Sandplay helps brain-injured patients become whole
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A Santa Fe psychologist as honored recently for her research on using sandplay therapy on patients with traumatic brain injuries. |
| Courtesy Photo | |
| Lorraine Freedle smiles while a participant takes a picture of her in the sandplay room. |
By Lee James/The Free Press
Local psychologist honored for her work
Dr. Lorraine Freedle, co-founder and clinical director of Teambuilders Counseling Service, was given the 2008 Original Sandplay Research Award by the Sandplay Therapists of America.
The award recognized her outstanding contribution to sandplay research. Her study centered on four adults — three men and one woman between the ages of 18 and 39 — who had experienced moderate to severe brain injuries.
Freedle said participants were chosen for sandplay by their rehabilitation team because they were experiencing significant psychosocial adjustment difficulties and were considered good candidates for psychotherapy. Often victims of brain trauma lose abilities they had before the injury occurred and being aware of that causes emotional trauma.
“In a lot of them, their very self-hood is shattered when their abilities, everything, changes,” Freedle said. “Sandplay helps them access preserved brain functions and accept (their limitations).”
Participants were invited to create a picture in the sandtray in the presence of Freedle, who was trained in sandplay therapy. If the individual chose to tell a story about the scene, the therapist listened and withheld any interpretation. Each sandtray scene was photographed.
Each of the study participants were asked to produce 12 sandtrays, and had an option to do more if they wanted. Freedle said one participant did 18 trays.
At the end of the sandplay sessions, the participants were given a two-hour debriefing session in which they examined slides of their sandplay series and reflected on their experiences. Therapy ended after the debriefing session.
Freedle said results of the sessions (photographs and notes) were independently reviewed by three certified sandplay therapists. They were blind to the purpose of the study, Freedle said, but were provided brief background information about the patients (age, gender and presenting issues).
Information gained in the study was organized according to three areas of study: participants’ experience with sandplay; content themes such as grief, loss and normalcy; psychological process themes such as emotional expressiveness and expanded perspective.
The four participants were named Russell, Joe, Pac and Karla. All four experienced similar transformations in certain phases of sandplay.
“The seven phases of sandplay that emerged resembled an archetypal journey, and involved at least two essential confrontations that occur in the individuation process: confrontation with shadow and manifestation with Self,” Freedle wrote in her summary.
Joe encountered his shadow most markedly in his eighth tray when he stood before a mirror holding a gun to what he despised within himself and the wheelchair he despised. Karla reached the depth of her shadow experience when she experienced a state of complete emptiness and inertia. Russell plunged into his shadow in his seventh tray when his warrior figure and its traveling companions were thrust into the underworld and engulfed by demons. Pac encountered his shadow most vividly between the fifth and seventh trays when he was “covered in death” and “lifeless.”
“After these experiences with shadow, each participant entered a phase of reflection and transformation, followed by an experience of the Self,” Freedle wrote.
She said the touching, seeing, and doing aspects of sandplay “seemed to be especially transformative for them and facilitated self-discovery and new perspectives.”
Freedle said results of the study indicate use of sandplay would be useful in treating war veterans suffering from active duty-related brain injury.
“It was beautiful to see,” Freedle commented later. “It changed my life to see them move through the depths of pain ... to find their self-worth and move toward becoming whole again.”
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