JOYANNA SILBERG, Ph.D.
PUBLICATIONS
THE CHILD SURVIVOR
Healing Developmental Trauma and Dissociation
By Joyanna Silberg, Ph.D.
2nd Edition August 19, 2021 by Routledge - 448 pages
In the second edition of Joyanna Silberg’s classic The Child Survivor, practitioners who treat dissociative children will find practical tools that are backed up by recent advances in clinical research. Chapters are filled with examples of clinical dilemmas that can challenge even the most expert child trauma clinicians, and Silberg shows how to handle these dilemmas with creativity, attunement, and sensitivity to the adaptive nature of even the most complex dissociative symptoms. The new edition addresses the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on children and provides tips for working with traumatized children in telehealth. A new chapter on organized abuse explains how children victimized by even the most sadistic crimes can respond well to therapy. Clinicians on the front lines of treatment will come away from the book with an arsenal of therapeutic techniques that they can put into practice right away, limiting the need for restrictive hospitalizations or out-of-home placements for their young clients.
CONTENTS
Introduction 1. Trauma and Its Effects 2. An Integrative Developmental Model of Dissociation 3. Diagnostic Considerations 4. Assessing Dissociative Processes 5. Beginning the Treatment Journey 6. Educate and Motivate: Introducing The EDUCATE Model 7. Bridging the Selves: Healing through Connections to what’s Hidden 8. "I Try to Forget to Remember": Reversing Amnesia 9. Befriending the Body: Somatic Considerations for the Child Survivor 10. Staying Awake: Reversing Dissociative Shutdown 11. Building Attachment across States: Affect Regulation in the Context of Relationships 12. Child-Centered Family Therapy: Family Treatment as Adjunct to Dissociation-Focused Interventions 13. Rewriting the Script: Processing Traumatic Memories and Resolving Flashbacks 14. Countering Organized Abuse: Organized Attachment and Love 15. Interfacing With Systems: The Therapist as Activist 16. Integration of Self: Towards a Healing Future References Appendices
THE CHILD SURVIVOR
Healing Developmental Trauma and Dissociation
By Joyanna Silberg, Ph.D.
Published October 16th 2012 by Routledge – 288 pages
The Child Survivor is a clinically rich, comprehensive overview of the treatment of children and adolescents who have developed dissociative symptoms in response to ongoing developmental trauma. Joyanna Silberg, a widely respected authority in the field, uses case examples to illustrate hard-to-manage clinical dilemmas such as children presenting with rage reactions, amnesia, and dissociative shut-down. These behaviors are often survival strategies, and in The Child Survivor practitioners will find practical management tools that are backed up by recent scientific advances in neurobiology. Clinicians on the front lines of treatment will come away from the book with an arsenal of therapeutic techniques that they can put into practice right away, limiting the need for restrictive hospitalizations or out-of-home placements for their young clients. The Child Survivor was awarded the 2013 Written Media Award by the International Society on the Study of Trauma and Dissociation.
CONTENTS
Trauma and Its Effects. An Integrative Developmental Model of Dissociation. Diagnostic Considerations. Assessing Dissociative Processes. Beginning the Treatment Journey. Educate and Motivate: Introducing The EDUCATE Model. Bridging the Selves: Healing Through Connections to What’s Hidden. "I Try to Forget to Remember": Reversing Amnesia. Befriending the Body: Somatic Considerations for the Child Survivor. Staying Awake: Reversing Dissociative Shut Down. Building Attachment Across States: Affect Regulation in the Context of Relationships. Child-Centered Family Therapy: Family Treatment as Adjunct to Dissociation-Focused Interventions. Rewriting the Script: Processing Traumatic Memories and Resolving Flashbacks. Interfacing With Systems: The Therapist as Activist. Integration of Self: Towards a Healing Future. References. Appendices.
ARTICLES & PODCASTS
System Speak: Dissociative Identity Disorder (Multiple Personality Disorder)
Guest: Joyanna Silberg, PhD
Our guest on the podcast this morning is Joyanna Silberg, Past President of ISSTD, and expert on dissociation in children and adolescents. She shares with us about her work with children and trauma. She talks about the capacity of dissociation as a gift to yourself. She speaks to the impact of screen time on families, and she also shares about her work with trafficking victims. Trigger warning for short and simple examples of abuse and trafficking in passing (not discussed in depth). Listen on Apple Podcasts by clicking the link below.
