DarrenMaguire

Trauma informed group psychotherapy facilitated by trauma specialists at Trauma Recovery Institute Dublin. The advanced group psychotherapy is suitable for psychotherapy students and those who have at least 4 years experience with psychotherapy.The psychotherapeutic approach applied is Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy (DPP) which is a very unique blend of interpersonal neurobiology, psychodynamic psychotherapy and transference focused psychotherapy incorporating the poly vagal theory by stephen porges. This group is a very effective platform to work through the neurobiology of trauma with the nervous system always in mind, keeping you safe and in felt sense at all times. Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy (DPP) at Trauma Recovery Institute Dublin Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy (DPP) is a highly structured, once to twice weekly-modified psychodynamic treatment based on the psychoanalytic model of object relations. This approach is also informed by the latest in neuroscience, interpersonal neurobiology and attachment theory. As with traditional psychodynamic psychotherapy relationship takes a central role within the treatment and the exploration of internal relational dyads. Our approach differs in that also central to the treatment is the focus on the transference and countertransference, an awareness of shifting bodily states in the present moment and a focus on the client’s external relationships, emotional life and lifestyle. Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy (DPP) is an integrative treatment approach for working with complex trauma, borderline personality organization and dissociation. This treatment approach attempts to address the root causes of trauma-based presentations and fragmentation, seeking to help the client heal early experiences of abandonment, neglect, trauma, and attachment loss, that otherwise tend to play out repetitively and cyclically throughout the lifespan in relationship struggles, illness and addictions. Individual Consultations are 125/150 and group fee is 250 Euro per month. Trauma can be conceptualized as stemming from a failure of the natural physiological activation and hormonal secretions to organize an effective [...]

Lifestyle medicine is a branch of evidence-based medicine in which comprehensive lifestyle changes (including nutrition, physical activity, stress management, social support and environmental exposures) are used to prevent, treat and reverse the progression of chronic diseases by addressing their underlying causes. Lifestyle medicine is often prescribed in conjunction with our trauma recovery programs. Trauma Recovery Institute & Plant Based Academy provide leadership in research, prevention and treatment of lifestyle-related diseases through lifestyle medicine. Lifestyle medicine includes functional health, plant based nutrition and complex trauma recovery. Functional Health addresses the underlying causes of illness & disease, using a systems-oriented approach and engaging both client and Plantrician in a therapeutic partnership exploring diet, lifestyle, trauma history, relationships, body and stress. This is an incredibly effective holistic approach to recovery, incoporating the very latest in gut research and psychobiotics, Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy, conscious relational sexuality via Embodied Tantra and Plant Based nutritional science. Functional Health is a healthy holistic journey out of anxiety, depression, eating disorders, diabetes, cancer, IBS and other gastrointestinal and autoimmune disorders. It is an evolution in the practice of medicine that better addresses the healthcare needs of the 21st century. By shifting the traditional disease-centered focus of medical practice to a more client-centered approach, Functional Health addresses the whole person, not just an isolated set of symptoms. Functional Health therapists spend time with their clients, listening to their histories and looking at the interactions among genetic, environmental, relational and lifestyle factors that can influence long-term health and complex, chronic disease, we also take a closer look at a clients relationship to food rather than just suggesting a diet, this is very effective for long term change, health and wellbeing. In this way, Functional Health supports the unique expression of health and vitality for each individual. Functional Health offers a powerful [...]

Trauma can be conceptualized as stemming from a failure of the natural physiological activation and hormonal secretions to organize an effective response to threat. Rather than producing a successful fight or flight response the organism becomes immobilized. Probably the best animal model for this phenomenon is that of ‘inescapable shock,” in which creatures are tortured without being unable to do anything to affect the outcome of events. The resulting failure to fight or flight, that is, the physical immobilization (the freeze response), becomes a conditioned behavioral response. In his book, Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self, Allen Schore has outlined in exquisite detail the psychobiology of early childhood development involving maturation of orbitofrontal and limbic structures based on reciprocal experiences with the caregiver. Dysfunctional associations in this dyadic relationship result in permanent physicochemical and anatomical changes, which have implications for personality development as well as for a wide variety of clinical manifestations. An intimate relationship may exist, with negative child/care giver interaction leading to a state of persisting hypertonicity of the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems that may profoundly affect the arousal state of the developing child. Sustained hyperarousal in these children may markedly affect behavioral and characterological development. Many traumatized children and adults, confronted with chronically overwhelming emotions, lose their capacity to use emotions as guides for effective action. They often do not recognize what they are feeling and fail to mount an appropriate response. This phenomenon is called alexithymia, an inability to identify the meaning of physical sensations and muscle activation. Failure to recognize what is going on causes them to be out of touch with their needs, and, as a consequence, they are unable to take care of them. This inability to correctly identify sensations, emotions, and physical states often extends itself to having difficulty appreciating [...]

Is your brain not working properly, perhaps you have brain fog, struggle getting up in the morning, struggle in real;ationships, struggle with daily tasks or struggle with memory, attention and focus ? We have a world unique holistic bioHacking program for you incorporating the latest research in gut science, neuroscience, and interpersonal neurobiology. This program will focus on culinary medicine, lifestyle medicine, stress management, relationship coaching and trauma recovery with the goal of upgrading all areas of your love, life and career. The Ultimate BioHacking Program. Exposure to extreme threat, particularly early in life, combined with a lack of adequate caregiving responses significantly affect the long-term capacity of the human organism to modulate the response of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems in response to subsequent stress. The sympathetic nervous system (SNS) is primarily geared to mobilization by preparing the body for action by increasing cardiac output, stimulating sweat glands, and by inhibiting the gastrointestinal tract. Since the SNS has long been associated with emotion, a great deal of work on the role of the SNS has been collected to identify autonomic “signatures” of specific affective states. Overall, increased adrenergic activity is found in about two-thirds of traumatized children and adults. The parasympathetic branch of the ANS not only influences HR independently of the sympathetic branch, but makes a greater contribution to HR, including resting HR. Vagal fibers originating in the brainstem affect emotional and behavioral responses to stress by inhibiting sympathetic influence to the sinoatrial node and promoting rapid decreases in metabolic output that enable almost instantaneous shifts in behavioral state. The parasympathetic system consists of two branches: the ventral vagal complex (VVC) and the dorsal vagal complex (DVC) systems. The DVC is primarily associated with digestive, taste, and hypoxic responses in mammals. The DVC contributes to pathophysiological conditions [...]

“The greatest damage done by neglect, trauma or emotional loss is not the immediate pain they inflict but the long-term distortions they induce in the way a developing child will continue to interpret the world and her situation in it. All too often these ill-conditioned implicit beliefs become self-fulfilling prophecies in our lives. We create meanings from our unconscious interpretation of early events, and then we forge our present experiences from the meaning we’ve created. Unwittingly, we write the story of our future from narratives based on the past.” ― Gabor Maté                                                     Addiction is a Response to Childhood Suffering By gabor mate I completely appreciate the 12 steps, and I talk about them in my book where I have an appendix on them. I think where they fail or where they miss something is when they focus on action while tending not to look at the underlying emotions and the experiences that underlie those emotions. You can go to 12-step groups for a long time and never find out how traumatized you were. That’s where the missing piece is and has been for a long time. The patients that I worked with—I’m talking about hardcore, street level drug users, people injecting cocaine and heroin and so on—not a single one of them ever came to me and said, “Doc, I was traumatized, and I’m using that as an excuse to do drugs.” They didn’t know they were traumatized. No doctor had ever pointed it out to them. They thought they were just fuck-ups. They thought they were just bad people. They thought they were just addicts. They didn’t realize that they were using the [...]

Join us for the Ultimate Relationship Program and take your relationship to the next level. Our Relationship Coaching sessions & workshops teach scientifically validated ways to build intimacy and dissolve conflict through interactive exercises, role-plays, and new communication skills to help deepen your connection with yourself and your partner. In The Ultimate Relationship coaching session, you will learn thought-provoking information and research on brain neurobiology that can help increase your understanding of the ultimate relationship method. You will also gain a fresh focus for meeting the challenges in your relationship in an intimate safe setting. Our approach is based on research conducted at the Gottman Institute and the research presented from the new field of interpersonal neurobiology incorporating ancient wisdom of tantra and new neuroscience of the poly vagal theory. Sessions take place in a beautiful safe setting. First Consultation is 150 Euro .The 12 week ultimate relationship program is 2500 Euro. When our relationships are working, everything else in life works so much better. Some of the biggest challenges in relationships come from the fact that most people enter a relationship in order to get something: they’re trying to find someone who’s going to make them feel good. In reality, the only way a relationship will last is if you see your relationship as a place that you go to give, and not a place that you go to take. “True love begins when nothing is looked for in return.” —Antoine de Saint-Exupéry The Ultimate Relationship Program – From Crazy Making to Love Making A passionate, thriving relationship is a beautiful thing that can give you certainty, meaning, and a powerful source of drive. What’s the secret to enjoying the relationship of your dreams? How do you spark passion and love, even in moments of conflict? Your relationship should be [...]

