Ellert Nijenhuis – författare

The Trinity of Trauma: Ignorance, Fragility, and Control is structured as a trilogy. This book includes the first two parts: Volume I, The Evolving Concept of Trauma, and Volume II, The Concept and Facts of Dissociation in Trauma, which are predominantly conceptual, theoretical, and empirical in nature.Volume I aims to overcome conceptual flaws that have plagued the trauma field to date. It proposes new definitions of trauma and derivative concepts as well as a dimension of trauma-related disorders. It suggests that individuals and their environment constitute, depend on, and are relative to each other. Volume I unites two groups of trauma-related disorders that were previously contrasted in psychiatric history under various names such as melancholia versus hysteria, traumatic neurosis versus traumatic hysteria, and posttraumatic stress disorder versus dissociative disorders. It also mends the dissociation of dissociative and conversion disorders.Volume II analyzes and defines the concepts of personality, self, dissociation in trauma, and dissociative parts. It explores and documents the biopsychosocial features of different prototypical dissociative parts in traumatized individuals. Important features of these parts also characterize other players in traumatization, stretching from perpetrators to society at large.

In his trilogy "The Trauma Trinity", Ellert Nijenhuis devotes himself extensively to the trauma phenomenon. Part I aims to overcome conceptual flaws. It offers new definitions of the term trauma and concepts derived from it and introduces a new dimension of trauma-related disorders. Part II analyzes the concepts of personality, self, self-confidence, dissociation in trauma and dissociative parts of the personality and substantiates these with empirical results. Part III, as a unique introduction, offers access to the enactive treatment of chronically traumatized people. Patients and therapists are understood as equal partners who join together in a shared, participatory attempt to explain a world that can be hurtful beyond any imagination.

The Trinity of Trauma: Ignorance, Fragility, and Control is structured as a trilogy. This book includes the first two parts: Volume I, The Evolving Concept of Trauma, and Volume II, The Concept and Facts of Dissociation in Trauma, which are predominantly conceptual, theoretical, and empirical in nature.Volume I aims to overcome conceptual flaws that have plagued the trauma field to date. It proposes new definitions of trauma and derivative concepts as well as a dimension of trauma-related disorders. It suggests that individuals and their environment constitute, depend on, and are relative to each other. Volume I unites two groups of trauma-related disorders that were previously contrasted in psychiatric history under various names such as "melancholia" versus "hysteria", "traumatic neurosis" versus "traumatic hysteria", and "posttraumatic stress disorder" versus "dissociative disorders". It also mends the "dissociation" of dissociative and conversion disorders.Volume II analyzes and defines the concepts of "personality", "self", "dissociation in trauma", and "dissociative parts". It explores and documents the biopsychosocial features of different prototypical dissociative parts in traumatized individuals. Important features of these parts also characterize other players in traumatization, stretching from perpetrators to society at large.

Als allgemeingebräuchliche Bezeichnung für tiefgreifende seelische Verletzungen ist der Begriff Trauma in aller Munde und es scheint, als wisse jeder, was gemeint. In der Fachwelt werden Begriffe und Konzepte allerdings weiter diskutiert – allen voran in der Traumaforschung.Ellert Nijenhuis widmet sich in seinem dreiteiligen Werk, von dem Band I und II hier zusammen vorliegen, der konzeptionellen Diskussion der Traumaforschung und neurobiologischen Grundlagen. Band I zielt darauf ab, das Feld der Traumaforschung bis heute beeinträchtigende konzeptuelle Mängel zu überwinden. Er bietet neue Definitionen des Traumabegriffs und davon abgeleiteter Konzepte sowie eine neue Dimension traumaverwandter Störungen. Nijenhuis zeigt hier auf, dass Individuen und ihre Umgebung wechselseitig abhängig sind, einander bedingen und entsprechen.Band I vereinigt zwei Gruppen von traumaverwandten Störungen, die in der bisherigen Psychiatriegeschichte als Gegensätze verhandelt wurden, und das unter so unterschiedlichen Begriffen wie Melancholie versus Hysterie, traumatische Neurose versus traumatische Hysterie und posttraumatische Belastungsstörung versus dissoziative Störung. Dieser Ansatz überwindet also letztlich auch die Trennung von dissoziativen und konversiven Störungen.In Band II analysiert Nijenhuis die Konzepte Persönlichkeit, Selbst, Selbstbewusstheit, Dissoziation bei Trauma und dissoziative Teile. Er geht auf die biopsychosozialen Merkmale prototypischer Teile ein, stellt entsprechende empirische Ergebnisse vor und er formuliert die Hypothese, dass prototypische Positionen zu dissoziativen Teilen hinsichtlich der kindlichen Traumatisierung auch in allgemeinerer Form existieren und sich von individuell bis zu gesellschaftlich bedingten Ursachen erstrecken.Der dritte Band befasst sich mit der Praxis und zeigt detailliert, wie Kliniker traumatisierten Personen Schritt für Schritt helfen können. Die deutsche Ausgabe dieses Bandes »Die Trauma-Trinität: Ignoranz – Fragilität – Kontrolle. Enaktive Traumatherapie« wird voraussichtlich 2018 erscheinen.

Enactive trauma therapy is grounded in so-called enactivism, which holds that, like anyone else, traumatized individuals are (1) embrained, embodied, and environmentally embedded; (2) constitute biopsychological organism-environment systems that are essentially interested in preserving their existence; (3) are primarily affective and oriented toward making sense of things. Individuals exhibit a phenomenal self, world, and self-of-the-world through self- and world-oriented actions. They do not act on the basis of knowledge, but possess knowledge on the basis of world-engaged sensorimotor, affect-laden, and goal-oriented actions. Whenever interpersonal traumatization by significant others occurs, individuals may get caught up in affective and relational conflicts they cannot resolve on their own. Their generation and maintenance of a trauma-related dissociation of the personality involves a kind of sense-making that supports their continued existence when their capacity to integrate traumatic experiences is still too low. However, what starts as a courageous effort to navigate a traumatizing life may at some point in time become a serious problem. Enactive trauma therapy comprises the collaboration of two organism-environment systems: the patient and the therapist. Together they spawn new meaning and adequate actions – an interaction that resembles dancing: It takes pacing, mutual attunement, good timing, a sensitivity to balance, movement and rhythm, courage, as well as the ability and willingness to follow and lead.