Dr Bessel van der Kolk is a clinician, researcher, and teacher who has spent his professional life studying how children and adults adapt to traumatic experiences.

He specialises in translating emerging findings from neuroscience and attachment research to develop and study a range of effective treatments for traumatic stress and developmental trauma in children and adults.

He is the author of the New York Times Bestseller: The Body Keeps the Score, the Founder of Trauma Center in Boston, and currently serves as President of the Trauma Research Foundation.

In this conversation, we explore:

— The role that neurofeedback can play in healing developmental trauma

— Dr van der Kolk’s study examining the effects of MDMA on PTSD

— The essential difference between those who were traumatised by the 9-11 attacks and those who weren’t

— How developmental trauma leads to deficits in sensory integration areas of the brain and the most effective treatments for addressing this.

And more.

You can learn more about Dr van der Kolk’s work by going to: https://traumaresearchfoundation.org/

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Bessel van der Kolk MD spends his career studying how children and adults adapt to traumatic experiences, and has translated emerging findings from neuroscience and attachment research to develop and study a range of treatments for traumatic stress in children and adults.

In 1984, he set up one of the first clinical/research centers in the US dedicated to study and treatment of traumatic stress in civilian populations, which has trained numerous researchers and clinicians specializing in the study and treatment of traumatic stress, and which has been continually funded to research the impact of traumatic stress and effective treatment interventions. He has focused on studying treatments that stabilize physiology, increase executive functioning and help traumatized individuals to feel fully alert to the present. ​

His efforts resulted in the establishment of Trauma Center (now the Trauma Research Foundation) that consisted of a well-trained clinical team specializing in the treatment of children and adults with histories of child maltreatment, that applied treatment models that are widely taught and implemented nationwide, a research lab that studied the effects of neurofeedback and MDMA on behavior, mood, and executive functioning, and numerous trainings nationwide to a variety of mental health professional, educators, parent groups, policy makers, and law enforcement personnel.

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3 Books Dr van Der Kolk Recommends Every Therapist Should Read:

— John Bowlby - Attachment and Loss - https://amzn.to/4bOd3NK

— Daniel Stern - The Interpersonal World of the Infant - https://amzn.to/4e1aTf8

— Ed Tronick - The Neurobehavioral and Social-Emotional Development of Infants and Children (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology) - https://amzn.to/459qIwa