Trauma Therapy in Minneapolis & Online
Offering trauma therapy in Minneapolis and online across Minnesota, North Dakota, and 40+ states.
Trauma can follow a single event, such as an assault or serious accident. It can also stem from a history of repeated abuse or mistreatment within close relationships. Its effects may continue long after those experiences have ended.
You might remain on guard in everyday situations or avoid places and conversations that bring back memories of a traumatic experience. You may have unwanted memories or nightmares, or feel distant from people you care about even when you want to be close.
If you’re unsure how your past relates to what you’re struggling with now, we can explore that together.
Understanding how past experiences affect you
We’ll start by looking at what happens in specific situations: what sets off a reaction, what you notice in your thoughts and body, and how you respond. We’ll also consider current stresses that may be contributing.
We’ll look closely at how you’ve been coping. Avoiding situations that bring back memories of the trauma, or keeping yourself constantly occupied so you don’t have to think about it, may bring relief in the moment. Over time, those efforts can make it harder to participate in activities and relationships that matter to you.
You don’t need to describe the trauma in detail in the first session of therapy. We can start by discussing what you want help with and any concerns you have about talking about the past.
Trauma work may be the main focus of therapy, or it may be part of our work on relationships, anxiety, or other concerns. We may talk through painful experiences and practice staying with the memories and feelings you tend to avoid. We’ll also look at how those experiences shape what you expect from other people and how you respond in your relationships now.
The aim is for memories of the trauma to become less distressing and interfere less with your life. We’ll discuss the pace of the work and check how you’re managing during and between sessions.
Working with difficult memories
Making changes in daily life
Depending on your concerns, we may work on:
Noticing when something reminds you of the trauma and checking what is actually happening in the present.
Gradually engaging in situations and activities that are safe but have become difficult to face.
Managing distress with less reliance on alcohol, overwork, or withdrawing from people.
Expressing needs and limits in relationships you want to maintain.
Written Exposure Therapy
One option I offer is Written Exposure Therapy (WET), an evidence-based treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It uses well-established exposure principles in a brief, written format to help traumatic memories become less distressing.
WET has several practical advantages:
No homework assignments. The structured writing is completed during sessions.
A brief course of treatment. The standard protocol involves five treatment sessions.
A written format. You describe the trauma in writing, which may feel more approachable than recounting it in detail aloud.
Research-supported results. Clinical trials have found that WET produces reductions in PTSD symptoms comparable to gold-standard, evidence-based treatments such as Prolonged Exposure (PE) and Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT). Its brief, written format and lack of homework can make treatment more approachable and manageable.
Each session includes about 30 minutes of writing in response to specific instructions. I review your writing and provide feedback to guide the next writing session. We also discuss the thoughts, feelings, and difficulties that come up as you write.
We’ll discuss whether WET fits your needs and whether to use it as a focused treatment or as part of broader therapy.