The Link Between Childhood Trauma and Mental Illness

Book excerpt: Each day, case managers, psychiatric nurses, and other mental health professionals interact with adults who have a history of physical and/or sexual abuse during childhood. Many of these important professionals will often be the first practitioners to hear about a client′s background of abuse, but they may not have specialized training in understanding and working with survivors of childhood trauma. The Link Between Childhood Trauma and Mental Illness gives mental health professionals who are not child abuse specialists knowledge and skills that are especially relevant to their direct service role and practice context. It introduces to these practitioners a conceptual bridge between biomedical and psychosocial understandings of mental disorder, providing a multidimensional approach that allows professionals to think holistically and connect clients′ abusive pasts with their present-day symptoms and behaviors. Building upon this conceptual foundation, the book then focuses on direct practice issues, including how to ask clients about child abuse, the nature of power in the helping relationship, the full recovery process, effective treatment models, client safety issues, and ways to listen to client′s stories. Also included are valuable insights into helping clients who are in a crisis situation, the particular needs of male victims of child abuse, racial and cultural considerations, and the professional′s self-care. Designed to meet the needs of such helping professionals as case managers, psychiatric nurses, rehabilitation counselors, crisis and housing workers, occupational and physical therapists, family physicians, and social workers, The Link Between Childhood Trauma and Mental Illness is an accessible and convenient guide to understanding the effects of childhood abuse and incorporating that understanding into direct practice.