 By Karen Carnabucci, LCSW, TEP
In the past two decades researchers have discovered a tremendous amount of information about the human brain. As we learn these startling new details, we are forced to discard old assumptions about how the brain works and learn about the brain's amazing powers. We now know about the delicate nature of the developing brain from the very beginning of life. Certain experiences – a stressed mother, a community trauma, a family crisis – appear to inhibit the circuitry of brain development even before the child’s birth. Yet the brain is not “fixed” to any specific configuration for life. For instance, we now understand that the brain is “plastic,” continuing to constantly change, alter and adapt as it responds to new life experiences.
1 Comment
By Karen Carnabucci, LCSW, TEP
When working with survivors of trauma, the main objective of every clinician is the creation of a structure that supports safety and containment. With the practice of action psychotherapy such as psychodrama, this objective becomes more crucial. Action therapy, including what appear to be rather benign techniques, is a powerful tool that can trigger unprocessed material in survivors of trauma, resulting in flashbacks and dissociation. The Therapeutic Spiral Model -- developed by clinical psychologist Kate Hudgins, Ph.D., TEP, and colleagues -- is an integration of classical psychodrama, object relations and recent advances in trauma theory to provide additional safety and structure when working with trauma. It follows the goal of providing safety and containment at every step for the client as well as the helping professional. Aspects of the model can be employed in individual and group sessions and may be easily adapted by talk therapists. The model identifies safety and containment in five areas:  By Karen Carnabucci, LCSW, TEP
Traditional talk therapy helps the suffering person understand what contributes to his or her eating disorder or dissatisfaction with body image. However, conventional talk therapy usually leaves the person with the knowledge of “why” the eating disorder is present but without changing the behavior. Psychodrama, the action method developed by Dr. J.L. Moreno and his wife Zerka T. Moreno, teaches the importance of human problems in the context of the roles that are played out in life. With the opportunity to change these roles to more healthy behaviors, we have found that tremendous healing is available with psychodrama. With the perspective of roles, rather than pathological behaviors, we identify sufferers as the one who binges, the one who restricts food, the one who purges, the one who isolates, the one who is anxious, the one who diets, the one who fears being fat, and so on.  By Karen Carnabucci, LCSW, TEP
It's Spring, so I had fun putting together this gift basket for the silent auction at the upcoming 2017 conference of the American Society of Group Psychotherapy and Psychodrama from May 4-7 in Clearwater, Fla. I call this basket "Warm Up Fun," and it includes an assortment of items, including masking tape, Tarot cards, small sand tray items, a music CD, a journal and a package of colorful plastic eggs. Here's the protocol for creating a warm up with your group with the eggs:  By Karen Carnabucci, LCSW, TEP
A man wrote to Dear Abby, the syndicated advice column, to voice his distress about his wife’s hoarding behavior. The letter was titled Key to Wife's Hoarding May Be in Her Genes. “Abby,” the name used by columnist Jeanne Phillips, offered her answer. I offer my view here too – it’s so important that people know about their options! Here's the letter: DEAR ABBY: My wife and I and our 13-year-old son live in a nice home we have been remodeling for the last eight years. The problem is, my wife has a hard time getting rid of anything, and she constantly brings home "new projects" that take up space but never get done. At one point, we hired a professional organizer because we had reached the point of having "goat trails" as the only means of navigating our way around the house. We also have a barn that is chockablock full. I have heard that the root cause may be due to an anomaly on a chromosome. How should I approach my wife about getting some genetic testing done? Her mom is also a professional pack rat. The clutter is taking its toll on our relationship -- we are in marriage counseling -- and on our family. We have so much stuff I can't breathe. -- SUFFOCATING IN MONTANA
 Photograph by Sergio Guimaraes of Buenos Aires, Argentina By Karen Carnabucci, LCSW, TEP
We mourn: Zerka Toeman Moreno, the co-developer of psychodrama, has died at the age of 99. When Zerka Toeman met Dr. J.L. Moreno in the summer of 1941, it was the beginning of a very successful partnership in the history of psychiatry and psychology. She would become his closest colleague, helping him edit and write books and journals and traveling with him throughout the United States and Europe to teach and demonstrate psychodrama, an action-oriented method which was considered an alternative to the psychoanalysis of the day, and sociodrama, which addressed social problems with enactment. After her husband's death, she continued to teach and expand the method, now practiced on nearly every continent -- becoming a kind of rock star herself with dozens of training institutes, schools and associations named in her honor. She died on Sept. 19, 2016 in Rockville, Md. Mrs. Moreno was born June 13, 1917 in the Netherlands. In 1932, she moved as a school girl from Amsterdam to London with her parents. She immigrated to the United States in 1939, as the clouds of inevitable war were gathering over Europe. In 1941, she brought her elder sister from Belgium to Beacon, N.Y., desperate to find help for her sister's mental illness at the sanitarium of Dr. J.L. Moreno, an innovative physician who used improvisational drama on a circular stage to address mental health problems and even then was considered a pioneering figure in group psychotherapy. He greeted her with open arms and a delighted “Yes!” and so began their collaboration. |
AuthorKaren Carnabucci, LCSW, TEP, is an author, trainer and psychotherapist who promotes, practices and teaches experiential methods including psychodrama, Family and Systemic Constellations, sand tray, mindfulness and Tarot imagery. Archives
February 2026
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed
Located in beautiful Lancaster County, Pennsylvania
What People Say
|
Subscribe to Karen's e-letter!Get updates on training events, special offers and resources for helpers and healers!
|
© 2016-2026 The Lancaster School of Psychodrama and Experiential Psychotherapies and Companions In Healing. All rights reserved. The trademark Lancaster School of Psychodrama and Experiential Psychotherapies™ is the exclusive property of The Lancaster School of Psychodrama and Experiential Psychotherapies and Companions In Healing.
This website, including text, blog content, graphic designs, photographs, and other creative works found on this website, constitutes educational and journalistic expression not intended as specific or individualized advice in the field of continuing education. The content on this website is educational content in the field of continuing education and is not a substitute for legal, financial, or tax advice.
Testimonials or reviews on this website reflect individual experiences. Outcomes, results and/or transformation are individualized and are not guaranteed.
This website, including text, blog content, graphic designs, photographs, and other creative works found on this website, constitutes educational and journalistic expression not intended as specific or individualized advice in the field of continuing education. The content on this website is educational content in the field of continuing education and is not a substitute for legal, financial, or tax advice.
Testimonials or reviews on this website reflect individual experiences. Outcomes, results and/or transformation are individualized and are not guaranteed.