Ambushed by Memories of Trauma: Memory-Processing Interventions in an Adolescent Boy with Nocturnal Dissociative Episodes
Editor: Eleni K. Maneta, MD
Authors: Lux Ratnamohan, MBBS, FRANZCP, Laurie MacKinnon, MSW, PhD, Melissa Lim, MPsyc(Clin), Richard Webster, MBBS, MSc, FRACP, Karen Waters, MBBS, FRACP, PhD, GCCM, Kasia Kozlowska, MBBS, PhD, FRANZCP, Joyanna Silberg, PhD, Ricky Greenwald, PsyD, and Monique Ribeiro, MD
CASE HISTORY
At presentation to the Accident and Emergency Department, BJ was a 16-year-old boy in eleventh grade, with a one-month history of unusual sleep-related behaviors. As the latest exam- ple, BJ had awakened one morning to find a painful cut on his arm and a bloodied knife in the kitchen; he had no memory of what had happened. BJ was admitted to the hospital, jointly, under a neurologist (RW), a sleep-medicine physician (KW), and a psychiatrist (KK).
Treating the Dissociative Child
The road back from the ultimate loss of self
By Joyanna Silberg, Ph.D.
She wasn’t responsive to my voice or my soft touch. Her face was pale, her body was limp, her breathing was rhythmic and shallow. Should I call the medics, I wondered, or have her mother carry her out of my office? Luckily, she was my last client for the day, so I had time to figure out what to do with this unresponsive teen. I was seeing dissociation in its extreme form: the body shutting down in a “freeze” position, the way some wild prey respond when threatened by a predator. But what in our session had 17-year-old Trina perceived as “predatory”?
Though there had been a casual conversation about college plans and a boyfriend, there had been no talk of her early sexual abuse memories with a grandfather with whom she no longer had contact. After three years of treating her for dissociative behaviors, including sudden regressions, amnesia, and dazed states, I thought we’d moved beyond such an extreme response to stress on her part.
Trina was demonstrating a “dissociative shutdown,” a symptom often found in children faced with a repeated, frightening event, such as being raped by a caregiver, for which there’s no escape. Over time, this response may generalize to associated thoughts or emotions that can trigger the reaction. Although the child’s body may be immobilized, her mind remains active and can invent solutions, often retreating into an imaginary world, where bad things aren’t happening. With time and practice, the mere thought of needing to escape a situation may trigger a self-induced hypnotic retreat, along with a primitive freeze response....
Therapists’ Perspectives on the Woody Allen Allegations
Clinician's Digest
By Garry Cooper and Mary Sykes Wylie
March 2014
Psychologist Joyanna Silberg, author of The Child Survivor: Healing Developmental Trauma and Dissociation, is a fierce advocate for abused children and for mothers accused by their husbands of encouraging their children to fabricate stories of abuse. “Ninety-eight percent of children’s stories of being sexually abused turn out to be accurately founded,” she says. “It would be hard for me to imagine that any child clinician would believe that Dylan Farrow is fabricating, but adult clinicians who’ve talked with people like Allen might tend to back him up.”
The Price of a Stolen Childhood
The New York Times Magazine
By Emily Bazelon
January 24, 2013
"Marsh suggested that Amy see a forensic psychologist, Joyanna Silberg, who evaluated Amy and said she would need therapy throughout her life and could expect to work sporadically because of the likelihood of periodic setbacks. Silberg attributed these costs — Amy’s damages — to her awareness of the ongoing downloading and viewing. “Usually, we try to help survivors of child sexual abuse make a very strong distinction between the past and the present,” Silberg, who has given testimony on Amy’s behalf for restitution hearings, told me. 'The idea is to contain the harm: it happened then, and it’s not happening anymore. But how do you do that when these images are still out there? The past is still the present, which turns the hallmarks of treatment on their head.'"
Amy's case featured in "The Price of a Stolen Childhood" is going to be heard by the Supreme Court. Read more here.