Category: violent conflict

TFT Relieves Veteran’s PTSD

Charles G. Hayward, Sr., tells how he finally found relief with TFT after many years of suffering from war-related trauma:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PM6u_t9Cxn8&hd=1&rel=0]

Local Rwandan TFT Therapists Relieving Trauma

We would like to share with you reports by ATFT Foundation-trained TFT therapists at the IZERE Center for Peace and Reconciliation in Rwanda:

“When we observe change in the lives of the people we are treating using TFT, we really feel a deep joy in our hearts and all this is because of your generosity which pushed you to think about us, and your love for us, that led you to decide to send again the team from the USA to train Rwandan therapists who are now doing their best to help people using TFT.”

“What is pleasing us the most is that after the departure of the team from USA, now many people are coming every day at IZERE CENTER to be treated, the average number being 30 people a day, and we are trying our best to treat them and finish them all.”

“Thank you for TFT which we are using to heal the people.”

“Those who are treated tell us that TFT helps so much and do not cause any danger to them; this because our clients fully participate in what is being done to them by tapping where we tell them to tap according to their problem. We also see ourselves that their facial expressions change drastically after treatment. They do not remain the same as before treatment. We see that they are happy again and confident. We are happy and empowered when we observe such great change in the lives of suffering people. There is nothing better than seeing somebody smiling again after so many years without smiling. Many of them became our friends.”

“Many Persons are excited too about TFT, and they have shown interest in our work. They know we are there and we are working for the good of our nation. We are constantly in touch with them so that we can always carry out our work publicly. And The IZERE Center is becoming the model of social center in our District. Our dreams are to see TFT growing bigger and reach as many people who need it as possible. The work we do speak itself and makes us known even without our notice. After the training of the trainers, we will be able to make sure our dreams.”

“Many Rwanda citizens are living with trauma and other Psychological problem because of the genocide and the war, the poverty. Consequently, there is a really a big need for services like these for many Rwandan people. Thank you very much.”

There are still hundreds of thousands of yet untreated genocide survivors who suffer from PTSD in Rwanda. The Rwandans need to be trained as TFT trainers so they can train others to use TFT in their homeland. This year the ATFT Foundation will be training four lead therapists from Byumba and Kigali to become TFT trainers themselves.

They will be brought to Hawaii for an intensive month-long training. As part of this training, the Rwandans will train 16-20 therapists over two days. They will then supervise the Hawaiian trainees in their own pro-bono clinics that serve needy populations.

Please consider helping the ATFT Foundation with this project. If you are able to donate funds to this effort, please click here. If you can donate needed United Airlines mileage for flying the Rwandan therapists to their training in Hawaii, please e-mail sheila@atft.org.

The Power of TFT

The following article is from “David Baldwin’s Trauma Information Pages”  and was written by Charles R. Figley, PhD,  Director of the Tulane University (formerly of Florida State University) Traumatology Institute. On behalf of the institution, he is editor in chief for Traumatology, the field’s independent, peer-reviewed, scientific/medical journal.

Charles R. Figley, PhD

Psychosocial Stress Research Program & Clinical Laboratory
Florida State University
Tallahassee, FL 32306-4097
June 27, 1995

Dear Colleagues,
As some of you may recall, I sent out early last year, via Internet and other media, nominations from clinicians about approaches that appeared to offer a “cure” for PTSD. I had become frustrated that, although we knew a great deal about the etiology, incidence and prevalence of PTSD, there was no known cure. My intention was to find a cure. and if one could not be found, build upon those offering the best hope for providing one.

Thanks to the help of colleagues all over the world, we were able to find four approaches that appeared to hold great promise for reaching our goal. We were so impressed with them that we invited the innovators of these approaches to our clinical laboratory for a week to participate in our systematic clinical demonstration study. The primary purpose of their visit was to treat our clients, while meeting with our Tallahassee clinical practitioner colleagues prior to and following their work here. The Four approaches we studied were: Traumatic Incident Reduction, Visual Kinesthetic Dissociation, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, and Thought Field Therapy (TFT).

Here I would like to tell you about one of the four approaches. I do this not because we are suggesting that it is better than any other approach. All four of the approaches we investigated generated impressive results. But TFT stood out from all other approaches of which I am aware because of five reasons:

  1. It is extraordinarily powerful, in that clients receive nearly immediate relief from their suffering and the treatment appears to be permanent.
  2. It can be taught to nearly anyone so that clients can not only treat themselves, but treat others affected.
  3. It appears to do no harm.
  4. It does not require the client to talk about their troubles, something that often causes more emotional pain and discourages many for seeking treatment.
  5. It is extremely efficient (fast and long-lasting).

