Page 39 - EMCAPP-Journal No. 9

Samuel Pfeifer (Switzerland)

Comment to Samuel Pfeifer,
M.D., has been
“Therapeutic Goals in the medical di-

Christian Counseling“ rector of the
Christian Psych-
iatric Clinic Son-
nenhalde in Ba-
Late-onset PTSD is a rare disorder but all the sel/ Switzerland
more distressing as the question arises, why this for 25 years. He
emotional pain is coming up at this stage of life. is now in private
The trauma in the life of Anna bears several practice and teaching as a professor for psy-
risk factors: it happened in the forming years chotherapy and spirituality at Evangelische
of childhood, it was severe and life-threatening, Hochschule Tabor in Marburg / Germany.
and it came from a family member. Despite the
healing time of more than 50 years in a wonder- Former articles by Samuel you can see here:
ful marriage and family life, the scars were still http://emcapp.ignis.de/4/#/78
there, now being triggered by this phone call of http://emcapp.ignis.de/4/#/146
one of her brothers. Uncommon as it may be,
late-onset PTSD does exist and it requires the
Christian counselor to explore the emotional
pain with empathy and compassion. Listening only the question of why God allowed this to
to the hurt and taking the traumatic past se- happen, but also the Christian stereotype that
riously, is already an important factor in he- one has to forgive (and perhaps even forget!).
aling. With soft, tentative questions one could Although we agree that forgiveness is an im-
further explore what has happened: What were portant factor in healing, we probably have to
her emotions? Shame, pain, humiliation, fear of expand the focus in severe trauma. I like the
dying etc. I am in full accord with the descripti- expression of “unburdening” the trauma or the
on of the therapeutic process as Shannon Wolf “letting-go process” (Pollock 2016).
describes it.
This means to first allow the client to acknow-
But there are also unanswered questions: why ledge that the trauma has happened, with all its
did the brother commit such atrocities, why painful aspects, and to see it as part of her hi-
did God allow this to happen? And there are story and her human existence. When we stop
no easy answers to that. A very helpful book to struggling to be happy, but allow ourselves to
address the spiritual questions is Christopher accept the dark parts of our lives, then we can
J.H. Wrights “The God I Don’t Understand. start to re-assemble the broken pieces. This exi-
Reflections on Tough Questions of Faith.” As stential approach is the focus of a relatively new
Christian counsellors we do not only want to therapeutic school, “Acceptance and Commit-
find a way through the forest, but we are going ment Therapy” (Harris 2008, Hayes et al. 2011).
alongside the person in his or her struggles with Acceptance allows you to acknowledge the bro-
a trauma that cannot be made undone. It is part kenness of our human existence, the yearning
of life, and it has not been erased from memo- for the glory to come as part of our Christian
ry. I fully agree with the way, Shannon Wolf is life (Romans 8). From there we can go and de-
describing the initial process of setting priori- fine values which we want to live. Out of accep-
ties, from exploring to explaining the organic tance of our weakness (another biblical term
aspects to addressing the spiritual issues. for brokenness, 2 Corinthians 12:9) grows the
commitment to let Christian values guide our
But let me go one or two steps further: in the acts and our thoughts despite the broken world
spiritual dimension of Anna’s story there is not in which we live.

38