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From the archives: Organized Sexual Abuse with Dr. Michael Salter · The Trauma Therapist

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Speaker 1: Our Today we even another episode from the archives with
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Speaker 1: one of my incredible guests. Enjoy. Welcome to the Trauma
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Speaker 1: Divers podcast, a show about the incredible people dedicated to
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Speaker 1: helping those who experienced trauma. My name is got macpherson
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Speaker 1: and my mission is to raise awareness of trauma and
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Speaker 1: to inspire each of us to help those around us.
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Speaker 1: A right, guys, welcome back to the Trauma Favers podcast.
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Speaker 1: I'm very excited to have us My guest today, doctor
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Speaker 1: Michael Salter.
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Speaker 2: Michael, welcome, A Hi God, it's great to be with you.
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Speaker 2: All right.
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Speaker 1: Michael Salter is and Sociate professor in criminology at Western
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Speaker 1: Stydney University, Australia and specializes in the study of organized
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Speaker 1: sexual abuse. In addition to his work on complex trauma,
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Speaker 1: he is research and published widely on violence against women
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Speaker 1: and children. Michael sits on the Scientific Advisory Committee and
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Speaker 1: the Board of Directors of the International Society for the
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Speaker 1: Study of Trauma and Association, and he's an associate editor
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Speaker 1: of Child Abuse Review You, the peer review journal of
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Speaker 1: the British Association for the Study and Prevention of Child
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Speaker 1: Abuse and Neglect. All right, Michael, let's kind of step
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Speaker 1: back here a minute and just share with our listeners
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Speaker 1: where you're from and where you're calling from, and then
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Speaker 1: let's let's do it.
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
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Speaker 3: So I'm currently calling from from Sydney, Australia, and I'm
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Speaker 3: based at Western Syney University here.
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Speaker 1: Okay, And where are you originally from there? Yeah?
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm Australian born and bred.
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Speaker 1: Okay. Nice. So just reading your bio, I mean, it's
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Speaker 1: it's it's it's serious heavy, and we're gonna we're gonna
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Speaker 1: get into how how you got there. But let's start
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Speaker 1: off with, as we usually do, with a quote, a sentence,
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Speaker 1: a mantra, something kind of set the tone here. What
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Speaker 1: do you have for us?
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Speaker 3: Well, quote that you know I first read when I
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Speaker 3: started doing trauma work and it's always stayed with me
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Speaker 3: comes from Marsha Lenahan, who of course is famous for
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Speaker 3: her work and dialectic behavior therapy, and you know, she
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Speaker 3: talks about the role of trauma therapy and recovery in
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Speaker 3: building a life worth living, and that concept of a
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Speaker 3: life worth living has just always stayed with me as
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Speaker 3: a guide in terms of what we're trying to secure
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Speaker 3: for survivors and what we're trying to offer to survivors
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Speaker 3: is the opportunity to find for themselves a life that
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Speaker 3: they want to live in. And it's a quote that
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Speaker 3: I've often been able to share with survivors, and it
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Speaker 3: really connects with them in a beautiful way.
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Speaker 2: I think.
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Speaker 1: So let's kind of unpack that via you kind of
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Speaker 1: describing your your story and how you got to this place. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: and and kind of let's dial in and take a
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Speaker 1: step by step if you can hear.
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Speaker 3: Can do my I suppose my journey is a little unorthodox.
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Speaker 3: I us came across the issue of trauma and association.
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Speaker 3: You know, in my late teens, a close friend of mine,
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Speaker 3: a young woman, began to disclose a pretty serious history
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Speaker 3: of child sexually abuse by a group of men in
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Speaker 3: the town where we grew up. And at the time
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Speaker 3: we were sharing a house, we were flatmates going to
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Speaker 3: university together, and so I witnessed firsthand what severe complex
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Speaker 3: trauma looks like. You know, she struggled to eat, she
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Speaker 3: had flashbacks, she you know, her mood was incredibly variable,
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Speaker 3: and she would become very depressed, and you know, all
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Speaker 3: of the common symptoms of severe trauma. And we spent
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Speaker 3: a period of time trying to find support for her
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Speaker 3: services that could help, and it was incredibly difficult, and
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Speaker 3: over a period of time, I came to realize that
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Speaker 3: something had to be done. My background was in research,
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Speaker 3: was in academic research and public policy, so.
