Session Synopsis by Francine Hoffman
"Don't you want to put your shoes on?" I asked my 11 year old client as he ran outdoors to the play area. "No, It's good to get dirty sometimes!" he yelled out. I heartily agreed and made a mental note to add this to our list of "small successes" he has achieved over the last year. My client came to me as a victim of physically violent bullying along with medical trauma for both himself and family members.
In our first several sessions I noticed he had a strong aversion to getting “dirty” with any kind of substance, a fear of bleeding no matter how small the scratch, a deathly fear of heights big and small, and fingers that were challenged by pencil and paintbrush and tying his shoelaces. These experiences usually ended up in an emotional meltdown of varying intensities and didn't bode well for cultivating friendships and playmates.
Our sessions have consisted mostly of dramatic doll play, use of an aerial yoga swing, and a healthy dose of outdoor games and adventures in the tall grass, earth, trees, sun and rain. Just last spring, on his own accord, he dramatized his doll's death and burial in the dirt at the hands of a bully doll. His doll’s rebirth ensued, rising from the damp earth, being washed clean in a basin, and then born again. His mother shared that he was particularly calm for days afterwards, "as if his brain had been reset".
This is the freedom and flexibility that expressive arts therapy offers - the ability to follow the client's imagination into tight spaces with active sensory experiences that can be witnessed by all present and then reflected upon. We bring the tools and media that the clients are drawn to and find where the door is open just enough to step through. Other art/play activities that aren’t initially attractive or pose too great a challenge will wait until the client is ready. This young boy made his own choice, in his own time, to forego his shoes as he ran in the grass. He even stomped his bare feet in a mud puddle with a big gleeful smile on his face. Imagine that!
Session Synopsis by Ofra Raz
The story of Little G : Breaking the ice - Kitchen Chamber Music to a Fork, aPlate, and a Chair.
The first time I met Little G was during dinner in my house. She came with her mom. I learned that she was eleven years old though she looked much younger. Mom was a colleague of my husband and so, everyone by the dinner table, but her, were all grownups, which made her look even smaller than her usual small stature.
As I was sitting next to her, she bragged about her great horse-riding skills and wanted to show me how skillful she was at “being” a horse. Despite my role as the hostess, I joined her upstairs and through most of the evening she was running around imitating horses moves with great accuracy. She seemed to me desperate for a play companion, and so I played along. Following this extra ordinary evening I began an expressive arts practice with her. We were meeting regularly, once a week, over four and a half years.
Little G had spent the first two and a half years of her life in an orphanage where she barely survived severe neglect and malnutrition. These two and a half years greatly impacted her physical growth and her general health. Some of the sad lessons she learned there was to be extremely careful at trusting other human beings and the uncertainty of having food to eat.
When I started working with her, she used to bark and expose her teeth in a threating doggy manner when things did not follow her whim. She would also neigh and move her head and feet in a horsy way when she was content.
I used to pick her up after school and bring her to my house. We worked and played in the garage and the yard. She always seemed hungry to me after school and so I would treat her to a small lunch in the kitchen. She seemed pleased and loved to lick her plate like a dog, and I did not stop her nor criticize her. Verbal communication was very basic with her, and she would rather “play horses” and gallop in the yard, together with me as her playmate.
Our first meetings were difficult, and I struggled. I was constantly trying to find new paths reaching out to her. Still, it seemed like breaking stones to me. One of these lunch moments, about two months later, as she was sitting by the kitchen table, the fork fell on the floor, making a loud sound, she moved her chair to pick it up and it squeaked and screeched. The plate that was on the table bounced and added a sound as well. Spontaneously, I started moving my chair back and forth, while using the food utensils as musical instruments. She joined in and we created rhythm and repeated the sounds created by this random “ensemble”. Little G. started laughing whole heartedly. It was the first time I had seen her laughing.
That miraculous moment was a real turning point. The ice between us was broken thanks to the kitchen musical piece created as an aesthetic response in the moment: A chamber music piece played with a chair, a fork and a plate. From that moment on she accepted me as a playmate. She trusted me. We co-played and kept expanding our play-room, thus I was taking care of Little G’s wellbeing for the next 4 and a half years