumb and stupid whenever he is around other people, and he even says that when he is alone at night, he agrees to feel as if he has died from his inside. All these traumas combining are weakening his ability to function like other normal men his age, and his great desire is to get someone who will not be overbearing and expounds the fact that he also wants to interact with people who are in a position to enable him to bring the best out of himself.

Part 2: Intervention

Psychoanalysis Therapy

Psychoanalytic therapy, in this case, will be suitable for Benjamin since he needs to attract along with many changes and improvements in his life by accepting how past events are affecting him now. With this strategy, the counsellor will allow Benjamin to talk a lot about the events that he believes were significant and make him feel that he would be triumphant someday while I do the listening. This is because psychoanalysis takes the perspective of assisting the patient by providing treatment right from the role the unconscious feelings and events in his childhood played a significant role in shaping him to the individuals I know today, which is the case with Benjamin. Although he must have met people perceived to be valuable, his self-worth was still broken by the memories of what his mother said about him. With psychoanalysis, the counsellor will provide Benjamin with an opportunity that he can use to narrate his experiences in life, which could be contributing to his problems. Here, the treatment tools that will be applicable will include the free association, which will provide him with an ample opportunity that he can utilize to talk about everything that comes into his mind without posing any judgement. The counsellor must also ensure that The counsellor does not censor any memory.

With this treatment, the counsellor will provide Benjamin with an opportunity to speak his mind out and enable him to go back into his normal state of mind so that the counsellor can determine the impact of any other underlying problems. To cater extensive background that will provide us with better income, the counsellor will also combine free association with tools such as therapeutic transference. This will provide a stable medium through which Benjamin can connect his thoughts and feelings linked to the key figures of his life, which is his mother and siblings. After creating this connection, the counsellor will transfer this knowledge to how Benjamin interacts with the people in his current life and determine how he manages stressful situations, which will help predict his ability to control what is going on in his mind. Interpretation is an important element in psychoanalytic therapy that entails reading between the lines and interpreting the underlying situation from the information provided by the client. Even if the counsellor role is to ask questions and follow up with everything that is going around his life, encouraging him to continue by providing case studies of the people from previous interactions with the case to let him know he is not alone. The counsellor will want to learn more about the contents of his dreams to assess the best type of medication to administer to restore him to reality since dreams form a significant part of the subconscious mind. In his opinion, his dreams are usually full of images of him killing himself, and this is a key point that will point out the extent of his brain has been affected by this trauma. The goal of this paper is to assist Benjamin through psychoanalytic, behavioristic and humanistic therapies.

Behavioristic Therapy

Benjamin fits the behavioral therapy as he is constantly Benjamin putting himself in self-doubt or self-blaming and is always haunted by the past events that keep him in the circle of depression (Gelso, Williams, & Fretz, 2014). Additionally, Benjamin is miserable and sometimes fantasizes about killing himself. The behavioristic treatment will be effective in this case because it will help Benjamin take off his negative thinking and replace them with positive ways of thinking. This will be helpful in his way of thinking and change his simple way of acting. This type of therapy is that Benjamin will change his perception that he is worthless and weak into him seeing himself as someone worthy and strong man. Also, there will be a change in his everyday behavior as he will no longer use alcohol and drugs.

Treatment Plan

The counsellor first task concerning the treatment plan is to try to replace the negative self-statements that Benjamin has, they include; “I feel hopeless and that I’d be better off dead” “I feel guilty that I haven’t worked up to the counsellor potential, that I’ve been a failure.” This is because imprecise language is one of the main causes of distorted thinking processes. As such, Benjamin should learn that words such as "should, must, ought" can be replaced by the preferences that can help him behave and think differently. This emotive technique will provide a cathartic experience to Benjamin and help him change some of his behaviors, thoughts, and emotions (Hofmann, Asmundson, & Beck, 2013). Also, the counsellor will use humor, shame-attacking practices, role-playing and use of force and vigor to ensure that Benjamin is not upset over the negative events.

