Deep Brain Reorienting
Deep Brain Reorienting Therapy (DBR) is an innovative, new trauma therapy emerging from Glasgow, Scotland. Created by Psychiatrist, Dr. Frank Corrigan.
Our brains are prediction machines and can experience “shock,” and subsequently these unexpected outcomes lead to emotional distress and then defenses. Someone says or does something rejecting, or perhaps there’s an unexpected disturbing event, trauma, danger, or even an interaction that “came out of nowhere.” We experience the unexpected, and it blindsides us.
These brain based moments of “shock” can then accumulate, stay “locked in,” and create a myriad of symptoms, sensitivities, and distress in our day-to-day lives. Our brains will continue to fire up the distress as if the past is still happening, even if we aren’t conscious of it.
Even those who have done extensive trauma work can still experience unhealed residual distress that “just won’t budge.” There can still be a deep sense of aloneness and emotional pain, that is experienced as hard to heal and still impacts one’s day-to-day life.
With Deep Brain Reorienting (DBR), our focus is on healing the unhealed shock that can “stack up” and is believed to contribute to a myriad of symptoms such as pain, distress, hypervigilance, nightmares, anxiety, and fear. Trauma processing via DBR Therapy aims to access and heal an accumulation of shock from moments when we first “clued in that something is wrong,” or “off,” those “oh no” moments, even before our emotions and defenses kicked in. By healing the shock, we are essentially “deflating it” as well as the subsequent emotions and defenses. We can then reduce the hypervigilance and triggers that might show up in our interactions with others and our day-to-day lives. We are then better able to feel more present and grounded in our day-to-day lives, and in relationship to ourselves and others.
