Trauma and life journeys: support attentive to your story, in Lyon

When the past weighs on the present

Some experiences leave marks that do not fade on their own. An accident, an assault, violence in childhood or in a relationship, a disaster, a sudden bereavement or a difficult birth can continue to intrude long afterwards, as invasive memories, fears or a constant state of alert. Other journeys, less dramatic, weigh too: leaving your country, starting life again elsewhere, growing up between two languages and two cultures, feeling like a foreigner everywhere.

These stories are unique, and they call for support that takes the time to hear them in their context: cultural, family, social and sometimes political.

Psychological trauma

After a traumatic event, it is normal to be shaken for a few days or weeks. For some people, the reactions persist or appear later: nightmares, flashbacks, avoiding anything that recalls the event, hypervigilance, irritability, a sense of detachment. This is known as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Repeated trauma, particularly in childhood, can also have more diffuse effects on self-esteem, emotions and relationships.

These conditions can be treated. Support first focuses on safety and stabilisation, then on working through memories and their place in the person’s story. To find out more: psychological trauma and PTSD.

Exile, migration and expatriation

Moving to another country is an experience of loss as much as discovery: you leave behind a language, loved ones, familiar landmarks, sometimes a professional status. People in exile have often been through major ordeals before and during their journey, and face precarity and uncertainty on arrival. Expatriates and their families experience other difficulties: isolation, loss of meaning, tension in the couple, children adapting faster than their parents, and a return home that is sometimes harder than the departure.

Intercultural psychology looks at what these moves do to identity and relationships, and takes into account the different ways, across cultures, of expressing suffering and thinking about care. To find out more: intercultural psychology, exile and expatriation.

My experience

I completed training in “Interculturality and psychological trauma” at the Centre Régional du Psychotrauma, and worked at the Orspere-Samdarra national observatory, dedicated to the mental health of people experiencing migration and precarity, at the Centre Hospitalier Le Vinatier.

I work in English, French and Portuguese, and I pay particular attention to the place of language in therapy. Being able to speak in your mother tongue, or in the language in which you feel freest, often makes a great difference.

How I can help

I draw on an integrative approach (find out more). Cognitive behavioural tools help ease symptoms and restore a sense of safety; the systemic approach takes into account family, couple and the communities you belong to; existential and psychoanalytic approaches help give what you have lived through a place and a meaning. I see people individually, and also as a couple or as a family when that helps.

Sessions last about 50 minutes, at the Brotteaux practice, 134 rue de Sèze in Lyon 6th, or by video, which makes it possible to continue therapy when you move or from abroad. Fees are listed on the home page.

Frequently asked questions

Useful resources

• Post-traumatic stress disorder, World Health Organization
• Cn2r, French national resource centre on psychological trauma (in French)
• Orspere-Samdarra, observatory on mental health, vulnerability and society (in French)