So I was flying home this afternoon from my usual work in community with First Nations Australians. Reflecting on my short life of 37 years. Then I thought of a cool question to ask. What’s something funny, beautiful or quirky that you have experienced from trauma? 1/14
I’ll go first. So during my first episode of Psychosis I decided I had enough with civilisation. I sold all my belongings and bought one of those army back packs, a spear gun to catch fish, and some tins of food. Since I sold my car, I paid a stranger to drive me to near 2/14
top of Australia. A spot in the rainforest 🌴🌺 called Cape Tribulation. In my mind my life was set. I would live in the rainforest. I would finally be free and at peace. However, it was monsoon wet season ☔️💦🌨 and once I got there it was pouring down torrential rain 🤦‍♀️ 3/14
There were also a million mosquitos 🦟 trying to eat me. My ideal verse reality. I did not have a phone. I gave it away. However, I decided I wanted to let mum know I was safe. So I packed what little belongings I had. I started walking in the pouring rain towards a phone ☎️ 4/14
A police car 🚔 pulled up. 👮‍♂️ 👮‍♂️ asked if I was Louise. I said that’s me. They said your mum is looking for you. She is really worried. I told the police I am okay. I did my PhD on the neuroscience of emotion. I told them I am just having a break. The police said you are 27. 5/14
We cannot stop you. I was not hurting anyone or myself. They offered to give me a lift to see my mum. Mum was already in the area with my brother looking for me. So I agreed. When we got there, my mum was understandably hysterical. The police told mum I was a grown adult. 6/14
They cannot stop me. My mum did not like this response. Remember I have Psychosis. Although on the outside I seemed as cool as a sea cucumber 😎 Mums being mums. You can imagine my mum on the outside 😡 My brother even said to mum to calm down. 7/14
He said mum you are the one who looks crazy 😳 I thought this was funny 😏 (Sorry mum 😬) Thankfully, I ended up bursting into tears. 😭 I told the police 👮‍♂️👮‍♀️ I actually am very unwell. 🤯 I think I need to go to hospital 🤕 The rest is history. 8/14
While this was certainly not funny at the time 😬 ten years later, this story makes me smile 🙂 I find it fascinating the places trauma can take us. Yes, some are too terrifying. Some more triggering than others. However, I have equally experienced much beauty from trauma. 9/14
As a patient with other patients in hospital. I never laughed so much in my life. We all felt like we were the naughty kids. The rejects from society. There was always something interesting happening in each day in hospital. Crisis after crisis. Break down after break down. 10/14
Yet I also never felt so safe in my life. None of us had any desire to judge, to fix, or to change one another. We all just accepted and supported each other. Crisis after crisis. Break down after break down. Of course, usually in the smoking section. 11/14
It is easy to fall into the trap of seeing trauma as something that is all bad. However, my life has been enriched from experiencing trauma. I have had many beautiful experiences that I know I would never have had if I did not experience trauma. 12/14
I have experienced so many different worlds that I would never have never known if I did not have trauma. So this brings me back to my question. What’s something funny, or beautiful, quirky for you as a result of having trauma? 13/14
Dr Louise Hansen
Psychologist
PhD in Psychology
Human Rights Activist

#HealingTrauma #Justice4Australia #WeAllBelong

💜🕊

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More from @drlouisehansen

28 Jul
Three Phase Approach to Healing Trauma: Some trauma experts say it is dangerous to open pandora’s box. Some reasons: psychosis, sessions are not long enough, there are not enough sessions, or we have to return to a dangerous environment, 1/38 #HealingTrauma
vulnerable and have not yet established a sense of stability, clarity, the ability to regulate our emotions, or connection and belonging. So for such reasons there is a Three Phase Approach to Trauma:

1.Safety and Stabilisation
2.Processing
3.Integration 2/38
Safety and Stabilisation: This involves learning trauma informed tools for wellbeing. These tools help us to be grounded so we do not get “flooded”. What is “flooded”? There is an expression in the field of trauma: “Be with it, but not in it.” 3/38
Read 38 tweets
27 Jul
Do five world views help or harm Australia in the 21st century? I live and breathe Psychology: I’ve taught it at University. I’m a front liner for First Nations in community. I have a lived experience of Psychosis. We absolutely can recover. 1/27 #HealingTrauma
So it breaks my heart to see someone who can’t call Australia home.

We all belong. #WeAllBelong

Addiction illustrates this beautifully: Renowned addiction expert Dr Gabor Mate says: “The first question you must ask is not why the addiction, but why the pain?” 2/27
If we wanted to created a system that makes addiction worse, that further disconnects someone, then you would design exactly the system we have: punishment, shame, stigma, isolation, disconnection. Ingredients for trauma. This is Australia’s home. 3/27
Read 28 tweets
27 Jul
What is Intimacy and Play?

So, for simplicity, try conceptualise mental illness as living within our threat system (i.e. fight, flight, freeze, or collapse). Think of depression as freeze or collapse; anger, anxiety, terror as fight or flight. 1/12 #HealingTrauma
Remember threat system is only intended for a real life and death threat. So the two fundamental questions to ask are:

1. Is this moment safe or dangerous?
2. Is this moment real or my imagination? 2/12
We need to get good at telling the difference between danger vs safety. Between imagination vs reality. That’s pretty much it. 3/12
Read 12 tweets
7 Jul
I have a crazy beautiful story about Psychosis. It was also absolutely terrifying. For those who have not read my threads on Psychosis, I did my PhD on the neuroscience of emotion. I asked the question where is emotion in the brain? Hemispheric asymmetry: the divided brain. 1/46
Well it turns out it’s not just in the brain. It is in our whole body. It also turns out this is a living cosmos. Bessel van der Kolk pioneered Psychiatry with The Body Keeps the Score. However, my third year of my PhD was in 2011, so these ideas were not fully mainstream. 2/46
2011 was also the year of Occupy Wall Street protests. The Maya calendar. Some said would be a spiritual revolution. Others, the end of the world. It was also when experts from all different fields increasingly appeared on TED Talks calling for social and political change. 3/46
Read 48 tweets
5 Jul
”545,000,000 reasons put a bad taste in Murdochs mouth. In 2005 Murdoch purchased Myspace for $550,000,000. What he did not know is that in 2004, Zukerberg and friends at Harvard started Facebook. In 2006 Facebook opened to public membership, and the rest is history. 1/40
Myspace was sold by Murdoch in 2011 for $35 Million. Generating a $545 Million loss. Murdoch was enduring difficult years. His China expansion had failed. His online venture had failed. 2/40
Murdoch tried for 10 years to be the major media in China, even married a Chinese lady, Wendi Deng, but in 2013 after 14 years they divorced. 3/40
Read 42 tweets
5 Jul
I’m going to make a series of threads on a QLD Intermediary Scheme that begins today. A pilot program in Brisbane and Cairns to assist in communicating with witnesses with communication difficulties in child sexual abuse matters. It includes Trauma Informed Care: #HealingTrauma
QLD Intermediary Scheme: “In its Criminal Justice Report (2017), the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse (‘Royal Commission’) recommended intermediary schemes be established in all Australian states and territories to assist in communicating with
witnesses with communication difficulties in child sexual abuse matters. The Department of Justice and Attorney-General (DJAG) responded to these recommendations by establishing the Queensland Intermediary Scheme (QIS) to commence in Brisbane & Cairns 5 July 2021 as two-year
Read 8 tweets

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