Trauma can be conceptualized as stemming from a failure of the natural physiological activation and hormonal secretions to organize an effective response to threat. Rather than producing a successful fight or flight response the organism becomes immobilized. Probably the best animal model for this phenomenon is that of ‘inescapable shock,” in which creatures are tortured without being unable to do anything to affect the outcome of events. The resulting failure to fight or flight, that is, the physical immobilization (the freeze response), becomes a conditioned behavioral response. In his book, Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self, Allen Schore has outlined in exquisite detail the psychobiology of early childhood development involving maturation of orbitofrontal and limbic structures based on reciprocal experiences with the caregiver. Dysfunctional associations in this dyadic relationship result in permanent physicochemical and anatomical changes, which have implications for personality development as well as for a wide variety of clinical manifestations. An intimate relationship may exist, with negative child/care giver interaction leading to a state of persisting hypertonicity of the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems that may profoundly affect the arousal state of the developing child. Sustained hyperarousal in these children may markedly affect behavioral and characterological development. Many traumatized children and adults, confronted with chronically overwhelming emotions, lose their capacity to use emotions as guides for effective action. They often do not recognize what they are feeling and fail to mount an appropriate response. This phenomenon is called alexithymia, an inability to identify the meaning of physical sensations and muscle activation. Failure to recognize what is going on causes them to be out of touch with their needs, and, as a consequence, they are unable to take care of them. This inability to correctly identify sensations, emotions, and physical states often extends itself to having difficulty appreciating [...]

Trauma can be conceptualized as stemming from a failure of the natural physiological activation and hormonal secretions to organize an effective response to threat. Rather than producing a successful fight or flight response the organism becomes immobilized. Probably the best animal model for this phenomenon is that of ‘inescapable shock,” in which creatures are tortured without being unable to do anything to affect the outcome of events. The resulting failure to fight or flight, that is, the physical immobilization (the freeze response), becomes a conditioned behavioral response. In his book, Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self, Allen Schore has outlined in exquisite detail the psychobiology of early childhood development involving maturation of orbitofrontal and limbic structures based on reciprocal experiences with the caregiver. Dysfunctional associations in this dyadic relationship result in permanent physicochemical and anatomical changes, which have implications for personality development as well as for a wide variety of clinical manifestations. An intimate relationship may exist, with negative child/care giver interaction leading to a state of persisting hypertonicity of the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems that may profoundly affect the arousal state of the developing child. Sustained hyperarousal in these children may markedly affect behavioral and characterological development. Many traumatized children and adults, confronted with chronically overwhelming emotions, lose their capacity to use emotions as guides for effective action. They often do not recognize what they are feeling and fail to mount an appropriate response. This phenomenon is called alexithymia, an inability to identify the meaning of physical sensations and muscle activation. Failure to recognize what is going on causes them to be out of touch with their needs, and, as a consequence, they are unable to take care of them. This inability to correctly identify sensations, emotions, and physical states often extends itself to having difficulty appreciating [...]

Having been diagnosed with cancer is like no other experience. It immediately scrambles our thoughts and dismantles our dreams and previous agendas. Our hearts and minds are lit with a burning and all encompassing fear. This occurs not because of the nature of cancer but rather is a consequence of a complete misunderstanding and lack of knowledge regarding biology, health and “disease”. It is essential to understand that our bodies function according to biological laws and are not arbitrary or doomed. Just as certain as a finger will heal, if cut with a knife, so can our bodies heal from cancer. Our aim is not only to treat the cancer, but to change the biochemistry of your body to a state of health and well being so the cancer will no longer flourish. What sets Life Change Health Institute apart from other centers is that we focus on providing you with this knowledge, to gain the understanding, the tools, and the direct experience, therefore the power to heal. When you understand how your body functions, how your brain and body are an organism functioning in unison, and how your mind and body have developed to the state it is today, then you can begin the process of healing, changing and transforming from a state of dis-ease to a state of vitality. The Chronic psychological status of the individual may play an important role either in facilitating tumour promotion or in dampening or accentuating the impacts of environmental stress. Lipman, head of the breast cancer section of national cancer institute Maryland has written that the human endocrine system provides one critical mediator of interaction between psyche and tumor, it seems inescapable that psychic factors which can evoke endocrine changes will have effects on actual tumour biology. The effect of hormones on [...]

Tantra is a spiritual path for integrating body, mind and soul. It differs from other paths in its honoring of the body, using the senses, sexuality, and feelings to help you evolve spiritually. Tantra assists you in realizing your full potential as a human being. If you choose to live from the Tantric perspective, you will transform your life. You will discover bliss. You may apply Tantric practices and principles to many areas of life - to relationship and sexual loving, spiritual practice and lifestyle, physical and emotional well-being. Red Tantra is the aspect of Tantra that relates to the mastery of sexual skills. White Tantra relates to the yogic or spiritual aspects of Tantric practice and consists of exercises or postures (asanas) combined with special breathing (pranayama), hand or finger gestures (mudras), internal muscular exercises (bhandas), chanting (mantra), and meditation. The skills and benefits of White Tantra practices increase ones ability to master Red (sexual) Tantra. Pink Tantra refers to a heart centered path of tantra that blends many of the elements of White Tantra with some aspects of Red Tantra. Within the path of Pink Tantra, all of the chakras are acknowledged. However, there seems to be an emphasis on the importance of the heart; opening the heart chakra and healing the heart. Compassion, acceptance and forgiveness for others and for our self are central themes to this practice. Pink Tantra teaches us to cultivate love without attachment, ownership or expectation. With Pink Tantra love is seen as the impetus for healing and transformation.     At the Heart of Tantra is Love. The practices and rituals of Tantra, both spiritual and sexual, work to create the conditions necessary for love to flourish and endure. When we achieve states of presence, energy flow, relaxation, harmony, and connection, love emerges and opens the [...]

You love animals, right? Well, did you know that the best way to save animals is by going vegan? By cutting meat and dairy products from your diet, you'll be saving the lives of more than 100 animals a year. Animals value their lives as much as you value yours. So do your best not to eat them. Make the switch to a compassionate, healthy lifestyle today by signing up for our Raw Food Mastery course at Plant Based Academy. After 30 days of living meat- and dairy-free, you'll feel so great that you just might turn 30 days into a lifetime. Watch the videos below and sign up for one of our upcoming course if you would like to eat better, feel better, and stop supporting cruelty to chickens, pigs, cows, and other animals raised for food.       "Raw vegan food is not boring salads and uncooked vegetables, raw food is a culinary pursuit, a dedication and endeavor to transforming the highest quality of vegetables using simple techniques to extract exquisite flavors, preserving the essential nutrients and enzymes and complementing them with an array of mineral rich nuts, seeds, seaweeds, sprouts and fruits. Raw vegan food is the pursuit of perfect food, art for the eyes, a taste of naturalness, unparalleled nourishment for the body and great for the planet too" - Plant Based Academy       Making a commitment to healthy eating is a great start towards a healthier life for you, for animals and our planet. Watch the educational movie below which outlines the practises used in meat and dairy production. We believe that animals are not ours to eat, wear, experiment on, use for our entertainment or abuse in any other way. Yet many people have never considered the impact that their clothes, food, cosmetics or entertainment [...]

The definition of trauma is experiences that overwhlem our capacity to cope. Trauma effects all areas of the brain. The major impact is on three brain networks called the Default Mode Network, the Salience Network and the Executive Network. The Default Mode Network is the major rest state network of the brain, when we are in a resting state, the default mode network is most active. The default mode network is composed of three brain regions called the posterior singulate cortex in the back of the brain and is responsible for helping us with self relevance. Often a traumatised person will have difficulty figuring out what is self relevent. For example, if someone was raped in the forest and then goes back to a forest years later, they may think they're going to be raped again because they think the forest is self-relevant even though it isn't at all. Another region of the default mode network is the dorsal medial prefrontal cortex which is located in the front of the brain in the middle. This area of the brain helps us to know what we feel and helps us to know our internal emotional life. Traumatised people find it very difficult to know internal emotional states. The third area of the brain that is part of the default mode network is the parietal cortex which allows us to have an embodied sense of self in space. Very often with Traumatised people , it can be difficult to know where the body starts and ends because of the disconnect from the body and how it relates to the environment. All of these areas are most active when we are at rest , when we are thinking or planning these areas are quiet. when someone experiences trauma very early in life, these [...]