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Speaker 2: I made a change of career change.
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Speaker 3: And a decision to specialize in the needs of this
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Speaker 3: group of people. So adult survivors of organized child sexual abuse.
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Speaker 1: Excuse me, michae let me just kind of jump in here.
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Speaker 1: So you said you were both at university. How old
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Speaker 1: were you in your twenties? Nineteen nineteen? Okay, So this
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Speaker 1: is a flatmate of yours, she comes to you and
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Speaker 1: shares a suit, and what was your response? I mean,
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Speaker 1: she was a good friend of yours, So you knew
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Speaker 1: her quite well?
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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I knew her fairly well.
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Speaker 3: You know, she didn't she didn't really have the ability
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Speaker 3: to disclose much because you know, she was really overwhelmed
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Speaker 3: by trauma symptoms, you know, you know, constant flashbacks and someone.
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Speaker 3: So it was pretty apparent just from her behavior that
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Speaker 3: something was wrong by our early twenties. So it took
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Speaker 3: a couple of years to realize that she was still
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Speaker 3: trapped in a cycle of abuse. She was still being
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Speaker 3: routinely abused by the men that had abused her as
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Speaker 3: a child, and so that, you know, that certainly triggered
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Speaker 3: a crisis period for both of us where I worked
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Speaker 3: with her quite intensively to try to secure her safety
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Speaker 3: from this group of men who were pretty dangerous and
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Speaker 3: they you know, they did things like break into the
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Speaker 3: house and they refeited the house, and they did all
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Speaker 3: sorts of crazy stuff. So there was a real illustration
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Speaker 3: to me that there was a group of people out
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Speaker 3: there like her who were completely vulnerable because we were
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Speaker 3: approaching police, we were trying to contact mental health services.
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Speaker 3: You know, I wasn't quiet about this. I was trying
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Speaker 3: to get help for her and there wasn't anything. So
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Speaker 3: it just it really drove the point home that if
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Speaker 3: someone was going to do anything about it, it was
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Speaker 3: probably going to be me.
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Speaker 1: Oh my god. So you got to the point where you,
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Speaker 1: or I guess probably quickly got to the point where
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Speaker 1: you were like, what the hell is going on here?
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Speaker 1: And just like you said, I've got to do something
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Speaker 1: about this.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a pretty good summary of how it felt
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Speaker 3: at the time. And I mean I was actually working
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Speaker 3: in politics for a couple of years while this was happening,
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Speaker 3: I was a policy advisor to a member of parliament.
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Speaker 2: So there was this really bizarre division.
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Speaker 3: In my life where during the day I had a
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Speaker 3: position of some authority and then at night there was
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Speaker 3: this completely out of control situation where mainly no one
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Speaker 3: took it seriously. So yeah, I made a decision when
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Speaker 3: I was about twenty four or twenty five to turn
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Speaker 3: this into a career and move away from politics and
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Speaker 3: public policy back into academic research.
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Speaker 1: What do you I mean that is I mean so
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Speaker 1: admirable to do what you did, and what if we can,
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Speaker 1: if we can kind of put a magnifying glass on that,
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Speaker 1: What was it in your being, in your soul that
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Speaker 1: made you take the step to do this as a
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Speaker 1: as a as a career. I mean you could see
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Speaker 1: some people maybe you know, wanted to get this person
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Speaker 1: help and doing what they can, but You're like, Bam,
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Speaker 1: this is what I've got to do. What was that
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Speaker 1: or is that in in you? Do you think?
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Speaker 3: To be honest, I've got a pretty kind of childlike
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Speaker 3: sense of injustice, and so when I think things are unjust,
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Speaker 3: I just have a primal sense of outrage, And you know,
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Speaker 3: I think it probably was a trauma response from my
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Speaker 3: end as well, a need to try and make sense
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Speaker 3: and make some meaning out of what had happened.
