In-Person Training

3 CE Hours Approved by NBCC

“Trauma-Informed Couples Counseling: Integrating Trauma-Informed Care and PREP® into Your Couples Counseling Practice”

Clark Stevens, PhD

Registration for this training is now closed.

Helping couples improve their relationship functioning is one of the most challenging things psychotherapists do, especially when one (or both) partner suffers with post-traumatic stress. Whether from cumulative effects of adverse childhood experiences, injuries in relationships with early caregivers and peers, or, from a significant traumatic event, partners experiencing post-traumatic stress often experience difficulty regulating emotions or building a trusting, intimate relationship. The trauma-informed counselor can help couples affected by post-traumatic stress navigate complex issues in ways that increase safety, strengthen their connection, and improve relational functioning.

Grounded in principles of trauma informed care, this presentation will review links between adverse childhood experiences, complex trauma, adult attachment patterns, and emotion dysregulation in intimate relationships. Post-traumatic stress associated with racial discrimination will also be explored. The program’s objectives are to review evidence-based information underpinning these clinical skills and (a) identify skills couples can use to reduce relational conflict and (b) describe how to help couples better understand and manage their own emotion dysregulation, and (c) provide information on how to help couples safely navigate post-traumatic stress when experienced interpersonally. Included in this presentation is an introduction to relationship skills and strategies in PREP® (Prevention and Relationship Education Program), an evidence-based relationship education program for couples and single adults.

Objectives:

• This workshop is designed to help you understand the principles of Trauma Informed Care.
• This workshop is designed to help you understand the relationship between post-traumatic stress and dysregulation of emotion, cognition, and behavior.
• This workshop is designed to help you understand Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and how these may influence health and behavioral outcomes in adulthood.
• This workshop is designed to help you consider the relationship between racial discrimination and emotion dysregulation.
• This workshop is designed to help you be able to identify adult attachment patterns and how these can affect marital dynamics.
• This workshop is designed to help you learn evidence-based skills and information you can apply while helping couples experiencing emotion and behavioral dysregulation due to post-traumatic stress.

About the Speaker

Clark Stevens, PhD

Speaker Bio

Dr. Stevens received his Doctorate of Philosophy in Clinical Psychology from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, UT Southwestern Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, in 1997. He is a psychologist in private practice and is the former Pastor of Marriage and Family Ministries at Fellowship Church Knoxville where he directed marriage and relationship education programming. He co-developed the Knoxville Marriage Initiative – now Healthy Connections Knoxville – with Dr. Kristina Gordon from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and now serves on the advisory board of this initiative. His expertise includes delivery of marriage and relationship education workshops in the Knoxville area as well as providing marriage and relationship counseling in his private practice.

TLPCA Contact

If you any questions, please contact Anthony Fuller.