The Chronic psychological status of the individual may play an important role either in facilitating tumour promotion or in dampening or accentuating the impacts of environmental stress. Lipman, head of the breast cancer section of national cancer institute Maryland has written that the human endocrine system provides one critical mediator of interaction between psyche and tumor, it seems inescapable that psychic factors which can evoke endocrine changes will have effects on actual tumour biology. The effect of hormones on the growth  and spread of cancer is twofold. First, many tumours are directly hormone dependant , or they, arise in organs intimately involved in homonal interactions, such as the ovaries or teste. Hormone dependant cancer cells bear on their membranes receptors for various hormones capable of promoting cell growth.one example of a hormone dependant cancer is that of the breast. it is generally understood that many breast cancers are oestrogen dependant, this being the rational for the use of oestrogen blocking drug tamoxifen. less well known is that some breast cancers have receptors for a broad array of other information substances including androgens,progestins, prolactin, insulin, vitamin D and several more all of them secreted by the HPA axis or regulated by it. Stress is a powerful modulator of hormonal function. Gabor Mate  One in three people in Ireland will develop cancer during their lifetime. In Ireland an average of 30,000 new cases of cancer are diagnosed each year. The number is expected to rise to over 40,000 per year by 2020. The five most common cancers in Ireland are Non melanoma skin cancer (the most common and treatable form of skin cancer), prostate cancer, breast cancer, bowel cancer and lung cancer. Up to 50% of all cancers are preventable, 30% are preventable through lifestyle changes alone. These Statistics are taken from [...]

The digestive system plays an important role in the absorption of nutrients into the body.  It takes the food we ingest, breaks it down mechanically and chemically in the mouth and stomach.  It then absorbs nutrients, fats, proteins and water in the intestines before eliminating the waste through the rectum. Major organs involved in the digestive system include the mouth, stomach, small intestine, large intestine, liver, pancreas. The main steps in the digestive system The digestive system is designed to do a few major things. They can be grouped into four categories: Ingestion Digestion Breakdown Excretion Following Food from Mouth to Anus To understand how our food is digested in the digestive system, it might be very useful to follow our food along its normal path, starting from the mouth. Imagine for just a second that you’re hungry and your eyes gaze upon a nice home cooked thanksgiving turkey dinner. Your mouth starts to water. The salivary glands in your mouth are triggered to start producing saliva, a compound that will aid in the digestion of the meal. As food enters your mouth, your teeth begin mechanically breaking down the food into small and smaller pieces. The saliva starts to chemically break it down as well. Soon, your conscious mind says, “lets swallow this food.” You swallow it and take another bite. While you’re thinking about your next bite of food, your nervous system is helping to move the bolus (the food package you swallowed), down throat. A small flap of skin called your epiglottis makes sure your food goes down your esophagus. Movements of the smooth muscles, known as peristalsis help move that bolus down your esophagus. When it reaches your stomach, a sphincter opens and dumps the food in. Inside the stomach, cells start to secrete different acids that help increase acidity [...]

The Art of Raw Gourmet Chocolate & Healthy Light Refined Desserts Course is now available as an online Course. This course is an advanced resource & guide on the art , history and science on raw chocolate and desserts.This course will teach you how to make your very own raw bean to bar chocolate, raw cheesecake, raw cookies and cakes. This online course is loaded with recipes, resources, tips about raw chocolate and amazingly how to make desserts health, fat free, sugar free and some even nut free, it is also loaded with informative online videos and research data on the chemistry and timeline of cacao, and why it is good for us as a probiotic, prebiotic and for its polyphenols and positive effect on our mood and hormones. If you want to make the best chocolate and the healthiest desserts then this course will be perfect for you. By Purchasing this online course you will have permenant access to this important material so you can revise any time you wish. After Purchasing, you will recieve an email with your username and password which you will use to log into our members only area and access this incredible course. Upon completion of this course you will become an expert fermentationist equipped with the most up to date information about out the incredible workings of our microbiota and psychobiotics.This is Module 5 from the 12 Module Professional Certificate Course with Plant Based Academy's Plantrician training program.Click HERE for more details.   Module 5 - The Art of Raw Gourmet Chocolate & Healthy Light Refined Desserts - Single Module 350 Euro Online / 500 Euro Onsite ( Advanced Module) The Art of Raw Chocolate module for obvious reasons is a very exciting as most people love chocolate. In this module we go [...]

Trauma informed group psychotherapy facilitated by trauma specialists at Trauma Recovery Institute Dublin. The advanced group psychotherapy is suitable for psychotherapy students and those who have at least 4 years experience with psychotherapy.The psychotherapeutic approach applied is Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy (DPP) which is a very unique blend of interpersonal neurobiology, psychodynamic psychotherapy and transference focused psyschotherapy incorporating the poly vagal theory by stephen porges. This group is a very effective platform to work through the neurobiology of trauma with the nervous system always in mind, keeping you safe and in felt sense at all times.     Treatment of Relational and complex Trauma at Trauma Recovery Institute Trauma Recovery Institute offers unparalleled services and treatment approach through unique individual and group psychotherapy. We specialise in long-term relational trauma recovery, sexual trauma recovery and early childhood trauma recovery. We also offer specialized group psychotherapy for psychotherapists and psychotherapy students, People struggling with addictions and substance abuse, sexual abuse survivors and people looking to function in life at a higher level. Trauma recovery Institute offers a very safe supportive space for deep relational work with highly skilled and experienced psychotherapists accredited with Irish Group Psychotherapy Society (IGPS), which holds the highest accreditation standard in Europe. Trauma Recovery Institute uses a highly structured psychotherapeutic approach called Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy (DPP). At Trauma Recovery Institute we address three of the core Attachment Styles, their origin’s the way they reveal themselves in relationships, and methods for transforming attachment hurt into healing. We use the latest discoveries in Neuroscience which enhances our capacity for deepening intimacy. The foundation for establishing healthy relationships relies on developing secure attachment skills, thus increasing your sensitivity for contingency and relational attunement. According to Allan Schore, the regulatory function of the brain is experience-dependent and he says that, as an infant, our [...]

It may be possible to relieve anxiety and depression solely by manipulating bacteria in the gut. Psychobiotics are defined as live bacteria and their food (probiotics & prebiotics) which, when ingested, confer mental health benefits through interactions with commensal gut bacteria. Ninety percent of what we lug around with us is not human. It's microbial, and it's vital to our health, our moods, even the decisions we make. There are roughly 15 trillion cells in our body—and over 100 trillion bacteria, most of them in the gut and most of them supporting such essential functions as digestion, immunity, metabolism, even mental health in ways that are only now being understood. The body is an ecosystem of interdependent parts relaying messages to each other, explains Ted Dinan, a psychiatrist at the University of Cork, Ireland. So influential are the thousands of species of gut flora on health that Dinan aims to harness the power of microbes to treat depression. Recently, he coined a term for the live organisms in the gut that are psychoactive and of potential benefit to those suffering from a variety of psychiatric illnesses—psychobiotics. Not only can researchers now discern which strains of gut bacteria affect the nervous system, they can also map the exact pathways through which specific gut bacteria influence the brain. Although there are many preparations of bacteria now being marketed as probiotics, "the vast majority do nothing for us," Dinan insists. "Most don't make it past the stomach acid. But a few have enormous implications for the future of psychiatric medication." It's long been known that the stress system is intimately involved in depression. People suffering from major depression frequently have elevated levels of the hormone cortisol, released in response to stress. In a recent study, a probiotic cocktail of Lactobacillus helveticus and Bifidobacterium [...]

The Art of Fermentation is now available as an online Course. This course is an advanced resource & guide on the art , history and science on psychobiotics.This course will teach you how to make your very own raw vegan organic sugar free nut and seed cheese,miso,tempeh, fruit yogurt, medicinal kombucha, herbal water kefir, pickled vegetables, seaweed sauerkraut & traditional kimchi. This online course is loaded with recipes, resources, tips about fermented foods, it is also loaded with informative online videos and scientific articles on Probiotics, Gut Flora, Gut Health and the link between healthy brain and healthy gut. If you want to improve your health, the health of other people, and improve your brain function, there’s one essential topic that you need to know. ( Probiotics, Prebiotics, Synbiotics & Psychobiotics ) By Purchasing this online course you will have permenant access to this important material so you can revise any time you wish. After Purchasing, you will recieve an email with your username and password which you will use to log into our members only area and access this incredible course. Upon completion of this course you will become an expert fermentationist equipped with the most up to date information about out the incredible workings of our microbiota and psychobiotics.This is Module 2 from the 12 Module Professional Certificate Course with Plant Based Academy's Plantrician training program.Click HERE for more details. Using Probiotiocs as a Prevention from Cancer Some LAB (Lacto Acid Bacteria)-fermented foods have antimutagenic and anticarcinogeinc activities (Lee et al., 2004). Kefir is used for the treatment of cancer (Otes and Cagindi, 2003; Yanping et al., 2009). Sauerkraut, fermented vegetable of Germany, contains s-methylmethionine, which reduces tumourigenesis risk in the stomach (Kris-Etherton et al., 2002). Consumption of fermented products containing live cells of L. acidophilus decreases ß-glucuronidase, [...]

