ACT for Trauma and PTSD: Integrative Neuroscience-Informed Applications
Most clients arrive wanting the trigger to stop. It will not, because it is a memory, and no treatment erases it. Emily Wharton’s starting point is that this is the wrong target anyway. The useful question is what the client does in the second after it arrives, and whether their life is allowed to be any bigger than the trauma has been letting it be.
She works the six ACT processes through trauma specifically. Experiential avoidance, which is what most post-trauma coping actually is. Fusion with what she calls the trauma voice, the one saying it was your fault, you are damaged, watch out. Self as content, where a client has become only the after. And values, where safety quietly becomes the only one that matters and the world contracts around it. Her framing is that the trauma can be in the passenger seat, and the question is who is driving.
Six hours, taught experientially. She runs the practices with the audience rather than describing them, on the basis that you learn this from the inside and then have it available in session. Neuroscience is woven through, especially the window of tolerance and what it explains about a client swinging between hyperarousal and shutdown. She is also trained in Prolonged Exposure and Cognitive Processing Therapy and covers how ACT sits alongside them rather than competing with them, which matters if you already work that way.
You’ll walk away with
- The six core ACT processes applied to trauma specifically, and a way of moving between them in session rather than working through them in sequence
- Experiential avoidance recognised as the common process under substance use, self-harm, compulsive behaviour and withdrawal, and what changes when you treat the function rather than the behaviour
- Defusion from the trauma voice, including working with it as a character with its own protective intent rather than something to argue down
- The window of tolerance as a working map, and why a client alternating between flooded and numb is behaving exactly as the model predicts
- The freeze and fawn responses explained in a way that dismantles self-blame, particularly for clients who did not fight back and have never forgiven themselves for it
- Comfort, stretch and panic zones, and the judgement about how far to push, including what happens when you get it wrong and how to recover it
- Exposure done in the service of values rather than as habituation for its own sake, so the client knows what they are doing it for
- A first-session exercise asking what life would look like if the trauma were not in the driver’s seat, and using the answer as the map for everything after
- Self as context work for the client who has become only their trauma, including the observer who was there and is also more than that
- How ACT sits alongside exposure protocols and DBT rather than replacing them, including using regulation skills to bring a client into a range where willingness is possible
Watch the course trailer
CPD Information For Mental Health Professionals
Enjoy complete flexibility with 100% self-paced learning you can access anytime, anywhere, and on any device. This course is included with your Tatra Training membership, along with every other course in the library.
Course Duration: 6 learning hours
Certificate and CPD hours: On completion you’ll receive a Certificate of Completion to support your CPD records. Your certificates are yours to keep.
Assessment: Complete a short quiz at the end (80% pass mark), which you can resit as many times as needed.
Revisit Anytime: Come back to the course as often as you like while your membership is active, whenever you want a refresher for practice.
CPD Eligibility: This program may be suitable for CPD for professionals such as:
- Psychologists
- Counsellors and Psychotherapists
- Social Workers
- Community Workers
- Mental Health Nurses
- General Practitioners (GPs)
- Occupational Therapists
CPD requirements vary between professional bodies, so please check with your association or credentialing body to confirm you can claim CPD hours/OPD points for this program and what evidence they require.
Course Content
Meet Your Instructor
Trauma and complex mental health presentations that may overwhelm traditional therapy approaches can respond dramatically when clinicians learn to integrate Acceptance and Commitment Therapy with evidence-based trauma treatment. Emily Wharton brings a unique combination of Stanford research excellence and frontline clinical experience to help practitioners master this powerful integration, particularly in perinatal and veteran populations.
As Clinical Assistant Professor at Stanford University School of Medicine and founder of Emily Wharton PsyD Psychotherapy, Dr. Wharton represents the bridge between cutting-edge research and compassionate clinical care. Her chapters in The Oxford Handbook of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and her work on moral injury treatment demonstrate her expertise in applying ACT to the most challenging trauma presentations. Her research with premature infants and their mothers at Stanford Children's Hospital gives her specialised insight into how early medical trauma affects entire family systems.
