Rewind Therapy

Rewind is a psychotherapeutic technique, developed by Dr David Muss, used to treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and associated issues such as anxiety which cause flashbacks, nightmares, intrusive thoughts and physical symptoms of fear and stress.

The stress created by the trauma continues to activate the fight, flight or freeze response within the body, which prevents the hippocampus processing and filing the information in the usual way.

The treatment works by helping to move traumatic memories from your short term (working) memory to the hippocampus. The client is led through a relaxation exercise, followed by visualisation of the triggering event in a dissociated framework, and mental anchoring to a positive memory prior to the trauma. This allows the mind to complete the processing and storage of the information. The number of sessions required to successfully complete therapy is dependent on the complexity and severity of the trauma.

I find that clients respond extremely well to Rewind therapy and it is one of the modalities I favour using when working with trauma, particularly isolated, “one-off” traumas, such as a minor road traffic accident. Alternatively it is very useful in dealing with multiple instances of trauma-inducing experience, working with each in turn.