The Ultimate Realtionship Coaching Program A passionate, thriving relationship is a beautiful thing that can give you certainty, meaning, and a powerful source of drive. What’s the secret to enjoying the relationship of your dreams? How do you spark passion and love, even in moments of conflict? Your relationship should be your greatest source of pleasure. If you’re struggling with your partner, or would like to take your relationship to the next level, we invite you onto the Ultimate Relationship Program with Embodied Tantra. Check out our approach below and fill in your details, get in touch and book a session with us. When we meet our partners, we make an unconscious contract to help each other resolve emotional injuries of the past , we unconsciously pick or hire the perfect person to trigger this stored painful memory of our past , it is for this exact reason we have come together . Relationships are not a problem to be solved but an adventure to be embraced. Conflict is a gift to be unpacked , to embrace, an opportunity to grow , resolve and mature . Conflict can not be resolved at the level with which it was created. We hire the person in our life who is most compatible to help us resolve what is unresolved from our childhood. Our relationship lives in the space between us and it is sacred . This becomes the playground for our children . When there are only two options , take the third option ! Keep the space between you safe and sacred . Honour the space between you , by visiting the other by crossing the bridge . Cross the bridge with an open mind to learn , with curiosity and compassion , leave behind your hurt and trauma. Crossing the bridge is becoming [...]

It is never too late to change your life. At Life Change Health Institute we offer a world unique holistic health program which addresses relationship distress & conflict, illness such as IBS & other gastrointestinal disorders of brain/gut axis, anxiety, depression and other life challenges, all of which are rooted in an early life traumatic event or events. Our world unique comprehensive holistic health program incorporates a gut repair program, psychotherapy, embodied tantra, conscious parenting/relating and plant based nutrition which bring about feelings of integration, optimum health, vitality, longevity and well being. This program will assist you in thriving rather than just surviving and help you to live life at a much higher level. Anything you desire in life, you need energy to obtain and achieve, the kind of energy that only comes from optimum health and passionate relationships. If you struggle with any of the following, then a comprehensive Consultation will be perfect for you : IBS Anxiety Depression Eating Disorder Addictions Relationship conflict Gastrointestinal distress Severe Menstrual Pain Chronic Dissociation Book in now for a comprehensive consultaion and get to the root of your life challenges so you can live a life of health and vitality. With our expert guidance you will learn to self regulate, heal your gut dysbiosis and reset your gut for health, activate parasympathetic nervous system for sustained relaxation, seek corrective emotional experiences through healthy and passionate relationships, invoke and strengthen healthy immunity with a healthy diet that does not feel like a diet,resolve emotional distress and dissociated painful experiences of the past and awaken a powerful lymphatic system via dance, movement and yoga. Repair Your Gut, create conscious passionate relationships, resolve anxiety & depression, reverse IBS and other gastrointestinal disorders holistically With Lifestyle Medicine & Functional Health   Lifestyle medicine is a branch [...]

During the last two decades of the 19th century, psychiatrists in Europe began to explore and define the peculiar behavior manifested by patients of theirs who fell under the diagnostic category of hysteria. Pierre Janet at the Salpetriere` described dissociation as phobias of memories, in the form of expressions of excessive or inappropriate physical responses to thoughts or memories of old traumas (Janet, 1920). After visiting Janet, Freud adopted many of these concepts of dissociation as a splitting of consciousness, often associated with bizarre physical symptoms and manifestations, and ultimately attributed such symptoms in his hysterical patients to a history of childhood sexual abuse (Freud, 1896). Evolution of the concept of dissociation led to the description of a constellation of varied clinical manifestations attributed to it, including altered perceptions of physical sensation, time, memory, and the perceptions of self and reality. Complex expressions of these states came to include conversion disorder, fugue states and multiple personalities (dissociative identity disorder) (Freud & Breur, 1953, Mayer-Gross, W., 1935, Spiegal & Cardena, 1991, Bremner, et al, 1992). Thus the concept of dissociation evolved to include not only mental and emotional aberrations, but also stereotyped and unusual somatic perceptual and motor experiences and expressions. All of these symptoms and behaviors were felt to be the sequellae of prior life trauma. The basic mechanism of dissociation was felt to involve the splitting off of parts of memory or perception in order to escape intolerable anxiety triggered by those areas of the mind that retained elements of the traumatic conflict. Relief from that conflict through hysterical dissociation resulted in relief from anxiety, resulting at times in the seemingly blasé acceptance of disabling physical conditions (la belle indifference`). Freud, however, soon began revising his concepts of hysteria, and by 1925 had recanted his theories of the relationship [...]

Trauma and The Gut The Polyvagal Theory is the product of decades of research by Dr Stephen Porges and his team at the Brain-Body Center in the University of Illinois, Chicago. Adopted by clinicians around the world, the Polyvagal Theory has provided exciting new insights into the way our autonomic nervous system unconsciously mediates social engagement, trust, and intimacy, and how these may be influenced by our interactions with others.It was whilst studying the evolution of the nervous system that Porges first made an important discovery concerning the vagus nerve which alters the way we understand autonomic nervous system functions. Before this time it was widely understood that our autonomic nervous system operated in a balanced sympathetic/parasympathetic manner, but Porges research changed this through two discoveries; firstly that the vagus nerve in mammals has not one but two branches, and secondly that the newest branch is able to inhibit other nervous system activity. Porges research showed that in the process of evolution, animals first developed immobilised defense responses (innervated by the vagus/parasympathetic system) –where they would adaptively collapse, shut down or feign death when faced with threats. Over time, the nervous system evolved to enable mobilised responses to threat through the activation of a sympathetic nervous system. This mobilised circuitry was able to speed up the heart and lungs, and act on the same visceral organs as the parasympathetic system, in order to promote adaptive fight, flight and active freeze responses to threat. The third stage of evoluntionary development saw the addition of a newer branch of the vagus nerve which is also able to slow the heart and lungs and which links the innervation of these two with the use of facial nerves involved in social engagement. For this reason, Porges theory proposes that this newer Vagal ̳brake‘ evolved [...]

Happy Brain, Happy Gut ! How does it work? The brain and the gut communicate via gut-brain axis, a mode of bidirectional signaling between the digestive tract and the nervous system. There are several central mechanisms by which gut bacteria can communicate with the brain. First, imbalances in gut bacteria can trigger inflammation by increasing the permeability of the intestinal lining, which allows toxins to seep into the bloodstream. Research has linked pro-inflammatory markers (cytokines) and increased intestinal permeability with anxiety and depression. Secondly, bacteria can produce neurotransmitters, which are carried through the blood to the brain. Bacteria can also stimulate specific nerves in the gut that then transmit information to the brain. Fortunately, you can support gut health (and therefore mental health) by eating a diet that's rich in probiotics -- the "friendly" gut bacteria that support digestion and a balanced microbiome, and are known to boost immune and neurological function. Use the following simple recipe from Plant Based Academy to ensure you are including high dose full spectrum probiotics into your diet and your family's diet. Join our Professional Certificate course in Plant Based Nutrition and Raw Food Mastery at Plant Based Academy to learn more about the art, history and science of fermentation and gut health.   Raw vegan Blueberry Yogurt  15 organic Brazil nuts or almonds (Soaked overnight and rinsed) 200 ml of pure filtered Water or Organic Probiotic drink (water Kefir/kombucha) 4 organic Dates 100g of organic Blueberries 1 organic vanilla pod scraped Probiotics 1 teaspoon (B.Infantis / B.Longum) Blend the nuts, dates, berries and water to a thick creamy and smooth consistency, pour into a container, add the probiotic powder, and stir. Cover with lid but not an airtight lid, as air is needed. Leave out of refrigerator for up to 12 hours. Then [...]

Treating Trauma & Maladaptive Trauma Based Presentations at Trauma Recovery Institute. We offer clients an unique opportunity to work with trauma professionals specialising in recovery from complex trauma using an unique blend of somatic and psychodynamic psychotherapy which a an approach called Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy which is based on the latest and most current trauma research and scientific findings from neuroscience, interpersonal neurobiolgy and attachment theory. Working with Trauma at Trauma Recovery Institute Trauma Recovery Institute offers unparalleled services and treatment approach through unique individual and group psychotherapy. We specialise in long-term relational trauma recovery, sexual trauma recovery and early childhood trauma recovery. We also offer specialized group psychotherapy for psychotherapists and psychotherapy students, People struggling with addictions and substance abuse, sexual abuse survivors and people looking to function in life at a higher level. Trauma recovery Institute offers a very safe supportive space for deep relational work with highly skilled and experienced psychotherapists accredited with Irish Group Psychotherapy Society (IGPS), which holds the highest accreditation standard in Europe. Trauma Recovery Institute uses a highly structured psychotherapeutic approach called Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy (DPP). At Trauma Recovery Institute we address three of the core Attachment Styles, their origin’s the way they reveal themselves in relationships, and methods for transforming attachment hurt into healing. We use the latest discoveries in Neuroscience which enhances our capacity for deepening intimacy. The foundation for establishing healthy relationships relies on developing secure attachment skills, thus increasing your sensitivity for contingency and relational attunement. According to Allan Schore, the regulatory function of the brain is experience-dependent and he says that, as an infant, our Mother is our whole environment. In our relational trauma recovery approach you will learn to understand how the early patterns of implicit memory – which is pre-verbal, sub-psychological, and non-conceptual – build pathways in [...]