In this brief space I would like to describe how it works in sufficient detail to permit you to try it yourself. By doing so, my hope is that the necessary work of clinical research will begin in as many laboratories as possible. It is only after the difficult work of science in testing the utility of the approach and an explanation for its effectiveness will it be sanctioned by our fields and utilized extensively. And, then, will we have a chance of realizing the full potential of this important discovery.

Dr. Figley then describes how to use the basic TFT trauma algorithm and invites colleagues to join him as “collaborative investigators” into the effects of TFT.

 

TFT Transforming the Wounds of Genocide

By Caroline Sakai, PhD, TFT-VT:

2010 ATFT Foundation Deployment to Byumba and Kigali in Rwanda

The Rwandan community leaders in Byumba who were trained as TFT therapists in 2009 and 2010 have treated over 2000 people in their community. The Izere Center has established an ATFT Rwanda branch, and TFT treatment offices that are manned by volunteers and part-time practitioners twice a week treat an average of 30 people a day with TFT on those treatment days.

In the Bishop Servillien Nzakamwita of Byumba Diocese’s opening reception, a government official noted that traveling down the streets he noted that the people of the sector had changed from depressed and not working, not smiling, not waving—to being productive and positive, smiling and waving and greeting each other since the ATFT team had been there the previous year and the TFT treatments of trauma had commenced.

This year the ATFT Foundation team led by Suzanne Connolly included Caroline Sakai, Cyndie Quinn and Gary Quinn. Caroline Sakai and the team did a review and abbreviated diagnostic training for the 33 therapists trained in 2009.

Suzanne Connolly led an algorithm training for 34 new therapists. The 2009 and 2010 therapists were all community leaders selected from orphanages, education, clergy, social work, psychology, business, police, nursing, government service, and others by Father Jean Marie Vianney Dushimiyimana of Izere Center, principle priest of Nyinawimana Parish and Brother Augustine Nzabonimana.

Then both the previously trained and the newly trained Rwandan therapists treated 603 people from the community who were suffering from 667 traumas and related issues. For the 667 traumas and related issues the mean SUD before treatment was 8.4, and the mean SUD after treatment was 0.2. The median SUD pre-treatment was 9, and the median SUD post-treatment was 0. There were 518 females and 82 males treated.

The major problems treated were trauma, anger, rage, fear, sadness, grief, pain, anxiety, depression, guilt, shame, and phobia. For a few of the people who were treated that had more complex issues that algorithms did not fully address, the Rwandan therapists who had the diagnostic level training treated them with supportive supervision. The ATFT Foundation team provided supervision as needed.

Additionally some villagers who were treated the year before just came by to express their appreciation for having TFT in their lives, as they were no longer suffering from trauma, rage, anger, fear, guilt, and pain symptoms.

In Kigali previously trained therapists did a review, and new therapists were trained. Also many of the participants of the PTSD research project done in 2008 returned to do a two year follow-up on the same assessment measures. Many of the participants spontaneously shared about their progress over the past two years since treatment of their traumas and related issues.

As the forgiveness and reconciliation efforts to reintegrate the Rwandan community have been in progress for a few years now, a number of Rwandans mentioned wishing that they had had the tools of TFT earlier to help with healing the wounds of trauma, calming and fears and anxiety, and working through the rage, resentment and anger that many harbored deep within despite their many attempts to think, talk, wish and pray them away.

They expressed their gratitude at having more means of healing the hurts, resolving the rage, facilitating the restitution and reconciliation efforts, reaffirming their faith, and restoring their hope. For the ATFT team, it further encouraged our convictions voiced so clearly by the Rwandans one after another, that TFT must be made more widely available to help all genocide survivors, all who have suffered from large-scale trauma.

 

YOU Can Help Relieve Suffering from Trauma in Rwanda

In August, 2009, Dr. Caroline Sakai and Suzanne Connolly led an ATFT Foundation Trauma Relief Team to teach community leaders in Rwanda to use TFT to help their fellow Rwandans.

This training took place at the IZERE Center for Peace and Reconciliation in Byumba, and 36 community leaders were trained over a period of two days. The newly trained Rwandan therapists then treated over 200 of their countrymen and women for symptoms of trauma, and continue to do so today with the support of the ATFT Foundation.

The Foundation is completely supported by donations and has established a sponsorship program to help support the Rwandan therapists. Sponsors will be able to get personal reports, handled through the ATFT Foundation, from their adopted therapist. The cost to sponsor one full-time therapist for one year is $2000; $300 for a part-time therapist for one year; or $150 for a part-time therapist for six months. This is a powerful opportunity to make a stand for world peace!

If you’d like to sponsor a therapist, or learn more about this program, contact sheila @ atft.org. To see a summary of self-reports (translated into English) by the Rwandan therapists three months following the ATFT Foundation training team’s departure, click here.