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Speaker 2: She wasn't the only survivor.
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Speaker 3: There was a group of survivors connected who'd been abused
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Speaker 3: by the same group, and there was at the time
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Speaker 3: an attempted police investigation into this group. That was a
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Speaker 3: very controversial investigation, and the ombudsman was then called in
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Speaker 3: to investigate the investigation, and then there was an investigation
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Speaker 3: of the investigation of the investigation, and it became apparent
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Speaker 3: that there were significant regularities in the attempt to investigate
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Speaker 3: this group. So it was a situation that I'd been
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Speaker 3: caught up in that had sort of spiraled out of control.
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Speaker 3: And you know, and I do think that the decision
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Speaker 3: to go back to study to make a career out
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Speaker 3: of this, you know, of course, you know, there was
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Speaker 3: altruistic motivations, but I think also I was in I
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Speaker 3: was in.
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Speaker 2: A bit of a state of shock and.
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Speaker 3: Really keen to understand in more detail what had happened
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Speaker 3: to her, but also what I'd been exposed to as well.
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Speaker 1: So what happens next you decide in terms of your
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Speaker 1: own story here, you decide that you're going to pursue
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Speaker 1: this professionally. What did you do specifically?
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Speaker 3: I was really aware that there was a lack of
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Speaker 3: evidence around organized child sexual abuse. This was around sort
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Speaker 3: of two thousand and five to two thousand and six,
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Speaker 3: where the concept of a pedophile ring was actually pretty
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Speaker 3: controversial and there was a broad view in the media
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Speaker 3: and amongst many academics and psychologists that child sex offenders
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Speaker 3: operated individually, that they didn't operate in groups, and so
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Speaker 3: there was a real need to flesh out.
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Speaker 2: This issue with robust research.
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Speaker 3: So I decided to go back to university and to
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Speaker 3: undertake a PhD and to do a focus bit of
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Speaker 3: work on organized abuse. So I spent three years interviewing
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Speaker 3: in detail interviewing other survivors of organized child sexual abuse
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Speaker 3: in Australia. So this was quite detailed interview research that
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Speaker 3: from the basis of my feasis and was then published
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Speaker 3: as a book in twenty thirteen.
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Speaker 1: The name of the book was what.
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Speaker 2: Organized Sexual Abuse?
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Speaker 1: Okay, what were some of you some of your findings?
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Speaker 1: I mean, it's hard not to you know, listening to talk,
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Speaker 1: it's hard not to think that, I mean, especially with
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Speaker 1: the me Too movement you know now upon us and
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Speaker 1: how many people don't want to come out because they're
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Speaker 1: not believed. And here we go again, the same resonance
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Speaker 1: of people not being believed. People don't want to see
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Speaker 1: evidence or hear evidence. So anyway, talk a little bit
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Speaker 1: about your findings, if you would.
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Speaker 3: The primary finding of the study was the role of
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Speaker 3: families in child sexual exploitation. The majority of the adults
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Speaker 3: that I interviewed described their parents as the primary offenders,
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Speaker 3: who then made them available for sexual abuse to other people.
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Speaker 3: And this was really contrary to the dominant view at
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Speaker 3: the time, which is that if pedophile networks existed, they
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Speaker 3: existed outside the family, they involved offenders in the community
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Speaker 3: or offenders online. And it's been interesting in the time
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Speaker 3: since the book's been published, as law enforcement agencies begin
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Speaker 3: to track down perpetrators of what sometimes called charpornography or
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Speaker 3: child abuse images, they are also finding that the majority
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Speaker 3: of offenders are parents and related to the child. So
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Speaker 3: this was a really important finding that has started to
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Speaker 3: have an international effect. The interviews also highlighted the role
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Speaker 3: of quite a controversial form of child sexual abuse known
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Speaker 3: as ritual abuse. Probably two thirds of my participants described
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Speaker 3: some experience of ritualistic abuse as part of their child exploitation,
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Speaker 3: and it really brought to the four that we have
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Speaker 3: subcultures of abuse and satism operating in the community that
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Speaker 3: do engage in quite bizarre behavior. But again this is
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Speaker 3: being substantiated by law enforcement investigations looking at sadistic abuses,
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Speaker 3: and there are a stratum of child sex offenders who
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Speaker 3: do engage in this type of behavior.
