Our eating disorders & psychodrama book is on its way!

I'm thrilled to report my new book with psychodramatist Linda Ciotola, M.Ed., TEP, titled “Healing Eating Disorders with Psychodrama and Other Action Methods: Beyond the Silence and the Fury,” has just been accepted for publication by Jessica Kingsley Publishers.

We don’t yet know the publication schedule but we're excited and want to share the good news. We think it is the first book to address the topic of eating disorders and psychodrama and in addition to clinical applications, we will be including some great new info about incorporating education, yoga, movement, nutrition, Reiki, family constellation work, mindfulness and more.

We are both psychodramatists and psychodrama trainers, and representative of the many fields  -- mental health, education, law, business and consulting -- that use the valuable method of psychodrama.  I am a licensed clinical social worker, psychotherapist and personal growth coach and Linda is an educator, fitness trainer and yoga instructor and the founder of Healing Bridges in Maryland.

We'll keep you posted as details arrive from the publisher. In the meanwhile, join our Facebook page and see an earlier blog post which includes a training handout here.

Psychodrama has powerful results with eating disorders

Linda Ciotola and "body book," an awareness activity.

With today marking the start of National Eating Disorders Week, today is a good time to spotlight the use of action methods for the treatment of eating disorders.

The use of psychodrama is especially helpful with the treatment of  traditional eating disorders as well as “dieting disorders” and a range of difficulties with body image. As I put together my next book with co-author and sister psychodramatist Linda Ciotola, I'm reminded again about the complexity of eating disorders and the amazing power of psychodrama.

Our book, titled "Healing Eating Disorders with Psychodrama and Other Action Methods: Beyond the Silence and the Fury," has just been accepted for publication by Jessica Kingsley Publishers and you will see it soon. In the meanwhile, you may enjoy my sample eating disorder training handout for trainees here.

To read about Linda Ciotola's innovative work with eating disorders and several articles about psychodrama, see her web site here.

A number of practitioners and psychodramatists, including Kim Burden, Monica Callahan, Kathy Metcalf, Colleen Baratka, Mary Bellofatto and Linda Ciotola have devoted some or all of their professional work to eating disorders. Listen to Mary Bellofatto, a psychodramatist who is a member of the board of directors for the International Association of Eating Disorders Professionals, talk about the value of psychodrama here. You may also find one of Mary's handouts here. 

Both the sociometric and the experiential nature of the modality help eating disorder patients in a number of ways. Sociometrically, the understanding of roles the patient plays — including the self-destructive roles — is a first step in enhancing new roles that are healthy and self-caring.

With psychodrama, the client is able to experience her relationship with the eating disorder as well learn more about its role in her life. The psychodramatic group is another plus, as people with eating disorders are often isolated from others and tend to use food or the misuse of food to avoid relationships with people.

Here's a short video about psychodrama with Angelina Gonzalez, therapist at the Oliver  Pyatt Centers, talking about the basics of psychodrama:

Malidoma Some speaks of rituals in the West Africa tradition -- the roots of experiential therapy?

Born in the African nation of Burkina Faso, Malidoma Some is the foremost teacher of African spirituality in the United States. He writes and travels to talk about the value of ritual, communion with nature and the necessity of the connection the ancestors.

I saw him on Saturday as one of the conference presenters at the U.S. Constellations conference in San Franscico, when he brought a message of hope, healing and reconciliation through the powerful tools of ritual and community building.

In this video, recorded at another time, he discusses how indigenous traditions, such as rituals, are relevant to modern society. Because rituals are experiential, I believe he is talking about the roots of what we call modern experiential therapies.

A journey of learning and time-shifting too

I did not plan to be a healer. Yet more than 20 years ago, while working as a daily newspaper journalist, I learned about a five-day residential program that treated adults reared in chaotic homes with an unusual interactive style of psychotherapy. Since I was researching an in-depth series of articles on the adult children of alcoholics movement -- just beginning to gain public attention at that time -- I wanted to learn more.

That residential treatment program, now known as Breakthrough, is part of Caron Treatment Centers, a sprawling campus in south-central Pennsylvania devoted to recovery from the ravages of drug and alcohol addiction. I signed up for the program to experience its philosophy firsthand, and I was startled to observe a method of psychotherapy that was very different from the usual sedentary talk therapy that I had known. The psychotherapists, wearing jeans and casual clothes, were approachable and relaxed. They encouraged members of the group to play roles for each other, creating dramatic vignettes that revealed the landscape of their inner lives, struggles and dreams. The premise was that drama, other creative arts, and play could repair the early wounds of our families.

By mid-week, I was asked by a group member -- let's call him Jerry -- to play the role of his mother.

Since he recalled his mother as the hard-working wife of a hard-drinking man, we decided that I would pose in the way that he most clearly remembered her: on her hands and knees, vigorously scrubbing the kitchen floor when he returned home from school. I took the pose, using an imaginary "scrub brush" as I "washed" the dusty "floor. "

Then something very powerful happened, a kind of time shifting. I was no longer the journalist, pretending to be a middle-aged mother in a therapy group in a treatment center somewhere in rural south-central Pennsylvania. I BECAME Jerry's mother, and he seemed to know it. With tears streaming on his reddened face, he talked and sobbed for at least 30 minutes, untangling the thick knot of memories and pain that he had held so closely for so many years.

"I needed you when I was a child and you weren't there," Jerry said, between the floods of tears.

As his "mother," I listened as he told "me" how the combination of alcohol, neglect, fear and abandonment had wounded him as a child. How it had contributed to decades of bad decisions, destructive relationships and feelings of low self worth. How he had continued to carry the pain inside him, without relief, to this very day.

I was aware of an equally complex experience in the moment within me. As the mother, my heart felt a hint of the tiredness and hopelessness of that difficult life. As myself, it was easy to identify with the pain of an adult who looked back to a childhood of loneliness. And there was yet another part of me -- the observer -- who was completely fascinated with this time-shifting and shape-shifting process.

"Wow," I remember thinking, "This stuff is powerful! Where did it come from, and why haven't I known about it before?"

When the drama concluded, it was clear that Jerry had changed in a deep way. His face seemed to be calmer and more open. He seemed to hold his body more loosely, and he was able to joke and talk more comfortably in our group.

My encounter with Jerry -- as well as my exposure to these different style of therapy -- led me on a journey that I am still traveling today. I began group therapy that employed these experiential methods and found profound personal change. Later I would return to school to study substance abuse, addiction and family systems; I learned that this interactive style of therapy came from the long-standing theory and practice of psychodrama and sociometry, a larger method developed by the European-born physician, Dr. J.L. Moreno. I found teachers, pioneers in this unique field, who demonstrated the subtle nuances of the use of the action methods, taking me beyond that single week in September.

Jerry and I would see each other periodically at group reunions at Caron and share a hug. He shared the victories and changes in his life and generously celebrated my own growth, both personal and professional. It has been a good journey, and I know the good will continue.