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A Reflection on the Writing of Subcutaneous, Subcortical, Subconscious and Subterranean: The Most Toxic Boy in the World’s Search for Mum. By Tim Woodhouse When Dennis first approached me to write a chapter on ‘Deep Play’, I experienced a gamut of emotions from my initial feelings of delight and I must admit some pride, which very quickly gave way to apprehension and concern that my writing style may give me away as being neither an academic, nor a story-teller. Once I managed to recognise these feelings as my own childhood scripts I was able to harness them and regulate my growing unease, which allowed the feelings to abate; this was old-stuff. Relieved of these constraints I set about the task for which I had been assigned; to consider the notion of ‘Deep Play’. Somatic Psychotherapy Today | Fall 2015 | Volume 5 Number 4 | page 60
As my body relaxed my mind freed up. With my higher cortex back on-line my mind opened up and two boys swam into my consciousness. The two boys were separated by 25 years in my career but shared the same backgrounds, articulated their pain both in their symptomatic behaviours and in their cognitive verbalisations. The first child I described was Elliott, who had a worker that was neither a therapist, nor experienced (I know this for I was that social worker described in the chapter). The only tools I had available in my therapeutic tool box was a desire to help and a craving for knowledge. The second child, Oliver was referred to me when my therapeutic tool-box had become somewhat fuller and my knowledge had expanded over the intervening period and had gained an ability to offer greater depth. The process I went through was a mild form of the children’s experience. It was the recognition that our development affects how we see and interact with the world, how it impacts on those we work with and how owning our strengths and needs is the only way of enabling ourselves and therefore others, be they the hurt children we see or the readers of our work. We have to face our own pain before we can help others face theirs. I then had to overcome how to give a true and honest account of Oliver’s journey without compromising his privacy and right to confidentiality, this is a tall task as it seemed that with every sentence more of the child was in danger of being exposed. However, once I learned how to effectively conceal identities the chapter itself was written relatively quickly, I had lived their experiences and thus it felt real. Finally, the question of what is ‘Deep Play’? As can be seen from the book, the notion varies considerably from author to author, but for me, it is creating an environment that is not pain averse, that enables and supports the child to get down to the source of his pain, to stay alongside him as he looks back from the here and now to the there and then, and make sense of that old experience. How the child reaches this place can vary but will invariably utilise using the medium that enables him to feel contained be it metaphor, symbolism, play or bodily action, reaction or somatised feelings. Then, here in the depths, when the pain has subsided, transformation can finally emerge allowing the child to celebrate his survival and move on with his life. Tim Woodhouse is a registered non-directive play and filial therapist, EMDR practitioner, sensorimotor psychotherapist and ABE-approved social worker who has worked therapeutically with children since 1991. He was a tutor on the Liverpool Hope MA and PG dip course in play therapy and a visiting lecturer to Manchester University’s Second Year MA social work program. He worked for the UK national children’s charity NSPCC for 15 years and was a founding member of St Mary’s SARC children’s assault referral center in Manchester. He is the founder and director of Tiptoes Child Therapy Service—a provision that provides assessment and therapeutic services for children affected by sexual trauma, for children who have sexually harmed others, and children with disrupted and insecure or disorganized attachment patterns. Somatic Psychotherapy Today | Fall 2015 | Volume 5 Number 4 | page 61
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Somatic Volume 5 Number 4 Fall 2015
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Our Usual Fare 10 From the IBPJ Man
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Our goal is for every baby to recei
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Page 11 and 12: The very effort of delivering two i
Page 13 and 14: Rae Johnson and Christine Caldwell
Page 15 and 16: Subsequently, the challenge lies in
Page 17 and 18: place they feel safe is with you, t
Page 19 and 20: “To feel the presence of others,
Page 21 and 22: fear” (personal communication, 09
Page 23 and 24: Self-Regulation “A number of tech
Page 25 and 26: “understanding why you feel a cer
Page 27 and 28: Stephen W. Porges PhD is Distinguis
Page 29 and 30: included methods have wide-reaching
Page 31 and 32: lean on “evidenced-based” or
Page 33 and 34: Empathy is: An interpersonal skill/
Page 37 and 38: we could somehow screen, or measure
Page 39 and 40: An answer came in 2010 in the form
Page 41 and 42: To sum up in the word of the surviv
Page 43 and 44: What is EFT? EFT or tapping, develo
Page 45 and 46: Table One: Evaluation Tools Used Ev
Page 47 and 48: number of treatment modalities, whi
Page 49 and 50: “Another case stands out in my mi
Page 53 and 54: came to visit with his Jeep. He was
Page 55 and 56: “ . . . I often felt quiet anxiou
Page 57 and 58: Bringing it together McCarthy begin
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Page 69 and 70: Through observation when conducting
Page 71 and 72: In many cases, the desire to disman
Page 73 and 74: which the Secondary Couple Personal
Page 75 and 76: This parable of the burning house i
Page 77 and 78: Intimately in our own experience, a
Page 79 and 80: There are many forms of sound thera
Page 81 and 82: In Conclusion When people take the
Page 83 and 84: The trouble with textbooks is that
Page 85 and 86: The function of mindfulness in Hako
Page 87 and 88: Hakomi Mindfulness-Centered Somatic
Page 89 and 90: Why this book? Why now? The book wa
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Page 93 and 94: Somatic Experiencing (SE)—Peter L
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Page 97 and 98: The Felt Sense of Safety and Pleasu
Page 99 and 100: that corresponding states of activa
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Contemplations Diane Doheny M.Ed.,
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Russell, E. (2015). Restoring Resil
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trauma treatment follows this. A pa
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It should be noted that the timelin
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The Phenomenology of Dance: Fiftiet
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The Phenomenology of Dance: Fiftiet
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might be applied to somatic psychol
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“Dance is a central aspect of lif
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Somatic Psychotherapy Today Trendin
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