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Gloucestershire Play Therapy
"Safety is not the absence of threat, it is the presence of connection"
- Gabor Mate
What is Play Therapy?
Play Therapy helps children to understand difficult feelings and make sense of upsetting and challenging events. It is based on the understanding that children communicate through play. Generally in adult therapy the adult explains what is troubling them, but this isn't the natural way children express themselves. In Play Therapy the child expresses their feelings and experiences through play at their own pace, in their own way and however they feel most comfortable.
Through the therapeutic relationship the child is able to express, project, replay, rework and integrate their (conscious and unconscious) experiences of their world within the safety and confidentiality of the sessions. As the therapist attunes to the child, the child is able to 'borrow' the therapist's nervous system, this allows for co-regulation. This co-regulation allows the child to explore uncomfortable thoughts and feelings as well as slowly learn to regulate their own emotions.
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Play Therapy can help with anxiety, low self-esteem, regulating emotions, appropriately expressing emotions, or processing difficult experiences.
How long does it take?
Some children will respond to just 16 sessions. However, with longer term or more severe problems it needs at least a school year (36 sessions). It's important for the sessions to be consistent in order for a trusting relationship to build. Sessions would be on the same day, and at the same time each week. It can take up to 7 sessions for the therapeutic relationship to build but this can take much longer depending on the situation. Unplanned missed sessions may disrupt the progress.
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