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Speaker 1: You mentioned early on when you were trying to advocate
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Speaker 1: and help your friend that you kind of ran up
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Speaker 1: against a lot of disbelief. Can you talk about that?
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Speaker 1: And even now you know what is it? We just
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Speaker 1: why do we not want to see or believe or
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Speaker 1: what is going on?
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Speaker 3: You know, child sexual abuse reveals the fundamental I guess
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Speaker 3: hypocrisies of society.
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Speaker 2: We love to believe that we live.
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Speaker 3: In a society that cares for children, that looks after children,
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Speaker 3: a society that is you know, predictable and orderly, and
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Speaker 3: child sexual abuse is incredibly challenging for people. It really
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Speaker 3: upends so many of our assumptions about our fellow human beings.
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Speaker 3: And it's just easier, it is easier to disbelieve than
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Speaker 3: to believe for somebody that has been severely abused as
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Speaker 3: a child in a premeditated and.
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Speaker 2: Sadistic way, you know, their needs are.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, they have a range of needs that are really intense,
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Speaker 3: going to need a lot of time, a lot of
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Speaker 3: energy to meet. And we have not arranged our health
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Speaker 3: systems to do that. We have not arranged our criminal
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Speaker 3: justice system in order to prosecute these sorts of defenses,
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Speaker 3: and so they just fall outside our established responses to
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Speaker 3: crime into abuse. And so I do just think it's
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Speaker 3: easier to turn away and to get on with your life.
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Speaker 2: Basically, it's easier. Yeah.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, And I realized, I mean, as you know what
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Speaker 1: I've read your bio initially and then again to before
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Speaker 1: we jumped on here. I was like, man, this is intense.
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Speaker 1: I mean, there's no two ways about it. And I
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Speaker 1: remember when I first got into graduate school, I knew
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Speaker 1: I wanted to focus on trauma, and yet there was
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Speaker 1: a fear had Michael, and it was really specifically about this.
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Speaker 1: It was like the fear that I would hear kids
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Speaker 1: sharing their stories or just the child abuse just freaked
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Speaker 1: me out. And it just it's it's so yeah, it's
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Speaker 1: just it's so intense. So how what are you doing now?
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Speaker 1: Specifically what's your role now?
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Speaker 3: So, of course I'm based at the university and my
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Speaker 3: focus is on research, so research into system responses to
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Speaker 3: complex trauma. So at the moment, I'm leading a national
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Speaker 3: study investigating the ways that different sectors including mental health,
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Speaker 3: alcohol and drug child protection, law enforcement, is responding to
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Speaker 3: adults with complex trauma. I also do a lot of
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Speaker 3: direct training and practice work with therapists and mental health
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Speaker 3: practitioners and also law enforcement to provide evidence and information
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Speaker 3: about organized child sexual abuse, and in the future, working
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Speaker 3: with law enforcement agencies at the moment, both here in
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Speaker 3: Australia and overseas to do more survivor focused research, particularly
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Speaker 3: looking at survivors of what's sometimes called charpornography or child
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Speaker 3: abuse images, to understand not only the context in which
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Speaker 3: child abuse material is being manufactured, but what are the
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Speaker 3: outcomes for survivors, How are they falling through the cracks?
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Speaker 3: How can we improve our support for adults who have
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Speaker 3: this kind of history.
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Speaker 1: Well, you talk about improving the systematic response for care
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Speaker 1: for these individuals, it almost feels as though that's going
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Speaker 1: to be born out of an improvement in people's individual
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Speaker 1: responses and feelings and beliefs, right, I mean, what is
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Speaker 1: a logistic response? But you know we've been talking about
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Speaker 1: how people just to find it very difficult even thinking
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Speaker 1: and talking and believing this what shifts need to be made.