Dr. Wharton's expertise spans Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy, trauma-focused CBT, PTSD treatment, complex trauma, anxiety, OCD, couples therapy, and perinatal mental health. Her bilingual proficiency and extensive work with diverse populations - from Harvard students to veterans to NICU families - gives her deep understanding of how cultural factors and life transitions impact therapeutic relationships. She specialises in identity-based trauma, moral injury, and cases where clients struggle with values-action discrepancies.
What sets her training apart is research-informed compassion. Wharton doesn't just teach techniques - she shows practitioners how to maintain therapeutic presence with the most challenging presentations while using evidence-based approaches that honor clients' values and cultural backgrounds. Her experience founding a nonprofit that built pediatric wards in Sub-Saharan Africa demonstrates her commitment to service that extends far beyond traditional clinical boundaries.
For your practice, expect to gain advanced ACT techniques for trauma, tools for working with perinatal mental health issues, and frameworks for addressing identity-based discrimination and moral injury. Her approach particularly benefits clinicians working with veterans, new parents, or clients experiencing values-based internal conflicts.
Quick Win: Wharton's "values compass" technique helps trauma survivors quickly reconnect with their core values when PTSD symptoms create feelings of being lost or disconnected - in a number of cases restoring hope and direction in a single session.
Qualifications
- PsyD, Clinical Psychology, PGSP-Stanford PsyD Consortium (APA-accredited)
- M.S., Clinical Psychology, PGSP-Stanford PsyD Consortium (APA-accredited)
- B.A., Social Studies, Psychology, Spanish, Harvard University (Magna Cum Laude)
- Licensed Clinical Psychologist, California
- APA-accredited doctoral internship, Palo Alto Veterans Affairs
- Bilingual proficiency: English and Spanish
Selected Publications
- Walser, R. & Wharton, E. (2022). "The Dissemination and Implementation of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy." In The Oxford Handbook of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (Oxford University Press)
- Walser, R. D. & Wharton, E. (2020). "Acceptance and commitment therapy: Using mindfulness and values in the treatment of moral injury." In Addressing moral injury in clinical practice (American Psychological Association)
- Moreyra, A., Seeman, S., Wharton, E., Borkovi, T., & Shaw, R. (2020). "Group Therapy Intervention for Mothers of Premature Infants." In Psychological Consultation on Parents of Premature Infants (American Psychiatric Publishing)
- Multiple peer-reviewed journal publications (2019–2023)
Teaching & Roles
- Founder & Clinical Psychologist, Emily Wharton PsyD Psychotherapy, January 2023–present
- Clinical Assistant Professor (Affiliated), Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University School of Medicine, current
- Clinical Instructor, Cognitive Behavior Institute Center for Education, current
- Clinical Psychologist, Palo Alto Veterans Affairs, current
Research & Clinical Experience
- Graduate Research Assistant, Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, Stanford Children's Health/Lucile Packard Children's Hospital Stanford, 2018–2021
- Former Member-At-Large Director, San Francisco Bay Area Chapter of the Association for Contextual Behavioral Sciences
- Mental Health Counselor, Harvard University, 2013–2014
Speaking & Training
- Professional presentations: American Psychological Association Convention (2019), American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (2020, 2022), International Marcé Society (2022)
- Workshop presenter: ACT, DBT, Cognitive Processing Therapy, Motivational Interviewing
- Featured in professional psychology networks and training institutes
Ready to integrate values-based approaches with evidence-based trauma treatment? Discover how Dr. Wharton's ACT-informed methods can transform your ability to help clients heal from complex trauma while staying connected to what matters most in their lives.
Feedback & Reviews
This course includes:
- Lessons 5
- Topics 0
- Duration 6 hours
- Quizzes 1
- Language English