TFT Relieves 16-Year Old’s Trauma from Uganda Massacre

Photo-AfricanFace19094933.thbSuzanne Connolly, LCSW, TFT-Adv, shares the following story from the ATFT Foundation‘s recent mission to Rwanda:

Kamal holds his hands to his head and says with wonder, “It’s gone! I can’t remember it!” He jumps up and gives me a hug and won’t let go. He dances around the room so we dance around the room hugging tight.

Kamal is 16 and been through more than anyone of any age should have to go through. He was born while his mother was still studying at the University so he lived with his mother’s sister.

When Kamal was three years old his mother died. When he was six his aunt, the only mother he had known, was killed, leaving him and his cousin Abdul orphaned.

He and Abdul were sent to a refugee camp in Uganda and while there he witnessed a horrific massacre. Until now he could never get it out of his mind, and he felt constant sadness and could trust no one. He thought anyone could change at any moment and kill him. He lived in constant fear of danger.

“I know it happened still” he says, “but I can’t think about it!” “Oh I am so happy!” Thank you!  Thank you” “Murakoze.”  He hugs me again and we do the dance for the second time. He finally lets go and we say good bye.

I see Kamal later in the school yard. He has changed to a dress shirt and walks like he has springs attached to his feet. Sometimes he almost skips. He comes back to thank me once again.

It is great to be able to share this moment with Kamal, and to be able to share it, like so many moments, with you. So many beautiful moments shared here in Rwanda, thanks to TFT and the wonderful ATFT members who have contributed to this mission.

There are so many stories, Kamal’s (not his real name, of course) only the most recent.

To go to Suzanne’s blog about this mission to Rwanda, click here.

TFT Helps Suicidal Young Man

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Retired fireman Bruce Ramsay describes how TFT relieved a suicidal man’s depression and trauma:

I have taught TFT algorithms to over two hundred people in native communities. They range from psychologists to elders, social workers, addiction counselors, nurses, fire fighters, tribal police officers and community members and leaders. It is very well accepted and the requests keep coming for more training.

I was recently back in a community where I had done the training previously and again a lady showed up who had had the Algorithm course. She said she came back to refresh and practice. She told a wonderful story of a suicidal young man who she had done TFT with.

He had come in depressed and traumatized and since they had no mental health facility the intake person had called for transport from the closest facility. My student heard about him, went and did TFT and by the time the transport arrived he was calm, reasoned and eating a meal with some elders.

The transport team had a mental health person and she examined the young man and declined to take him saying she could find no distress in him at all. He is doing fine and now volunteers at the elder center and is back in school. Says he wants to be a social worker.

Thank you again Dr. Callahan. TFT is amazing. It amazes me almost weekly. I will continue teaching it as long as I am able. Your vision at giving me this opportunity has been realized in many native communities and the word spreads. Your gift to all of us is truly wonderful. I have used it thousands of times to help others.

TFT Transforms a Prisoner

An interview describes how Dr. Caroline Sakai used TFT to relieve a prisoner of trauma and stress and completely turn his life around.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMwsI3VLxYs&feature=channel_page&rel=0]

TFT Heals 60-Year Old Trauma from Rape

Photo--Woman CryingMy name is Rosemarie Solarz. I am currently seventy years old. I would like to share with you a very traumatic experience I had at 10 years old.

My parents went out for a New Years eve dance in town and left my brother and I with a neighbor’s son who was sixteen years old. He told my brother and I (who was 9 at the time) that he wanted to teach us a new game we could all play.

For us it sounded like fun. But it wasn’t. He started doing things we didn’t like and we did not want to play anymore and began to get scared. Before I knew it, he had raped me.

I remember I did not cry because I did not know what had just happened to me. Back then, words like rape were not mentioned. All I could remember the rest of the evening was I hurt and did not feel good so I went to my bedroom and stayed until my parents came home.

The memory of that horrible experience changed the rest of my life. I never had any lasting, healthy relationships, low self-image, worked hard to have people like me, gained weight, self-sabotaged myself and finally a broken marriage to make me feel even more inadequate!

Those memories were stored so deep in my subconscious that I was in my mid-forties before they revealed their ugly self. I had an opportunity to attend a healing mass at my church one evening and the priest that was conducting the healing part whispered in my ear had I been sexually abused by my father.

I just froze! Then I began to shake. Tears came to my eyes. He laid his hand on my shoulder to calm me and said to come see him the next day and talk about. I never cried so hard in my life. The release was more than I could bear, just to have it come out.

He gave me the name of a counselor to go to. I took advantage of many opportunities to seek help. However, I reached the point where I felt I had worked through everything and did not need to go on further.

How wrong I was! For some unknown reason I would shy away from any conversations that would pertain to rape, or anything that had to do with intimacy. Never wanted to be around men and I still felt shame.

However, recently my eldest daughter, Christina Mayhew, completed Dr. Roger Callahan’s TFT class in California and helped clean out all the old baggage I was still carrying around. She taught me how to use the Trauma and shame algorithm technique in order to free me of the remaining pain I felt.

I cannot express strongly enough just how much it has helped me. The experience of this technique is nothing short of a miracle in my opinion. The technique took us no more than ten, maybe twelve minutes. I pray that anyone else going through trauma of any kind will seek out this program in order to receive the complete healing they deserve!

TFT Healing Traumatic Stress

Dr. Robert Bray, traumatic stress specialist, talks about healing with TFT. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uot9ITt282c&feature=channel_page&rel=0]