Drawing on his work with patients who have survived a variety of traumatic experiences — from plane crashes to rape to torture — Van der Kolk considers the great challenge of those of us living with trauma:In response to the trauma itself, and in coping with the dread that persisted long afterward, these patients had learned to shut down the brain areas that transmit the visceral feelings and emotions that accompany and define terror. Yet in everyday life, those same brain areas are responsible for registering the entire range of emotions and sensations that form the foundation of our self-awareness, our sense of who we are. What we witnessed here was a tragic adaptation: In an effort to shut off terrifying sensations, they also deadened their capacity to feel fully alive. While this dissociation from the body is an adaptive response to trauma, the troublesome day-to-day anguish comes from the retriggering of this remembered response by stimuli that don’t remotely warrant it. Van der Kolk examines the interior machinery at play: The elementary self system in the brain stem and limbic system is massively activated when people are faced with the threat of annihilation, which results in an overwhelming sense of fear and terror accompanied by intense physiological arousal. To people who are reliving a trauma, nothing makes sense; they are trapped in a life-or-death situation, a state of paralyzing fear or blind rage. Mind and body are constantly aroused, as if they are in imminent danger. They startle in response to the slightest noises and are frustrated by small irritations. Their sleep is chronically disturbed, and food often loses its sensual pleasures. This in turn can trigger desperate attempts to shut those feelings down by freezing and dissociation. In a passage that calls to mind philosopher Martha Nussbaum’s excellent [...]

Lifestyle Medicine is a comprehensive mind body medicine that addresses the underlying causes of illness & disease, using a systems-oriented approach and engaging both client and clinician in a therapeutic partnership exploring diet, lifestyle, trauma history, relationships, somatic memory and armouring and stress. This is an incredibly effective holistic approach to recovery, incoporating the very latest in gut research and psychobiotics, dynamic psychosocialsomatic psychotherapy, conscious sexuality and embodied tantra and plant based nutritional science. Lifestyle Medicine is an evolution in the practice of medicine that better addresses the healthcare needs of the 21st century. By shifting the traditional disease-centered focus of medical practice to a more client-centered approach, lifestyle medicine addresses the whole person, not just an isolated set of symptoms.   Lifestyle Medicine at Life Change Health Institute Reclaim your health on our new 12 week life change program. This 12 week life chnage program is a comprehensive professional program for weight loss and/or reversing chronic illness. The 12 week program will include two psychotherapy sessions per week for 12 weeks, a comprehensive diet and lifestyle plan for the 12 weeks, an online repair your gut program and a number of other online modules including simple and advanced recipes for healthhy meals, juices and smoothies and a detailed nutritional science guide. Our 5 Step Holistic Approach to Optimum Health is: 1) Eliminating toxic and inflammatory foods: 2) Rebuilding the Body & Rebuild the Gut: 3) Identifying environmental toxins: 4) Healing autoimmune-related infections: 5) Emotional release process and lifestyle changes   Follow this program, Whether you're battling diabetes, cancer, multiple sclerosis, thyroid disease, autoimmune disease, IBS or obesity, or you simply want to put an end to nagging minor symptoms and get back to full health. Our Holistic approach, based on the latest scientific research is designed for optimum weight loss without [...]

Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) Otto Kernberg’s description of the pathological narcissistic individual centers around a set of paradoxes: self-inflation existing alongside a limitless need for praise, a charming and engaging surface covering a ruthless interior, and a persona of self-sufficiency defending against underlying feelings of intense envy . For Kernberg, the diagnosis of the narcissistic character also depends on the quality of the person’s object relations and the pattern of his or her intrapsychic defenses. Narcissistic individuals experience their relationships with others as exploitative and parasitic. They divide the world between those who contain something that they can extract and those who do not. They distinguish between extraordinary people on the one hand - in association with whom narcissistic individuals experience a sense of greatness themselves - and mediocre or worthless people on the other. Narcissistic individuals idealize the former and are contemptuous of the latter. Yet those they idealize they also fear, as they project onto them their own exploitative wishes and experience them as potentially attacking and coercive. They thus are unable to rely on any object and fear dependence on another person, rendering all their object relations empty and dissatisfying. Like the borderline character, Kernberg’s narcissistic individual uses primitive defenses of devaluation, projective identification, omnipotence, and primitive idealization in his or her efforts to preserve self-esteem and self-coherence and to combat the intense feelings of envy and rage that threaten to undermine them. The narcissistic individual is distinguished from the borderline individual by his or her sense of object constancy, better impulse control, and better social and professional functioning, although these too may be fragile and hollow beneath a surface of apparent solidity. Although splitting as a defense is found in narcissistic pathology, its use is less prominent than in borderline pathology. The grandiose self further differentiates [...]

If you were neglected or abused as a child, your primary orientation to the world is likely to be one of threat, fear, and survival. Its only natural that a childhood experience with untrustworthy parents would leave you untrusting or confused about what constitutes a loving relationship. Fear and lack of safety might compel you to continuously scan your environment for potential threats. you may have relied on coping strategies to survive, such as dissociation, a protective mechanism that disconnects you from threatening experiences. if you can relate to these qualities, you may also identify with related issues such as self criticism, emotional suffering, and relationship difficulties. Healing childhood trauma involves a balance: attending to the wounds of the past while living in the present.   Take comfort in this: Complex PTSD is the result of learned ineffective maladaptive beliefs and behaviours that can be replaced by a positive mind set and health promoting social engaging behaviours.   The Role of the Therapist in transforming attachment trauma:  Healing into wholeness takes the active participation of at least one other brain, mind, and body to repair past injuries – and that can be accomplished through a one-to-one therapeutic relationship, a therapeutic group relationship or one that is intimate and loving. In exploring the “age and stage” development of the right hemisphere and prefrontal cortex in childhood, we discover how the presence of a loving caregiver can stimulate certain hormones, which will help support our growing capacity for social engagement and pleasure in all of our relationships. Brain integration leads to connection and love throughout our entire life span. At trauma recovery institute we bring a deep focus to the role of Neuroscience in restoring the brain’s natural attunement to Secure Attachment. Our brain is a social brain – it is primed for [...]

Neuroscience informed group psychotherapy facilitated by trauma specialists at Trauma Recovery Institute Dublin. The advanced group psychotherapy is suitable for psychotherapy students and those who have at least 4 years experience with psychotherapy.The psychotherapeutic approach applied is Dynamic Psychosocialsomatic Psychotherapy (DPP) which is a very unique blend of interpersonal neurobiology, psychodynamic psychotherapy and transference focused psyschotherapy incorporating the poly vagal theory by stephen porges. This group is a very effective platform to work through the neurobiology of trauma with the nervous system always in mind, keeping the client safe and in felt sense at all times. Trauma can be conceptualized as stemming from a failure of the natural physiological activation and hormonal secretions to organize an effective response to threat. Rather than producing a successful fight or flight response the organism becomes immobilized. Probably the best animal model for this phenomenon is that of ‘inescapable shock,” in which creatures are tortured without being unable to do anything to affect the outcome of events. The resulting failure to fight or flight, that is, the physical immobilization (the freeze response), becomes a conditioned behavioral response. In his book, Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self, Allen Schore has outlined in exquisite detail the psychobiology of early childhood development involving maturation of orbitofrontal and limbic structures based on reciprocal experiences with the caregiver. Dysfunctional associations in this dyadic relationship result in permanent physicochemical and anatomical changes, which have implications for personality development as well as for a wide variety of clinical manifestations. An intimate relationship may exist, with negative child/care giver interaction leading to a state of persisting hypertonicity of the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems that may profoundly affect the arousal state of the developing child. Sustained hyperarousal in these children may markedly affect behavioral and characterological development. Many traumatized children and [...]

The way we understand how trauma affects the brain and body has changed a lot in the last several years. We now have deeper insights into the nature of trauma that simply didn’t exist, even a short time ago. Researchers studying trauma can now show what actually happens – in the brain and in our nervous system – during and after a traumatic event. With this new science we’re able to help clients rewire the trauma response and foster healthier integration,and a new way to interpret the world.   Trauma can be conceptualized as stemming from a failure of the natural physiological activation and hormonal secretions to organize an effective response to threat. Rather than producing a successful fight or flight response the organism becomes immobilized. Probably the best animal model for this phenomenon is that of ‘inescapable shock,” in which creatures are tortured without being unable to do anything to affect the outcome of events. The resulting failure to fight or flight, that is, the physical immobilization (the freeze response), becomes a conditioned behavioral response. In his book, Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self, Allen Schore has outlined in exquisite detail the psychobiology of early childhood development involving maturation of orbitofrontal and limbic structures based on reciprocal experiences with the caregiver. Dysfunctional associations in this dyadic relationship result in permanent physicochemical and anatomical changes, which have implications for personality development as well as for a wide variety of clinical manifestations. An intimate relationship may exist, with negative child/care giver interaction leading to a state of persisting hypertonicity of the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems that may profoundly affect the arousal state of the developing child. Sustained hyperarousal in these children may markedly affect behavioral and characterological development. Many traumatized children and adults, confronted with chronically overwhelming emotions, lose their capacity to use [...]