In ensuring successful use of the behavioristic therapy regarding the counsellor treatment plan, the counsellor will also create a form of collaborative working relationship with Benjamin that will help recognise and change the self-defeating thoughts and maladaptive thoughts inherent in his mind. This will help him re-conceptualise the problems he is facing in a manner that will increase his chances of finding the solutions. This will be achieved through educating him on the importance of examining his automatic thoughts, self-talk and other negative thoughts (Dobson, & Dobson, 2016). This is because negative thoughts are the main causes of many problems, including depression, anxiety, and addiction. Through this behavioristic therapy, Benjamin will understand Benjamin’s mind the negative thinking and develop a healthier way of thinking that can be vital that can be incorporated into his life.

Humanistic Therapy

This therapy treatment is appropriate for Benjamin's case since most of the problems that brought him to the counselling facility are obvious. He has experienced constant neglect, emotional trauma. He has also developed an addiction to drugs and alcohol. His behavior is running out of his control as he is trying extremely hard to gain acceptance. Personal counselling, in this case, will thus be beneficial as it will play a huge role in creating an environment where Benjamin will feel comfortable to actualize himself and gain awareness on why he is the way he is and work towards improving himself. This is important because His elder siblings have overshadowed benjamin throughout his life, which made it impossible to identify what he could do best in his life. He has been blinded by resentment, which he all directs to himself. This treatment will work well with Benjamin because he is a sophomore in college which means he will not require multicultural allowance to get assistance. Instead, he will be able to have a space where he can actualize who he is. The counsellor helps him see how he can slowly but consistently integrate the motivation and encouragement he has developed recently about his life. During the counselling session, the counsellor should be ready to modify their therapy strategies when dealing with clients from different cultures, which is the case with Benjamin since he is a Mexican-American. However, the counsellor will still uphold the client-centred therapy, which does not use any inflexible techniques. It provides an ample opportunity for the client to control the therapy and take it in the direction they feel confident expressing themselves. The therapist will not require to employ major shifts in practice. They can continue with what they know that will be best and effective for their clients.

On the issues that pertain to ethical issues surrounding the counselling that is oriented on the client, the counsellor will not have to worry much since the ethical burden is not on their side. All they have to do is to ensure that the client will get the best he can acquire from the therapy in the long run. The therapy outcome will revolve around what the client wants to achieve, which does not mean the humanistic therapy is bulletproof at this point. This is because many clients nowadays are seeking a therapist who can diagnose them using diagnostic tests and techniques that specialize particularly on the client's problems and provide them with empowerment options that they can rely on for effective recovery (Wolfe, 2016). Therefore, it will be upon the counsellor when applying this outcome to ensure that they are putting in the client's informed consent that describes the expectations along with the limitations that they will be encountered by using this counselling technique.

Treatment Plan

Benjamin is in the middle of a mental breakdown as he describes that he feels as if he is dying from inside, given the history of his abuse when young. Instead of getting help after growing up, he experienced the same sort of trauma with his ex-wife. Benjamin suffers from mental dysfunction and emotional breakdown as he agrees to experience these problems daily, especially where he has to interact with his peers in college or develop any functional relationship with new women. After an extended period of self-hatred, Benjamin has indulged himself in drug and alcohol abuse. He states that although they make him forget for a while of his life problems, they have played a key role in increasing his behavior change as he is now more aggressive than before. Benjamin feels that his mother played a significant role in manipulating him to change his opinion about his father as he was quiet and passive while his mother was dictating similar to what his ex-wife had done, which made him develop even more hatred towards women. With the trauma building up consistently after many years, Benjamin has reached a point where he is feeling that he is not in the right class of people even if he has developed a lot of motivation and positive inspiration about life to keep away the evil thoughts that are showing him that he should kill himself (Whitton, 2003). Currently, Benjamin needs an individual who can hear him out and understand him the way he is and show him love which he has been denied since he was little. Humanistic therapy will thus help him accomplish what he needs through elements such as compassion by getting a room where he can feel safe expressing his life problems and having an ear to listen to him and hold his hand through it all. The second element to improve his personality will be congruence, which involves the therapist providing him with a realistic world by replicating the same level of honesty that Benjamin has portrayed while narrating what he has been through. With transparency, the therapist will create an environment where he can base his perspective to provide Benjamin with the help he is looking for from a personal approach. The last element that this treatment will use is unconditional positive regard by accepting the client for who he is and working with him to become a better person and develop positive relationships with those around him. Also, with positive regard, Benjamin will be able to erase the resentment he has held against himself for a long time and instead develop a habit of actualizing his abilities while promoting personal growth.

