Historical/ Intergenerational Trauma

Did you know that, according to the EMDR Institute, there is biological evidence to suggest that intergenerational trauma is hereditary? The stress that comes from the trauma and adversity of generations before you CAN affect your stress. You are not your ancestors, and their story does not have to be your story. We can't control all the fucked up problems of the world, so let's focus on what is in OUR control. Let's work together to identify what advocacy looks like for you and heal.

As a Certified EMDR Therapist, I support individuals who have experienced various types of traumatic events and who are dealing with strong and distressing memories that have an impact on their lives.

Over the last several years, I have dedicated myself to understanding and studying historical trauma across the lifespan and how to begin the path of healing. Doing my own work around what being Indigenous and Jewish means to me today, I have come to find that acknowledgement of the past, integrating our intersectional identities to accept the whole of who we are, and addressing systemic injustice are just a few major keys in accessing the resilience that is already within us.

Most people think about trauma as a war or a near death experience, but in therapy we know that trauma is present when we see some specific symptoms that are usually results of an embodied, neuro-biological experience from a time where our brains and bodies were overwhelmed. In those moments it can seem like we don’t have access to the more philosophical and emotionally intelligent parts of ourselves.

Some of the deepest and most impactful work I do is with clients wanting to heal trauma from their families of origin. Clients receive an individualized approach. I use emotionally-focused talk therapy, principles of structural family therapy, and Brainspotting therapy to target intergenerational trauma. Clients often make huge strides in self-awareness and in the ability to participate more fully and authentically in their present lives.

All staff are people of color that participate and have completed training in this area as well.

For many of us, particularly those of us who are members of oppressed groups, the trauma we have experienced in this lifetime is only a piece of the puzzle. Our ancestors and the pain and unhealed wounds of their suffering can also be in our nervous systems, minds, bodies, and spirits affecting our psychological and physical health. I will always hold this truth in our work together and if you are interested we can explore those historical elements together.

Claudia was trained at the Ackerman Institute for the Family with a specialization in family systems theory. Claudia's approach to family therapy begins with a look at intergenerational patterns, and includes her expertise in trauma recovery.

Years of grappling with trauma has shown me something beautiful. Yes, we inherit post-traumatic stress. But we inherit post-traumatic growth too! We can rewire the ways our wise adaptive minds read information. Soothe the fear. Reeducate the vigilance. Keep potential trauma from becoming embedded. Trauma comes to our bodies through relationship, but healing does too. When we reshape how we safely show up in world, we heal & reveal our full Selves & pave the way for healthy whole-hearted children

Inner child work may help with those experiencing intergenerational trauma. Inner child work helps explore unprocessed childhood emotions and feelings that currently impact one’s life and understanding, managing, and/or reducing triggers. One desire for inner child work may be to identify wounded areas and/or unmet needs of the child, learn to advocate, protect, or show compassion for the child, create a safe enough space to invite the child to play, and integrate the child with the adult self.

I can provide EMDR therapy

Even before I became a therapist, my personal family recovery taught me the power of intervening on cycles of abuse/neglect and misinformation. Brainspotting and Internal Family Systems therapy are powerful healing modalities to address childhood trauma, even if it goes back many generations.

Indigenous practices have been around and utilized for centuries yet, due to cultural stigma, erasure, and genocide, many of these practices have been lost or not deemed acceptable within our Eurocentric mental health profession. The act of reindigenizing mental health is the effort to replace the current systems with culturally specific, culturally sustainable, and culturally appropriate mental health and well-being practices developed and passed on among indigenous people.

If you have historical trauma/ intergenerational trauma that continues to haunt you and you would like to work through it. Art therapy and energy medicine can be very helpful in addressing and releasing historical trauma. I work with my clients to create a safe space and give them tools so that we can address old traumas in a kind and gentle way that respects your body, mind and spirit.

More new information is emerging about the effects of trauma on health & wellbeing. PTSD and CPTSD (complex - PTSD due to years of abuse/neglect) is when we feel hi-jacked by our senses/body connecting us back to past events that were (or seemed) life threatening. These experiences can be from Domestic abuse, events/accidents related to the lifestyle of substance abuse, and from chronic traumatic/neglectful childhood experiences. There is hope for recovery. It is time for you to heal.

Trauma can derive from obvious, horrific events, as well as from universal ones such as having been raised by a critical parent. In other words, what determines trauma is its impact, not the event(s) itself. Upsetting experiences - even forgotten ones - can get lodged in our nervous systems and stimulated in subsequent, parallel circumstances. Trauma treatment, including EMDR, can help clients adaptively process past experiences to prevent them from getting re-triggered in the present.