As the theme is "lived experience" this year, I've decided to write about a form of therapy that is, in my opinion, very under utilised, easy to learn with very speedy results. This therapy is the rewind technique which I have used successfully with clients on a number of occasions. I can't describe a client's experience of it but I can discuss my use of it personally in the hope it might be a solution someone might find if they read this blog.
In 2019 I was in a serious accident. The build up to it was traumatic but it was actually a fall between two parked cars on a busy road. In order not to fall under a moving car, I fell across my left arm and my elbow was smashed to pieces upon impact with the edge of the kerb of the pavement. The surgeon who operated said my elbow looked like a malteser that had been hit with a hammer. My elbow is now a hinge and my arm is made of metal from just below my shoulder to just above my wrist. The surgeon did an amazing job and saved my arm and movement in my fingers but it changed my life overnight. He advised me to get an automatic car, not to do the gym classes I loved, I immediately stopped running which was my 'go to' to unwind and destress. I felt sick if I was near the kerb on a busy road. There followed five weeks of the worse depression I've ever had. I changed my car for an automatic and managed to get back into work but every time I knocked my arm or felt nerve pain then I was reliving the fall. The worst thing was the noise of the car braking that I nearly fell under. That replayed in my head with pinpoint accuracy sometimes a dozen times a day especially when I was sitting at my desk at work.
I then started training to be a counsellor and initially came across the rewind technique on my supervisor's website. It really interested me and it was the first thing I chose to learn after I qualified. It is mainly used for single acts of trauma and the concept is very simple. You don't have to talk about the event during the therapy and you process it in detached state which causes less distress and less risk of re-triggering post-traumatic stress symptoms.
Once I had completed the training, I decided the best way to test it out would be to try it myself and I immediately thought of the flashbacks etc., that I was experiencing myself from the fall. I set everything up as I would for a client, completed the trauma impact statement and then did the rewind technique. It felt like a bit of a non-event afterwards and we advise clients not to keep reflecting on it and just to live their life as normal and then come back to therapy two weeks later. A few days later, I noticed that I hadn't been thinking about it quite so much. I didn't get transported back to the side of the road every time I felt pain or knocked my arm. The most amazing thing was that I stopped hearing the brakes of the car but I can't say exactly when this happened. It's a very subtle change but the only time I recall the accident now is when I consciously do it and I can't remember what the brakes sounded like anymore, I just relate to them as being very loud at the time.
My arm will never do what it's supposed to do properly again, I need to have a soft cushion to rest it on to sleep, I burn my hand on pans and things because I can't feel anything but then (bizarrely) if something hot or cold touches the back of my hand I then feel it on the palm of my hand. I also have constant pins and needles and nerve pain in the end of two of my fingers that is not pleasant.
This year's theme is about lived experience and my feelings have also shifted from the unfairness and helplessness I experienced at the time to gratitude to the brilliant surgeon who saved my arm and the amazing care I had at Leeds General Infirmary. The rewind technique seems like such a small and inconsequential thing but it had a huge effect on my recovery. If this sounds like something that might help you then please do get in touch with me to explore this and other forms of therapy.