Dan and Jon's presentation focused on how the brain develops with comfort and joy: How DDP and PACE promote reversal learning, new neuropsychological relational patterns, affect regulation, and then reawaken the child's capacity to feel the need for both comfort and joy from his or her parents or other caregivers.
Sue provided the theoretical principles of EFT and used clinical examples to illustrate how healing can occur in the context of empathic and attuned relationships. EFT and DDP principles and concepts have many parallels. Sue illustrated how caregiver self awareness of attachment style/issues is an important component of child's attachment healing process. Sue and Dan commented on the similarities of EFT and DDP at the end of her presentation.
Moving from “You’re Weird! “ to “How Come You’re Weird? - The beginnings of curiosity in the shift from Mistrust to Trust in developmentally traumatised children. Jon Baylin and Dan Hughes have developed helpful concepts about how some children develop core constructs of Mistrust rather than Trust in their relationships with parents. Julie's presentation focused on how children and adolescents begin to become interested in how other people think and feel.
Robert's presentation took us through success and difficulty with the longer, slower cases. Robert says: "Not all our cases look like the successes in training tapes, and sometimes the harder cases seem to fill our case loads. This presentation will go over a brief video of a challenging case with a wounded caretaker and review some of the factors to remaining 'open and engaged' when conditions are less than ideal."
We have included the conference program here as an overview of the presentations and workshops given over the three days. Sian Phillips wrote a conference summary and reflections that was sent to everyone who attended the conference. We have also included this here.
In her presentation "Soft Heart – Fresh Start: the taming of the tornado" Betty J.B. Brouwer, a certified DDP therapist and registered Art Therapist, shared how she weaves art therapy into DDP using case presentation, images, story and theory.
Sian and Demi's presentation outlined their experiences of developing The Belong Program. This program actively bringing PACE into a school classroom environment. The initial results from outcome study are encourging.
How do we tell and listen to stories? In her presentation on Monday 6th October Julie talked about the importance of telling our stories and bearing witness to other’s stories. Julie also explored the collaborative process of telling and hearing in preparation for her experiential workshop on Tuesday 7th October.
This presentation by George Thompson and Dan Hughes discussed the integration of Dr. Thompson's use of medication to facilitate a child's ability to form an attachment to his parent and make better use of DDP interventions. George presented one of his families for which Dan provided supervision and consultation. George is the Medical Director of KidsTLC, a residential program in Olathe, KS, which is in the process of becoming certified as a DDP Organization.