Introduction to Conscious Parenting 6 week course at Conscious Parenting Ireland  This amazing new course is a level 1 certification course on conscious parenting which takes place at 24 lower baggot street on fridays from 10 am to 1pm, there are a maximum of 8 spaces in this class. The class will be in a group format and will be an intensive 6 week journey into conscious parenting. Fee is just 500 Euro payable upfront. book your space now with deposit of 250 Euro. To book your place fill in your details below and we will email you payment details and also answer any questions you may have. Course starts in December, exact date to be confirmed and course ends in January. Conscious parenting is parenting through connection instead of coercion, through love instead of fear.Conscious Parenting recognizes that securing and maintaining a healthy parent-child bond is our primary work as parents and the key to our children's optimal human development. Our effectiveness as parents is in direct proportion to the strength of the bond we have with our child. Connection Parenting promotes parenting practices that support a strong, healthy parent-child bond.The Latest Neuroscience now confirms attachement theory and the critical importance of the parent child attachment, This above all will influence the appropriate brain development of your child and influence the adult your child will become. The model of parenting most of us grew up with was authoritarian parenting, which is based on fear. Some of us may have grown up with permissive parenting, which is also based on fear. Authoritarian parenting is based on the child's fear of losing the parent's love. Permissive parenting is based on the parent's fear of losing the child's love. Connection parenting is based on love instead of fear. Connection Parenting recognizes that securing and [...]

Did you know, that when a baby is born, his/her brain is ½ the size of an adult brain? By the time he/she is 3 years old, the brain has grown to 80% size of an adult brain. This is incredible growth, in just 3 years. So how does the brain work, and how can we foster this development?   The Working Brain Within the brain there are billions of nerve cells, known as neurons. The neurons have to connect with other brain cells in order to work. Some of these connections are present from birth – for example, the ability to breathe, to suck, to cry and others occur as the baby grows and develops. The connections occur when experiences or skills are repeated over and over. For example you don’t learn how to fly a plane with just one lesson – you need multiple opportunities to practise in order to be competent. Babies are the same – in order to learn to walk, or stack blocks or feed themselves – it doesn’t happen with just one instruction from us. This is why a young baby will drop toys (or food!) over the high chair repeatedly. Parents often think that the child doesn’t want the object. What the baby is learning, is when I drop this book, it goes bang, and when I do it again, it still goes bang. When I drop the orange it rolls away, sometimes it rolls left, sometimes right… they are looking to make the connection (in their brain) between action and response. Once they’ve dropped the book often enough, then they no longer need to do it, because they know it will go bang. Fostering Brain Development Whilst our skulls are hard, the brain within is fragile, and like glass, can be easily damaged. [...]

At conscious parenting Ireland we offer individual parenting consultations and conscious parenting weekly groups to explore conscious parenting and optimal child development with one or both parents. A parenting philosophy is relevant only to the extent that it promotes parenting practices which support secure bonding. Our effectiveness as parents is in direct proportion to the strength of the bond we have with our child. Securing and maintaining that bond is our primary work as parents and is the key to optimal human development. If as parents we have not resolved our own history of insecure attachment with our own caregivers, trauma and/or neglect as a child then it becomes extremely difficult to establish and maintain a secure bond with our children. We pass down trauma from one generation to another and learnt maladaptive interpersonal behaviours are communicated consciously and unconsciously encoded in verbal and non verbal interactions with our children. If we have not had a present loving caring safe nurturing attuned parent , then it will be extremely difficult for us to provide this for our children. Individual consultations and group work are extremely effective in supporting parents to explore and heal from their own traumatic histories whilst also learning effect toools and healthy parenting skills to create secure bonds with their children which is necessary for optimal brain development. Our nervous system is experience dependant, our early experiences are wired into our nervous system. If we grow up in a stressed anxious home, then we become stressed and anxious as adults. Our Conscious Parenting group takes place weekly. This group is a support group for parents facilitated through the framework of conscious parenting philosophy and a safe supprtive space to explore your own attachment styles.     Dr. Maté speaking for the Healing our Children 2016 World Summit [...]

At conscious parenting Ireland we offer individual parenting consultations to explore conscious parenting and optimal child development with one or both parents. A parenting philosophy is relevant only to the extent that it promotes parenting practices which support secure bonding. Our effectiveness as parents is in direct proportion to the strength of the bond we have with our child. Securing and maintaining that bond is our primary work as parents and is the key to optimal human development. If as parents we have not resolved our own history of insecure attachment with our own caregivers, trauma and/or neglect as a child then it becomes extremely difficult to establish and maintain a secure bond with our children. We pass down trauma from one generation to another and learnt maladaptive interpersonal behaviours are communicated consciously and unconsciously encoded in verbal and non verbal interactions with our children. If we have not had a present loving caring safe nurturing attuned parent , then it will be extremely difficult for us to provide this for our children. Individual consultations and group work are extremely effective in supporting parents to explore and heal from their own traumatic histories whilst also learning effect toools and health parenting skills to create secure bonds with their children which is necessary for optimal brain development. Our nervous system is experience dependant, our early experiences are wired into our nervous system. If we grow up in a stressed anxious home, then we become stressed and anxious as adults.   Dr. Maté speaking for the Healing our Children 2016 World Summit on why he believes that every disorder and disease has its roots in early childhood, why our culture hasn't supported healthy childhood development for years, and what we can do about it. Dr. Mate confirms that raher than looking at [...]

Our approach to personality disorder treatment and research is based on the understanding of personality disorders in general and BPD in specific that is described on this page. Transference-Focused Psychotherapy is grounded in contemporary psychoanalytic theory since we believe that psychoanalytic thinking has much to offer in terms of understanding and treating personality disorders. However, our approach includes specific modifications of technique to address the therapeutic needs of patients with borderline and other personality disorders. Our patients do not lie on the couch, do not come to see us four or five times per week, and we, the therapists, are far from silent and removed from the process. Two beliefs that inform our work, that we share with most other psychoanalysts, and that distinguish our work from that of say, a cognitive-behavioral therapy (for example, Dialectical Behavior Therapy [DBT], another treatment for BPD) are that: (1) “Symptoms,” the observable, behavioral manifestations of any disorder, are explained significantly by internal, mental or emotional factors, not generally visible to the naked eye, and that attention to these internal emotional factors or states is an essential part of the treatment process; and (2) Over the course of a psychotherapy, some of the emotional factors that influence the problematic behaviors or symptoms and that had previously been unclear to the patient and therapist become clear to both through their mutual, careful attention to the goings on in the treatment relationship, which includes the transference of images within the patient’s mind, which they may not be fully aware of, to the person of the therapist (and others in their life). So with this overview, let us now proceed to build on our understanding of personality disorders to explain how we conceptualize treatment. Within the International Society for Transference-Focused Psychotherapy, one of the more challenging aspects [...]

Attachment is a special emotional relationship that involves an exchange of comfort, care, and pleasure. The roots of research on attachment began with Freud's theories about love, but another researcher is usually credited as the father of attachment theory. Bowlby shared the psychoanalytic view that early experiences in childhood have an important influence on development and behavior later in life. Our early attachment styles are established in childhood through the infant/caregiver relationship. In addition to this, Bowlby believed that attachment had an evolutionary component; it aids in survival. "The propensity to make strong emotional bonds to particular individuals [is] a basic component of human nature" (Bowlby, 1988, 3). Attachment refers the particular way in which you relate to other people. Your style of attachment was formed at the very beginning of your life, during your first two years.  Once established, it is a style that stays with you and plays out today in how you relate in intimate relationships and in how you parent your children. Understanding your style of attachment is helpful because it offers you insight into how you felt and developed in your childhood. It also clarifies ways that you are emotionally limited as an adult and what you need to change to improve your close relationships and your relationship with your own children. John Bowlby’s investigation into the intense distress caused in children when separated from their parents led him to define what he called the attachment behavioral system. Later work by Mary Ainsworth made clear distinctions of attachment categories (known as attachment styles) including Secure, avoidant, ambivalent, and disorganised. Contemporary research shows that these early experiences in childhood repeat themselves in adult relationships by how we interact in and what we expect from our significant other. Further work on attachment theory has been done by experts Allan Schore, Dan Siegel, [...]

Although serotonin is well known as a brain neurotransmitter, it is estimated that 90 percent of the body's serotonin is made in the digestive tract. In fact, altered levels of this peripheral serotonin have been linked to diseases such as irritable bowel syndrome, cardiovascular disease, and osteoporosis. New research at Caltech, published in the April 9 issue of the journal Cell, shows that certain bacteria in the gut are important for the production of peripheral serotonin. "More and more studies are showing that mice or other model organisms with changes in their gut microbes exhibit altered behaviors," explains Elaine Hsiao, research assistant professor of biology and biological engineering and senior author of the study. "We are interested in how microbes communicate with the nervous system. To start, we explored the idea that normal gut microbes could influence levels of neurotransmitters in their hosts." Peripheral serotonin is produced in the digestive tract by enterochromaffin (EC) cells and also by particular types of immune cells and neurons. Hsiao and her colleagues first wanted to know if gut microbes have any effect on serotonin production in the gut and, if so, in which types of cells. They began by measuring peripheral serotonin levels in mice with normal populations of gut bacteria and also in germ-free mice that lack these resident microbes. The researchers found that the EC cells from germ-free mice produced approximately 60 percent less serotonin than did their peers with conventional bacterial colonies. When these germ-free mice were recolonized with normal gut microbes, the serotonin levels went back up—showing that the deficit in serotonin can be reversed. "EC cells are rich sources of serotonin in the gut. What we saw in this experiment is that they appear to depend on microbes to make serotonin—or at least a large portion of it," says [...]