Part 3: Living a productive and successful life

With these approaches, Benjamin will likely get the help he needs from humanistic therapy because it focuses on creating an actual world which is important for interpersonal interaction. The difficulty, in this case, is creating an environment that will allow for interpersonal interaction because he is from a different culture than the therapist. On the other hand, behavioristic therapy might be inappropriate for Benjamin's case because this approach is not able to solve complex cases of mental illnesses that have been ongoing for quite some time. For Benjamin, this trauma has been living with him since his childhood, and therefore it won't be easy to make a verdict based on his current behavior. Lastly, Benjamin will not react well with the psychoanalytic approach since it involves retrieving memories that he had decided to forget, thus hurting him in the long run.

Benjamin can live a healthy life after therapy is to embracing himself around the people who are willing to bring the best out of him by positively influencing him. Also, these friends should walk with him on the journey of quitting drug and alcohol abuse, enabling him to control his emotions, thus reducing aggressiveness in his behavior. Lastly, he should learn to forgive and let bygones be bygones since what happened in his earlier life does not determine the destiny of the individual he is about to be in his future.

References

Dobson, D., & Dobson, K. S. (2016). Evidence-based practice of cognitive-behavioral therapy. Guilford Publications.

Gelso, C. J., Williams, E. N., & Fretz, B. R. (2014). Counseling Psychology. Third Edition. Washington, DC: American Psychology Association

Hofmann, S. G., Asmundson, G. J., & Beck, A. T. (2013). The science of cognitive therapy. Behavior therapy, 44(2), 199-212

Whitton, E. (2003). Humanistic approach to psychotherapy. Whurr Publishers.

Wolfe, B. E. (2016). Existential-humanistic therapy and psychotherapy integration: A commentary.

Grading Rubrics

Part 1

Creative Title (5)

1. Background Information: (8)

Write out the relevant factors such as age, gender, family and social relationships, drug and alcohol history, life difficulties, goals and coping skills and weaknesses etc. etc. 

2. Presenting Problem (10)

Describe the problems or symptoms that called for a therapeutic intervention: for example, a. The client’s complaint of any physical, emotional or behavior problems. Thoughts, feelings and perceptions related to the symptoms. b. Describe the problems and symptoms of the client observed by family and friends.

3. Diagnosis (7)

State your diagnosis. Explain your conclusion based on the symptoms or criteria given in your text book or DSM 5. 

Part 2: Intervention

Describe the specific methods that each therapist would use with your client.

1. Psychoanalytical Approach (10)

2. Cognitive-Behavioral (CBT) Approach (10)

3. Humanistic Approach (10)

Part 3: Living a productive and successful life

(Continue to write this part in the third person)

1. Critique of the three types of intervention in this case: (15)

Describe how your client would respond to each therapist and the effectiveness of the treatment approach. Note the difficulties and successes encountered by your client with each therapist.

2. Best Treatment Plan (write in the third person): (20)

Develop the best treatment plan for your client. Describe the client’s reaction to the treatment and the end result of this approach. Explain why this treatment was successful.

3. Provide helps to prevent a relapse and tips for your client to live a healthy life. (5)

Nisha,

It would have helped if you used the grading rubrics as your outline for this paper and looked at the Sample Paper that I posted. You have missed out the most important part of this paper, namely, the Diagnosis. You do not have the Presenting Problems, the Critique of the three therapies and the Overall treatment.

Peace

Paul