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Speaker 3: Look my assumption, you know, the more work that I
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Speaker 3: do with professionals across a range of sectors in complex
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Speaker 3: trauma and organized to the more work that I do,
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Speaker 3: the more I realize people want to do their jobs well,
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Speaker 3: they want to do their jobs well, they want to
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Speaker 3: feel good about the work that they do. They don't
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Speaker 3: want people to slip through the cracks either, And so
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Speaker 3: that's always my foundational assumption whenever I'm working with an
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Speaker 3: agency or a profeesion.
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Speaker 2: You know, ultimately it is.
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Speaker 3: About assuring people that they have something to offer in
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Speaker 3: these really complex cases and they can make a difference.
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Speaker 3: What we don't want is professionals feeling overwhelmed, professionals feeling deskilled,
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Speaker 3: professionals feeling like they're not up to the task. So
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Speaker 3: there is part of my job sometimes is assuring people
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Speaker 3: that they can do this and providing information to support
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Speaker 3: them to do that. Nonetheless, you know, organized abuse and
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Speaker 3: complex trauma it does require a collaborative approach. Survivors need
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Speaker 3: continuity of care across different agencies, and that can be
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Speaker 3: a real challenge because the culture of a mental health
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Speaker 3: service is very different to the culture of law enforcement.
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Speaker 3: They speak a different language, they have different assumptions. So
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Speaker 3: there needs to be some work done in terms of
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Speaker 3: bridging those gaps so that you know, different types of
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Speaker 3: agencies can work together effectively in these cases.
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Speaker 1: If we kind of shifted focus here and maybe addressed
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Speaker 1: our discussion towards therapists and given this podcast a little before,
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Speaker 1: you talked about providing evidence of child sexual belief, talk
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Speaker 1: more about that. What do you mean by.
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Speaker 3: That, Well, one of the things that we can do
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Speaker 3: for therapists, especially when they come across their first case
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Speaker 3: where a child or an adult might be disclosing organized abuse,
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Speaker 3: or they're encountering for the first time somebody that meets
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Speaker 3: the criteria for discity of identity disorder, it can trigger
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Speaker 3: a real crisis in people's practice. It can be a
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Speaker 3: real shock, and so there is it's quite important that
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Speaker 3: people have access to information about organized abuse normalizers that
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Speaker 3: normalizes the experience, that assures them they're not alone, that
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Speaker 3: this is a recognized problem, and that they're in a
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Speaker 3: position to take the skills that they already have and
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Speaker 3: adapt them and apply them to a client who does
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Speaker 3: have a history of severe abuse. So, of course I
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Speaker 3: don't provide clinical advice because I'm not a clinician, But
21:28
Speaker 3: what I do find is that provide you know, having
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Speaker 3: this discussion with therapists about organized abuse, about the patterns
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Speaker 3: of abuse, the sorts of things that survive as are
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Speaker 3: disclosing when they talk about organized abuse can be really
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Speaker 3: empowering for therapists and give them a lot more confidence
21:45
Speaker 3: in working with this population.
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Speaker 1: Well, let's talk a little bit about that if we can.
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Speaker 1: What are some of the things that someone might disclose,
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Speaker 1: And granted things are going to be different for individuals,
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Speaker 1: but what can you give an example of what a
21:59
Speaker 1: therapist might ca you're or look for or how they
22:02
Speaker 1: might respond, etc.
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Speaker 3: Certainly, what I've found when I'm interviewing survivors about about
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Speaker 3: their therapy experiences, and I've also done a lot of
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Speaker 3: interview work with therapists working with this population, is that
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Speaker 3: disclosure is staggered.
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Speaker 2: And it happens over time.
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Speaker 3: So you know, survivors will expand on their history, sometimes
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Speaker 3: over a period of a couple of years, but particularly
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Speaker 3: crucial for therapists, I suppose to hold open a space
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Speaker 3: in which survivors can start to talk about.
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Speaker 2: Experiences.
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Speaker 3: Particularly shame is something that keeps this group silent.
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Speaker 2: They often feel.