Vitamin A is a group of similar molecules that includes retinol, retinal, and retinoic acid. It is an essential nutrient that we need to get from our diets.  It is needed for growth, healthy skin and hair, mucus membranes, digestive juices, our immune system, and also for good eye health and vision.  Its name, retinol or retinal, comes from its abundance in the retina of the eye.  Vitamin A works with vitamin D to normalise immune tolerance and vitamin A deficiency predisposes individuals to gut mucosal damage.1 Vitamin A levels are also important in thyroid health as it is needed for the uptake of Iodine2 and is required for the thyroid hormone triiodothyronine (T3) to bind to intracellular receptors.  The most important fact about vitamin A is the difference between retinoid and carotenoids. The vitamin A from animal sources is retinoid, also called retinol, while plant sources of vitamin A is carotenoids, specifically three forms which are α-carotene, b-carotene and β-cryptoxanthin which can be from food or supplements and converted to Retinol. There are three other carotenoids, Lycopene, Lutein, and Zeaxanthin all of which cannot be converted into retinol but also have their own specific role in human health. Whilst fat assists in the absorbtion of carotenoids and conversion to Vitamin A, Fibre can inhibit this process. Whilst cooking some foods can give a higher carotenoid and higher antioxidant level with great absorption and therefore greater conversion to Vitamin A, the heating process will diminish other vitamin properties within the food source such as Vitamin C which unlike the Fat soluable Vitamin A, Vitamin C is water soluable. a-Carotenoids – converts at a ratio of 1/24 (24mcg of a-carotenoids = 1mcg of retinol) b-Carotenoids – converts at a ratio of 1/12 (12mcg of b-carotenoids = 1mcg of retinol) b-Cryptoxanthin – [...]

A person who experiences early trauma, regardless of its source, does not feel welcomed into the world. When, at the beginning of life, for whatever reason, we do not feel welcomed, we find it difficult to develop a sense of our right to exist, of our sense of self, and of our entitlement to fully live. The life theme of this earliest survival style develops in relation to the issue of connection. Our earliest experiences of life in utero, at birth, and with early attachment shape our relationship to feeling secure in our capacity for contact. When this capacity for connection is in place, it supports our right to be and is the foundation upon which the healthy self is built. Early trauma compromises our sense of safety and existence in the world and our capacity for connection: we do not learn how to connect to ourselves, to our body, or to others. Our earliest trauma and attachment experiences form a template for our lifelong psychological, physiological and relational patterns. The identity of individuals with early trauma is shaped by the distress they experienced in early life. Difficulties at this initial Connection stage of development undermine healthy progression through all later stages, impacting self image, self esteem, and the capacity for healthy relationships. Trauma in this Connection phase is the basis for many seemingly unrelated cognitive, emotional, and physiological problems. From Healing Developmental Trauma by Laurence Heller, PhD and Aline LaPierre, PsyD, published by North Atlantic Books, copyright © 2012 by Laurence Heller, PhD and Aline LaPierre, PsyD. Reprinted by permission of publisher.   Early Events That May Cause Long-Term Traumatic Reactions   Caregiver Related A family where one or both parents struggle with Connection issues themselves A mother who is chronically depressed, dissociated, or angry Being the result of [...]

Life Change Health Institute is a world unique holistic treatment centre specialising in mind body medicine. We offer expertise in five main areas of focus which are Trauma Recovery Psychotherapy, Healthy Sexuality, Plant Based Nutrition, Conscious Parenting and Conscious Lifestyle. Our approach to addressing the mind body connection and how stress can massively impact and impair our development, our brains and our bodies has been developed from the latest research and developments in attachmnet theory, affect regulation,object relations theory,  neuroscience and interpersonal neurobiology. At Life Change Health Institute, we believe trauma underlies all conditions. Trauma, whether related to addiction, attachment or abuse, can reverberate through the many facets of our lives, follow us into adulthood and inhibit us from living in the present. We treat a wide variety of conditions with a number of treatment strategies with the objective of addressing the root trauma at the heart of each person's life challenge. At Life Change Health Institute we are experts in working with complex trauma. We promote plant based nutrition, healthy sexuality, conscious lifestyle changes and long term psychotherapeutic relationships in order to maintain optimum health and well being.   Services offered at Life Change Health Institute Individual & Group Psychotherapy with Trauma Recovery Institute Nutritional Counselling with Functional Health approach Sexuality work with Embodied Tantra Ireland Raw Food Mastery courses with Plant Based Academy Conscious Parenting workshops with Conscious Parenting Ireland   Contact us for expert support if you can identify with any of the following, 1)Recovering from an illness or trauma 2)Seeking a Time-Out 3)Looking to embrace a healthier fuller lifestyle of love and happiness 4)Experiencing challenges in realtionships and sexuality 5)Suffering with personality disorders and / or addictions 6)Struggling as a parent of young children and teens 7)Felling like trauma from the past is holding you back in present at work and relationships   [...]

  REISHI Main active components, Reishi’s wide-ranging health benefits are due to its combination of highly active immune-modulating polysaccharides and over 130 triterpenoid compounds (primarily ganoderic and lucidenic acids), with actions including: anti-inflammatory, antihistamine, sedative, anti-hypertensive and anti-cancer1. Traditional use, Reishi has traditionally been associated with the Taoist quest for immortality, as well as being used to treat a range of health conditions, including: cancer, heart disease and bronchitis.     Main Health Benefits Cancer, Reishi has a long history of use in cancer treatment with many reports of spontaneous remission2. Although both polysaccharides and triterpenes contribute to Reishi’s anti-cancer action, clinical trials have focussed exclusively the more easily characterised polysaccharide extracts, with a recent review of 5 randomised controlled trials indicating that patients given Reishi polysaccharide extracts were 1.27 times more likely to respond positively to chemo/radiotherapy than those without3. At the same time, Reishi’s triterpenes also show extensive anticancer activity, inhibiting cancer cell growth, inducing apoptosis (cell death) and, in the case of prostate cancer cells, blocking androgen receptors4. Allergies, Reishi’s combination of high immuno-modulatory activity with strong anti-inflammatory and anti- histamine activity make it a uniquely suitable supplement for those suffering from allergies such as hayfever (allergic rhinitis)5. By addressing both the underlying immune imbalance that predisposes the body to overreacting to pollen or other allergens, as well as the histamine-mediated inflammatory responses that result, it can be used to both help alleviate the symptoms and prevent their development. Auto-immune disease, Reishi’s combination of immunomodulatory and anti-inflammatory action also makes it a useful supplement for a range of inflammatory auto-immune conditions, such as rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis or ulcerative colitis. Insomnia/anxiety, The traditional name ‘spirit mushroom’ points to the sedative action of Reishi’s triterpenoid components. Improvements in sleep patterns are one of the most commonly reported effects of Reishi supplementation and it is frequently prescribed for this [...]

The Courage to Love is a unique journey for individuals or couples, empowering you to thrive in Love, Intimacy, sexuality and relationships. During our sessions we will explore any blocks to Intimacy and self love , challenges and destructive patterns in relationships and any negetive beliefs around sexuality and intimacy. This tantric path is a unique blend of Tantra and Attachment Theory within a psychodynamic framework. Learn how to to Embody Tantra and Live it. This is very powerful , safe, empowering, informative, psychoeducational, psychotherapeutic and liberating inner work. These sessions are suitable for people at all levels including complete beginners of Tantra practise and is perfect for anybody looking to create a healthy relationship with strong boundaries, communication, intimacy, connection, love, happiness and passionate love making.   "Tantra is not technique but prayer. Is not head oriented but a relaxation into the heart. Please remember it. Many books have been written onTantra, they all talk about technique but the real Tantra has nothing to do with technique. The real Tantra cannot be written about, the real Tantra has to be imbibed(absorbed). How to imbibe real Tantra? You will have to transform your whole approach." Osho Embodied Tantra is a dive deeper, tantra with a difference, where not only will you learn tools for living intimately but get an opportunity to work through any blocks you have to intimacy. Our Clinic is at 24 Lower Baggot Street Dublin 2. Initial Consultation is 100 Euro. Book your consultation Now  or Fill our form below.     If the flame is a metaphor for love, then Playing with Fire is the white gauze for singed hands and seared hearts. A slow flicker at times, a wild dance. Playing with Fire will make the sap crackle from your veins, lift the burning leaves from [...]

