Meet the Therapist - Chloe

Dramatherapist

Hi, I’m Chloe and I’m a volunteer therapist at York Women’s Counselling Service.

After 10 years in mainstream and special education, I found that many of the children and families I was working with were needing more psychological support than I was qualified to give. I decided to train as a dramatherapist, as I had always been interested in how creativity can support people in accessing and processing trauma, difficulties and emotional issues.

 So, what is dramatherapy? 

Dramatherapy is a creative arts therapy, under the umbrella of psychotherapy which uses creative expressive mediums  in order to communicate and explore feelings and issues. Dramatherapy can be used as a psychological intervention for issues such as trauma, bereavement, self confidence, post natal depression and attachment difficulties.

 Dramatherapy is not about performing or acting and no prior experience or interest in drama is necessary. Dramatherapy uses all creative medium including; projections, objects, drawing, music/sound, visualisations, breathing techniques, role, metaphor and others, to offer a safe space in which difficult issues can be looked at without being threatening and without causing further trauma. It is a client led therapy, which is focused on how the client is in the here and now – instead of focusing on the trauma itself. The dramatherapist will offer a range of possible interventions, within the safe space for the client to access with their support and guidance.

 Dramatherapy is utilised in a huge range of settings, with clients of any age. One of the only necessities is for the therapist to be able to place physical and psychological boundaries around the client, to ensure their psychological safety. Dramatherapy can be used as short therapy, to aid assessment, or as long term psychological therapy.

One client who I worked with was a victim of incestual, child, sexual, emotional and physical abuse. We worked together for 30 sessions, once a week over 18 months. Through dramatherapy she was able to work safely through feelings and insecurities that she had as an adult. The final piece of work we did together was a series of letters that she wrote to her inner child, these letters changed the difficult and traumatic memories into a rescue scene. Within the rescue scene, the adult would rescue the child from harm. Although this didn’t change history or prevent the events that had already happened, it offered my client the opportunity to recognise what happened to her was wrong, to assert control over situations as an adult that she wasn’t able to do as a child.