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Speaker 3: Very culpable for the abuse that's happened to them, but
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Speaker 3: they've often been forced to do things to others that
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Speaker 3: they feel incredibly guilty and ashamed about, and so holding
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Speaker 3: open a sort of a non judgmental listening space that
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Speaker 3: invites people to elaborate on experiences that would otherwise be
23:19
Speaker 3: intolerable for them to talk about is really important. But
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Speaker 3: I think, yeah, certainly paying attention to some of the
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Speaker 3: dynamics around how clients are talking about abuse, particularly abuse
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Speaker 3: by a parent, and then behind behind that experience there
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Speaker 3: can be that can just be the tip of the iceberg.
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Speaker 3: But if the client feels as though they've been heard
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Speaker 3: in a non judgmental way and some trust developed, then
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Speaker 3: they may have a lot more to say.
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Speaker 1: Before you talked about overwhelm with the therapist, what I
24:02
Speaker 1: mean because obviously this can be overwhelming even for well
24:06
Speaker 1: certainly for a newer therapist. But what do you recommend
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Speaker 1: people do to prevent overwhelm and if they do become overwhelmed.
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Speaker 3: So you know, there's a range of strategies of course
24:22
Speaker 3: for the prevention of vicarious trauma just in.
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Speaker 2: The day to day work of psychotherapy.
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Speaker 3: Of course, in terms of having adequate professional supervision, you know,
24:33
Speaker 3: promoting your own mindfulness practice, whatever that may be. In
24:39
Speaker 3: terms of work with this group, I think reaching out
24:43
Speaker 3: for support from colleagues and other therapists who have experienced
24:48
Speaker 3: working with this population. That's really important, finding someone that
24:53
Speaker 3: can provide some clarity around around these issues. And you know,
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Speaker 3: I sit on the border of the International Society for
25:03
Speaker 3: the Study of Trauma and Association and it's so fantastic
25:07
Speaker 3: to have so many colleagues that work in an effective
25:10
Speaker 3: way with this group. But they also you know, have
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Speaker 3: a very clear set of boundaries around how they work
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Speaker 3: with this group. And that's another important point, which is boundaries.
25:21
Speaker 3: This is a client population that by definition is routinely
25:25
Speaker 3: in crisis. When they trust a therapist, they develop you know,
25:30
Speaker 3: very very strong attachments to that therapist, which then evokes
25:34
Speaker 3: a lot of difficult emotions for them. So you know,
25:38
Speaker 3: being able to receive supervision or support from colleagues who
25:41
Speaker 3: can explain how they've managed the intensity of this kind
25:45
Speaker 3: of therapy. I think also for therapists, you know, being
25:52
Speaker 3: very selective about where you find information about organized abuse
26:00
Speaker 3: reality testing is important in working with organized abuse survivors.
26:05
Speaker 2: There is a lot.
26:06
Speaker 3: Of information on the internet about organized abuse. Some of
26:10
Speaker 3: it is really useful, but some of it is quite
26:13
Speaker 3: conspiratorial and less useful. And when we're feeling burnt out
26:19
Speaker 3: or overwhelmed, you know that reality that reality testing can
26:24
Speaker 3: be difficult. So it's important that we find ways to
26:28
Speaker 3: keep our feet on the ground so that where grounded
26:32
Speaker 3: when we're in contact with this group who sometimes also
26:36
Speaker 3: finds it really difficult to distinguish between what's real and
26:40
Speaker 3: what's not.
26:42
Speaker 1: I know, I've heard that there are some people who
26:46
Speaker 1: you know, disbelieve in the ritual abuse and so forth.
26:50
Speaker 1: And when you mentioned this conspiratorial information, say more about that,
26:54
Speaker 1: do you what is that?
26:57
Speaker 2: You know?
26:58
Speaker 3: Ritual abuse has been just incredible difficult issue in child
27:02
Speaker 3: protection and child abuse for thirty or forty years now,
27:06
Speaker 3: and it was a form of abuse that you know,
27:09
Speaker 3: I think people really struggled to understand when it first
27:12
Speaker 3: emerged in the eighties and the nineties. You know, you know,
27:16
Speaker 3: for my direct experience, I'm not a survivor myself, but
27:20
Speaker 3: you know, my friend was a survivor of ritual abuse,
27:23
Speaker 3: and you know, we.
