Dialogical Exposure in a Gestalt-Based Treatment for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder

Abstract

Traumatic experiences not only may lead to the well-known posttraumatic symptoms but also can change a person's self and self-processes. The importance of the ability to maintain an intrapsychic dialogue, necessary for the resolution of the disruption which trauma causes in relationships and contact, is often not sufficiently regarded. The process-oriented trauma therapy presented here combines a Gestalt therapeutic frame with cognitive-behavioral elements and is committed to an interactional and dialogical approach. This intervention, with “dialogical exposure” as one of the core features, allows for the identification and resolution of the disruptions of contact so that patients can again experience continuity in their experience and regain their contact-ability.