This past year has been a watershed of crisis emergency for children and families across the globe—the pandemic of COVID-19, loss of loved ones, unemployment, financial downturn, displacement of families, homelessness, increased natural disasters, racial discrimination, among others. For children and caretakers, these trauma experiences can have a lasting impact encoding deep within their bodies and cognitive and emotional processes. Mental health practitioners have seen a dramatic upsurge in clients suffering from increased anxiety, depression, isolation, somatic symptoms, domestic violence, and suicidal ideation. Many of these issues can cause disruptions in parent-child attachment relationships and within intergenerational family systems.

Presented from an informed neuroscience perspective, this webinar will examine attachment-based expressive and body-oriented play therapy approaches to heal the complex and shock traumas facing children and families. Participants will learn several resiliency focused approaches to repair relational trauma and disconnection. Drawing upon the wisdom of the body, participants will learn how nurturing touch parent-child play therapy interventions can enhance and repair attachment relationships, increase a neuroception of safety, decrease anxious states, and foster co-regulation. Specifically, participants will be introduced to an embodied Ericksonian-based therapeutic approach developed by Dr. Courtney, called FirstPlay® Kinesthetic Storytelling. Additionally, through experiential engagement, participants will learn several play therapy and expressive arts strategies to interrupt trauma-reactive patterns and to formulate new narratives of connection and healing. Creating a holding space of presence, practitioners will learn ways to stimulate the Vagus Nerve impacting the parasympathetic nervous system by guiding parents and children in self-soothing and mindfulness activities to regulate arousal states FirstPlay® Kinesthetic Storytelling. In addition, participants will learn, through a series of experiential activities, numerous strategies focused on the Play Therapy and the use of expressive arts, aimed at blocking patterns of reactivity to trauma and developing new narratives of connection and healing. Through the creation of a supportive space of presence, therapists will learn new ways to stimulate the vagus nerve - which profoundly affects the parasympathetic nervous system - by guiding children and parents in activities focused on self-consolation and healing. mindfulnessin order to regulate their activation states.

*Note, as many practitioners are now seeing clients virtually, the interventions presented will include a discussion on how they can be adapted to tele-health or in-person sessions.