Integrating trauma-informed practice when working with clients affected by AOD

This one-day interactive training provides practitioners with the foundational knowledge and skills for working clinically with adult survivors of complex trauma and to understand the complex interaction between alcohol and other drugs (AOD) and presentations of complex trauma.

This training initially introduces the universal trauma-informed framework, which underpins all practice. It then focuses on the physiological impact of psychoactive substances, which clients may use to manage their symptoms of complex trauma. The training also looks at the adaptive qualities of AOD use in a trauma-informed framework.

Participants will acquire insights and tools to support clients who present with challenges related to ‘adaptive’ coping strategies, arousal, emotional regulation, attachment and safety. The training promotes a strengths-based approach that minimises re-traumatisation, fosters a therapeutic relationship and enhances possibilities for recovery from both AOD use and complex trauma.

By participating in this professional development training, attendees will:

• Utilise knowledge of the types, prevalence, dynamics and impacts of individual, complex and collective trauma
• Develop an understanding of the complex interaction between complex trauma and AOD use as an adaptation to manage their arousal and nervous system dysregulation
• Apply an understanding of the stress response,attachment and child development to strategies for supporting the capacity to regulate emotions and arousal
• Increase awareness about the interconnectedness of complex trauma and problematic AOD use and the clinical implications resulting from this link 
• Develop a best practice framework when working with people affected by complex trauma and AOD use