Constructive avoidance of present day situations: Techniques for managing critical life issues

The purpose of the constructive avoidance script is to assist clients in dealing with their anxiety or stress-provoking present day situations. Dissociative clients generally are phobic or avoidant of many activities such as medical procedures, going to the dentist, taking examinations, going for job interviews, and so forth due to the complex nature of their traumas, panic, anxiety, and other trauma-related problems. Despite their difficulties, clients in treatment still have to function in their communities, jobs, roles, and deal with situations that cause anxiety, triggering, stress, and so forth in their current lives. Clients can become very adept and creative about situations and events in which they have previously been uncomfortable by following the Constructive Avoidance Protocol. When the client is going to encounter a situation that has caused high stress or triggering in the past (doctor visits, interviews, exams) and has not completed (or begun) an EMDR target focusing on that issue, chances are that the ego states involved are not yet ready to deal with the situation. They can stay at the Home Base while the client deals with the present situation. The client can practice with the parts before the upcoming event in sessions and as homework between sessions. This protocol assumes that clients have already established a Home Base and Workplace.

Book Section

English

Forgash, C. (2010). Constructive avoidance of present day situations: Techniques for managing critical life issues. In M. Luber (Ed.), Eye Movement Desensitization (EMDR) Scripted Protocols: Special Populations (pp. 291-296). New York, NY: Springer Publishing Co