Being a chocolate maker (someone who makes chocolate from scratch), I am always on the lookout for great sweeteners to use in Sacred Chocolate. Several years ago, a vendor approached me trying to sell me coconut sugar (aka coconut palm sugar as opposed to palm sugar which is not from a coconut tree) as a healthy sweetener because of its relatively low glycemic index of 35. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHWuQj95SYw I was excited about the possibility of a good tasting, inexpensive sweetener that was also heathier than refined cane sugar. Could this be the ultimate sweetener redemption? It seemed too good to be true to my sometimes skeptical engineering mind. I asked for proof, and was directed to this published paper: Click Here for Paper  My concerns with this study were twofold. The study was conducted on only 10 people. And, the study was done by a government who is one of the largest producers of coconut sugar in the world. Personally, I was hesitant to make an informed decision until more independent studies were conducted. Unfortunately, the only other study I have seen since shows a glycemic index for coconut sugar to be 54 as can been seen here: Click Here to View Study A whole raw chocolate industry has popped up over the last few years touting coconut sugar as a low glycemic sweetener citing the first study above. But, as can be seen from the second study, further studies need to be conducted since there is such a difference between the two: 35 vs 54. I am not the only one with concern regarding the ambiguity associated with what is known about the glycemic index of coconut palm sugar as evidenced by these links: Link 1 Link 2 Link 3 Through my experience as a chocolate maker for almost 10 [...]

Memory has evolved, no doubt, because it is a benefit to survival. This is quite clearly evident in many different ways: We remember where food is; we remember who is a friend and who is a foe; we remember details; we remember stories and narra- tives that give us place and culture; we remember fears; and we remember pleasures. We remember many things to help us be safer and more successful in the future. I say “the future” because that is what memory is all about holding the experience of the present in such a way that it can be useful in the future. Colloquially, we say that we “learn from our ex- perience”. This actually means that memory is not just a benign storing of information, but a resource that can be accessed; it is something that is encod- ed, stored, and then retrieved (Baddeley, Eyesenck, & Anderson, 2009). What occurs in the present is encoded by biological processes and stored some- where. This recording of the present soon becomes an artefact of the past but, once retrieved, returns to the present again. Memory is something of a time machine. It is a link between what was and what might be. Memory can—and does—influence what we will do in the next moment. Memory is a powerful thing. The Way We Live Our behaviour, our responses, our actions, are af- fected by a number of inbuilt qualities and quantities that we bring with us into this world as the building blocks of our ongoing development, or nature. Many things contribute to our “nature”, including: instinct (Winston, 2003); temperament (Kagan & Snidman, 2004); evolutionary genetic “hardwired” patterns (Watson & Crick, 1953); gene mutations and poly- morphisms (Bull, 2000); neural architecture (Osch- ner & Gross, 2007); and immediate levels of demand by the [...]

EMOTIONS ARE ONE of the most salient components of psychotherapy. The neuroscience view of emotion is related to, but distinct from, the way clini- cians usually define and think about emotion. In usual clinical parlance, the terms emotions, feelings, and affects are all used interchangeably. In contrast, the neuroscience view of emotion refers specifically to subcortical, often body- based experiences and not the conscious awareness of a feeling. Often, thoughnot necessarily, the body-based experience serves as a platform or scaffolding upon which the subsequent consciously experienced feeling or affect is built. Emotions form in the subcortical systems, are often experienced in the body before entering consciousness, and have a significant effect on judgment and decision making. This view of emotion affirms that a lot is happening within a person nonconsciously before there is any conscious aware- ness of it. Alerting patients to their bodily experience may help attune them a bit more quickly to what might lie below the surface. For some patients, alerting them to attend to their bodies’ signals gives them a way of accessing their emotions when language does not suffice. The neuroscience view of emotion can be integrated into mainstream psychody- namic clinical practice to offer another rich pathway for clinical exploration, intervention, and transformation. As most psychodynamic therapists would likely agree, the body as a source of understanding emotion is underutilized in mainstream clinical practice. There is consensus among neuroscien- tists, neurobiologists, and neuropsycholo- gists that emotions are not necessarily “felt experiences” but are formed in the body prior to any conscious awareness of a feel- ing (e.g., see the work of Da-masio, 1994, 1999; Ekman, 2003; LeDoux, 1996; Pally, 1998a; Pally, R. & Olds, D., 2000; Siegel, 1999). There are some nuanced definitional differences among leading neuroscientists, with Panksepp noting that emotions can start [...]

A thyroid disorder is an autoimmune condition related to the thyroid gland, a small gland that manufactures and stores thyroid hormones. A thyroid disorder impacts the metabolic processes and may be characterized by nervousness or tiredness, weight changes, weak muscles, impaired memory and irregular menstrual flow. Your thyroid is one of your body's most important glands. When your thyroid doesn't work properly, it can cause you to feel nervous or tired; make your muscles weak; cause weight gain or loss; impair your memory; and affect your menstrual flow. A thyroid disorder can also cause miscarriage and infertility. About 20 million Americans—more of them women than men—are affected by a thyroid disease or disorder, according to the American Thyroid Association (ATA). In fact, an estimated one in eight women will develop a thyroid disorder at some time in her life. Thyroid Disease in Women Women are five to eight times more likely to have thyroid dysfunction than men, but most don't know they have it. Women often overlook their symptoms or mistake them for symptoms of other conditions. For example, women are at particularly high risk for developing thyroid disorders following childbirth. Symptoms such as fatigue and depression are common during this period, but these are also symptoms of thyroid disease. The ATA estimates that more than half of thyroid conditions remain undiagnosed. How the Thyroid Works The thyroid is a butterfly-shaped gland you can feel at the base of your neck, just below your larynx (voice box). Two lobes (the "wings" of the butterfly) fit on either side of your windpipe. The thyroid gland manufactures and stores thyroid hormone (TH), often referred to as the body's metabolic hormone. Among other actions, TH stimulates enzymes that combine oxygen and glucose, a process that increases your basal metabolic rate (BMR) and body heat production. The [...]

Transference-Focused Psychotherapy (TFP) is an evidence-based psychodynamic therapy designed for patients with the type of condition known as personality disorders. Individuals with these conditions may experience depression, anxiety and/or other intense emotions. They may also experience frustration and a lack of fulfillment in personal relationships and work achievement. "Psychodynamic" refers to the idea that different parts of our mind are always in movement and that this may result in conflicts; for example, conflicts about whether or not to act on an impulse, urge or desire. TFP sees difficulties in an individual's psychological structure (the way the mind is made up) as underlying many of the specific symptoms the individual is experiencing. Simply put, psychological structure is seen as built around images of oneself and important other persons that have been internalized in the course of growing up. These images are not fully conscious within the individual, and they may contain distortions. They play an essential role in how the patient adjusts to life as they become the lenses through which an individual interprets or "reads" what he is experiencing. Exaggerated, distorted or unrealistic internal images can lead to problems in mood, self-esteem and relations with others. These problems can be modified through psychotherapy. TFP is based on the idea that the patient experiences and lives out the internal images that make up their psychological structure in his or her relationship with the therapist, known as the transference (the transference of internal images and beliefs onto the current experience that the patient is having). Helping the patient get to know the repertoire of images that make up his mind—his internal world—can help him or her better adjust these images to the world around him. This process can lead to a decrease in depressive and anxious feelings and more successful experiences in personal relations [...]

This test evaluates the level of red cell membrane fatty acids, imbalances of which significantly affect inflammatory and other disorders. By knowing the various fatty acid levels, one can re-establish a balance using nutritional intervention.This comprehensive profile allows practitioners to accurately assess dietary intake and metabolism of fatty acids in each patient. Precise, custom-tailored nutritional intervention is then made possible. Fatty acids comprise some of the most essential nutrients in the human diet. They are critical for cell membrane structure and function as well as local “hormonal” signaling. Essential fatty acids (EFAs) are transformed into local hormonal mediators called eicosanoids. Eicosanoids regulate all stages of inflammation, including initiation, propagation and termination. This process is vital to the ability of the body’s immune system to repair and protect itself. Fatty acids are also crucial components of neural membranes and receptors that ensure proper intracellular communication within the brain and nervous system. The Clinical Significance of Fatty Acids: The number of diseases whose clinical course can be affected by fatty acid therapy is enormous. These include: Inflammatory disorders Cardiovascular disease Hormonal disorders Autoimmune disorders Arthridities Senile neurological degeneration Mental and behavioral disorders such as depression and ADHD Hair and skin related conditions, such as dermatitis, alopecia, brittle nails coarse dry hair and frequent infections The Omega-6/Omega-3 Ratio: EFA imbalances have been cited by some experts as the most widespread nutritional problem in modern times. The ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fats has increased dramatically due to the widespread use of vegetable oils, rising from about 4:1 for Americans at the beginning of the twentieth century to about 20:1 at the present time. Increased consumption of saturated fats and decreased consumption of omega-3 oils (cold water fish and flaxseed oil) have also contributed to the growing prevalence of these imbalances. Some individuals with a healthy dietary [...]