TWIN FALLS — Over the weekend at the Crisis Center of South Central Idaho, ART International, a nonprofit organization, helped teach local area clinicians a form of psychotherapy called Accelerated Resolution Therapy. This form of therapy helps treat people dealing with varying forms of trauma or anxiety.
ART International is dedicated to expanding access and awareness over the country by training clinics and their employees in this form of therapy, how it works, and how it can be applied.
Executive Director for ART International, Kelly Bustin, said, “It is a trauma-based therapy that is used to treat various symptoms of trauma and other co-occurring diagnoses that can often happen in tandem with people who experienced trauma. So that involves anxiety, depression, substance use, and abuse.”
The therapy is an eye movement therapy, and it utilizes bilateral stimulation of the eyes. This process and technique allow people to bring forward memories of the past and enable new imagery to be attached to those existing memories.
Holly Christensen, Master Level ART Clinician and Trainer said, “When they record, they re-record this for themselves. The brain accepts that as, ok, that’s the reality. It leads to closure. It leads to healing.”
Employees for ART International feel that this form of treatment s more relevant now than ever before due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and new experiences people have to have to deal with daily.
“We have a lot of stressors that are taking place. We have a lot of things that people have never experienced before. Not many of us have lived through a global pandemic before. Not many of us have had everything around us shutdown. It’s traumatizing,” said Christensen.
Those who were able to participate in the training over the weekend and are eager to use the practices they learned.
Lory Hartje, Advanced Drug and Alcohol Counselor for the Crisis Center, said, “It’s honestly empowering, and it gives you more hope. It’s given me more hope that I’ll be able to help more people and effectively help more people. And I feel like I will be able to target certain populations that seem to be more higher risk of mental health issues.”
