War Wounds.

Related Reading: 
Douma, Syria 
​What Do You See? 

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As I close my eyes and drift away to a land where there is love, health, peace, and blessings. I wanted to take the time to think and reflect.

     The truth is that when we hear of and see images of war, we see heavy physical destructions that are afflicted on the physical body, there are injuries sustained, which are visible to the human eye. These injuries require immediate care, and for the immediacy, medical care is the viable option. This option is immediate, and fulfills the criterion of immediacy. This is also where there are injuries and casualties sustained from war, medical teams must be ready and available. The immediate care takes care of the wounds, but this care is the beginning of a healing journey. A process that begins from the physical to the psychological recovery. From these thoughts we can assert, just as the saying goes: "It takes a village to raise a child", it takes a team to heal one person. We can probably think of examples that we have seen in a regular hospital, where there are teams of professionals that are assigned cases, and are integral to the healing of one person. From restoring the physical injuries, nutrition, dietary care, to that of the psychological, depending of the case of care.

​     In this case I am talking about injuries from war. After the body is able to cope with the pain from the afflictions, the trauma from the wounds of war begin to surface. If you ask anyone who has been through war, they will tell you that they are not the same person as they were pre-war. The difference between the physical and the psychological is that one can be seen, and the other  in most cases, cannot be seen. And only really surfaces after some time. This is where we have to think about what, or is there any care received to heal from the trauma of war? Especially in Syria, or even the U.S. military who have been serving in the war torn regions. 

    While we might also tend to the psychological level with the immediacy through medications, the medications are more likely to add to unwanted bodily affects. Psychological healing is a slow, and often a long process. For better results it always good to have a long-term plan of care, such as creative arts therapies (CAT). Although immediacy and urgency will require the use of medicalization, these will result with side effects. Which is why once again, I say that there must be long-terms plans for care. 

     The advantage of the Creative Art Therapies is that they can allow patients to express themselves, without necessarily verbalizing the trauma. This differentiates CAT from traditional Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) and Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT), both of which involve speaking to someone else. Often, when a patient has to talk to someone else, he / she might not open up fluently, or implicitly say what he / she thinks the practitioner wants them to say. 

     Art can act as a bridge between the physical and the psychological. When the patient is engaging with the self, soul, and in a sense trying to heal from within, through soul restoration. At this point what is probably the best intervention from the practitioners level, is to facilitate, and find ways that allow the artistic expression to unfold. Depending on the severity of the injury, the explorations can involve body movement, dance, and singing. With any creative arts therapy, it is important to remember that these should be viewed as psychological interventions / treatment. Where there might be a need for a reflective practice as well, such as to write about the experience itself. With any healing intervention, it must be remembered that we are allowing our inner wounds to open up, giving them air, space, and time to breathe, heal. 

     When we think of the recent physical injuries and casualties from the Chemical Gas attacks in Syria, it must be noted that the physical is accompanied with the psychological, while the immediacy is to take care of the physical wound, the psychological must also be tended to. To restore the body from the interior, exterior, encompassing the mind, body, and soul. 

My thoughts to share with love & kindness! :)

Notes: These thoughts were originally hand-written on April 16th, 2018.
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