27:24
Speaker 2: Had men break into the house.
27:26
Speaker 3: They painted it in blood, they left pig gorgans in
27:29
Speaker 3: our bed, they painted weird occult symbols on our walls,
27:33
Speaker 3: and they also and I don't want.
27:35
Speaker 2: To get too graphic about this, but I saw them.
27:40
Speaker 3: I saw brands on her when they branded her with
27:43
Speaker 3: the cult symbols. So you know, I understand why people
27:48
Speaker 3: disbelieve this sort of stuff, and I wish that I
27:50
Speaker 3: could disbelieve it as well. But you know, I don't
27:54
Speaker 3: have the luxury of disbelief because you know, I've witnessed
27:59
Speaker 3: this sort of activity, you know, directly myself, and you know,
28:03
Speaker 3: I've had death threats and those sorts of things. You know,
28:07
Speaker 3: over the last fifteen to twenty years, we've seen ritual
28:11
Speaker 3: child sexual abuse substantiated in multiple criminal prosecutions in the
28:16
Speaker 3: United States, in the United Kingdom, and elsewhere.
28:20
Speaker 2: There is no.
28:21
Speaker 3: Doubt that this is a practice that you know, severe
28:25
Speaker 3: pedophiles and sex offenders do engage in. I've had detailed
28:30
Speaker 3: conversations with very well known forensic psychologists who treat child
28:35
Speaker 3: sex offenders, who have spoken to me directly about the
28:39
Speaker 3: men that they have in prison, who have disclosed engaging
28:42
Speaker 3: in this sort of activity. So this is something that
28:46
Speaker 3: happens in the world and we do need to grapple
28:48
Speaker 3: with it. But it's a type of abuse that.
28:55
Speaker 2: You know, it seems.
29:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's very difficult for bystanders to grasp and I
29:03
Speaker 3: think there's a tendency to either disbelieve it or to
29:07
Speaker 3: engage in a kind of conspiratorial type of understanding, and
29:13
Speaker 3: we need to find a middle way between those two things.
29:16
Speaker 1: How do you manage all this? I mean, how do
29:18
Speaker 1: you take care of yourself? Serious?
29:20
Speaker 2: Seriously, Yeah, look, it's a great question.
29:24
Speaker 3: I also receive a supervision, So although I'm not a therapist,
29:30
Speaker 3: I see a clinical psychologist once a month, and I've
29:33
Speaker 3: done that on and off for ten years or so,
29:37
Speaker 3: and so that just provides me with a space to
29:41
Speaker 3: sort of talk about the work.
29:44
Speaker 2: You know, over the course of my research, I.
29:51
Speaker 3: Engage in a regular meditation practice, So I meditate every day,
29:56
Speaker 3: and I also teach meditation on behalf of my local
30:00
Speaker 3: Buddhist temple. So I'm quite involved with my local Buddhist community,
30:05
Speaker 3: and I give that a lot of credit in terms
30:07
Speaker 3: of providing me with a kind of a foundation of
30:11
Speaker 3: resilience and a way of understanding so much suffering in
30:17
Speaker 3: the world. I guess, without without being overwhelmed by it.
30:21
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, I got to say, I mean, I
30:23
Speaker 1: really admire you doing this work. Immunity, it's definitely I
30:27
Speaker 1: can't think of a more fitting word. It's just so
30:31
Speaker 1: it's so intense, and it's just so crazy, so beyond
30:35
Speaker 1: like you said, you know what, we want to think
30:37
Speaker 1: of ourselves as human beings. And yet it's not what
30:46
Speaker 1: book recommendation would you advise when I ask for two,
30:49
Speaker 1: but specifically something you'd recommend for for therapists and maybe
30:53
Speaker 1: even newer therapists, something that would really inform them around
30:58
Speaker 1: this topic.
