Background:

• 18 year old whom a teacher had raped repeatedly over a four year period.
• Diagnosis: PostTraumatic Stress Syndrome (Very dramatic re-traumatic reaction).
• Has been at different institutions since the client was 14. If the situation did not change the chances are the client would be a psychiatric "case" for a long time.
• Problem: Every time the client was brought into near contact with his hometown, the client had a very dramatic reaction (similar to an epileptic seizure).
• Goal: The ability for the client to live at home with the client's family.

Treatment:

Work with the client over a period of time for several hours a day. The therapist had known the client for nearly six months and had previously tried different approaches before without success.

Day 1

Frames of NLP:I confirmed that I had a good Rapport with the client. Then I verified the client's goal of moving home (Outcome). I also established that this was what the client's family wanted (Ecology). I decided to use several techniques after checking out the client's strategy for "getting ill" (by using the Meta model.)

The client's strategy when he got ill was:

The client recognizes the town (V), started to remember the incident (V); then as the client told himself that he could be raped again (Ad), the client started to feel sick (K). After that the client started to hear the teacher's voice (Ar) and started feeling even worse (K). This resulted in an epileptic like seizure.

Day 2

That day I used the technique of anchoring to create the feeling of being safe, secure and feeling OK. This I did every time when I spoke of it and every time it was clear to me that he was having a good time (we were bowling, playing pool and so on.) I set the anchor at his right shoulder since I probably was going to drive the car and he would most likely be sitting at my right side in the front seat when he would most likely start to feel ill.

Day 3

I started out with the Trauma Relief Technique. I used the technique described in the book (page 22 almost word for word (in Norwegian). After lunch we headed for the client's home. It is a 45 minute drive and during the drive we talked about his favorite subject, movies. (That was also an anchor (A) of feeling safe and protected.) In the beginning it started out fine and we entered the town without incident, but as we approached the school (where the client had been raped) the client became very quiet and started to perspire a lot. Then I fired the anchor (right shoulder) and started to talk about different movies. After a few seconds my client started to reply to my questions about movies. It was almost as if the client had forgotten about the school and the rape. We then went to visit my client's family and stayed there for one hour. (The client's family and friends lived in a different town then my client due to this situation.)

Day 4

We went back to visit my client's family and this time we stayed there most of the day. There were no problems as we took a drive past the school on our way back.

One month later:

My client now lives at home with his family, has a job, and has been reconnected with his friends. I did some follow-up with the States of Excellence technique that seems to work very well. There has been no re-occurrence with the trauma, but it will take some time for my client to get used to life outside of an institution. I have every confidence that my client will accomplish this.