31:00
Speaker 3: One of my favorite books in this area was written
31:04
Speaker 3: by a fantastic trauma therapist in the States called Harvey Schwartz,
31:08
Speaker 3: and he published a book in twenty thirteen called The
31:12
Speaker 3: Alchemy of Wolves and Sheep. And in this book, Harvey
31:17
Speaker 3: reflects on his thirty years of experience treating survivors of
31:24
Speaker 3: you know, really severe complex trauma, including organized abuse, and
31:28
Speaker 3: draws direct parallels with other contemporary examples, including demobilized child soldiers.
31:36
Speaker 3: And it's a tremendously useful book. It has, you know,
31:40
Speaker 3: a great deal of advice for therapists, but it's such
31:44
Speaker 3: a human book. I think it's very very profound in
31:48
Speaker 3: terms of the insights that Harvey shares into the human condition.
31:52
Speaker 3: And it's a very hopeful book as well. So yeah,
31:57
Speaker 3: he's a very important voice in this area.
32:00
Speaker 1: So that's thanks for that. I've never had that recommended.
32:03
Speaker 1: So it's the alchemy of Wolves and sheep relational approach
32:05
Speaker 1: to internalized perpetration and complex trauma survivors, Harvey L. Schwartz
32:10
Speaker 1: And again I'll have this linked up at the show
32:12
Speaker 1: notes page at the Trauma tapispodcast dot com. And then
32:17
Speaker 1: a final book recommendation from you. What do you What
32:19
Speaker 1: would you say?
32:21
Speaker 2: Look, I'm going to recommend my book.
32:23
Speaker 1: Well, that's that's that's going to be up there. Anyway,
32:27
Speaker 1: give me give me something else. That's that's whether you
32:30
Speaker 1: know trauma related or not, your book's going to be
32:33
Speaker 1: up here.
32:34
Speaker 3: Look, there was a really influential book for me from
32:37
Speaker 3: two thousand and one is by a ukp sociologist called
32:43
Speaker 3: Sarah Scott, and it's called it's called Beyond Disbelief, The
32:48
Speaker 3: Politics of Ritual Abuse. And this was work that Sarah
32:52
Speaker 3: did in the United Kingdom. She also did interview research
32:55
Speaker 3: with survivors of ritual abuse and she provides a really
32:59
Speaker 3: ground analysis of their life histories and really demystifies ritual abuse.
33:06
Speaker 3: She shows how richual abuse happens in just the everyday
33:10
Speaker 3: context of people's lives. It's not bizarre, it's not extraordinary.
33:15
Speaker 3: It's not like alien abduction. It's something that is woven
33:20
Speaker 3: into you know, suburban life in a very credible sort
33:27
Speaker 3: of way. And so that was published in two thousand
33:30
Speaker 3: and one. I think it's a really important book that
33:33
Speaker 3: answers a lot, you know, puts to bed a lot
33:36
Speaker 3: of questions around the credibility of ritual abuse. I'd really
33:40
Speaker 3: encourage people to look at it.
33:42
Speaker 1: Okay, So once again that's the politics and experience of
33:47
Speaker 1: ritual abuse, Sarah Scott. Also The Alchemy of Wolves and
33:51
Speaker 1: Sheep by Harvey L. Schwartz and Michael your book Organized
33:55
Speaker 1: Sexual Abuse by Michael Salter. That will be up here
33:58
Speaker 1: also on the showes page. At the Trauma Theapis podcast
34:01
Speaker 1: dot com. What's the best way Michael for people to
34:04
Speaker 1: get in contact with you.
34:06
Speaker 3: People are welcome to contact me. They can email me
34:11
Speaker 3: at Michael dot Salter at Westernsydney dot du dot au.
34:17
Speaker 3: I also had a website at www dot Organized abuse
34:23
Speaker 3: dot com and that's got my contact details there as well.
34:27
Speaker 1: Awesome. Well, Michael, I want to thank you so much
34:30
Speaker 1: for taking the time to do this again. I'm glad
34:33
Speaker 1: there are people out there like yourself who are doing
34:37
Speaker 1: this incredibly challenging and amazing work. So thank you so
34:43
Speaker 1: much for coming on the Trauma Davis Podcast.
34:45
Speaker 2: Thank you, guys, I really appreciate it.
34:47
Speaker 1: All right, take care. Even common s