When Trauma is Current: Treating Clients with Ongoing Traumatic Stressors
A client is hypervigilant, sleeping badly, scanning every room, braced for the next thing. If the next thing is genuinely coming, none of that is a disorder. It is a brain doing exactly what it is supposed to do. Those symptoms only indicate pathology when they no longer match the environment, which means the same presentation can be intelligence in one life and illness in another.
That is the problem Jennifer Sweeton sets out here, and it runs deeper than it first appears. PTSD requires that at least a month has passed. The DSM’s whole trauma and stressor-related category assumes the stressor is behind the client. Most trauma treatment is built on the same assumption. So when someone is still in the violent relationship, still in the situation, still being harmed weekly, you are applying a framework that was designed for something else and diagnosing a client whose symptoms may not be pathology at all.
Three hours, prompted by a question she is asked constantly in her EMDR trainings: do we process the violence while the violence is still happening? She is honest that the research here is thin, that there are no hard answers, and that most of what she offers is evidence-informed judgment rather than settled protocol. The course is not built around a new technique. It is about taking the tools you already use and working out what to modify, what to emphasise, and what to leave alone.
You’ll walk away with
- The distinction between symptoms that reflect a disorder and symptoms that reflect an accurate read of danger, and why it changes the treatment plan
- Why the DSM category and most trauma therapies assume the stressor is in the past, and what that leaves you with when it is not
- A trauma treatment roadmap, the order she teaches across her workshops, and where it breaks down under ongoing trauma
- What you are actually aiming for in the brain when the danger is current, which is not the same target as when it is over
- Techniques to help a client inoculate against the effects of continuing stressors rather than process something that is not finished
- Modifications to EMDR and other exposure approaches, to somatic therapies, and to cognitive approaches
- Four case examples drawn from her own practice, including the ethical dilemmas in each
- Barriers to entering treatment at all when a client’s situation has not stabilised
- An honest account of how little research exists here, so you know which parts are established and which are considered judgment
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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: 3 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 survivors whose PTSD symptoms resist traditional therapy approaches - and clinicians struggling to understand how neuroscience can enhance treatment - may need more than generic trauma protocols to help create lasting healing. Jennifer Sweeton has spent her career bridging cutting-edge neuroscience research with practical clinical application, becoming an internationally recognised expert who has revolutionised how practitioners understand and treat trauma through brain-based interventions.
As a Stanford-educated clinical and forensic psychologist with doctoral training at Stanford University School of Medicine and a master's degree in affective neuroscience, Dr. Sweeton represents the pinnacle of scientific rigor applied to trauma treatment. Her Amazon #1 bestselling book Trauma Treatment Toolbox and recognition by Shortform as one of the "100 Best Trauma Books of All Time" demonstrate her ability to translate complex neuroscience into practical tools. Her recent completion of her JD from the University of Missouri-Kansas City adds crucial legal expertise to her forensic psychology practice, making her uniquely qualified for complex cases involving legal proceedings.
Dr. Sweeton's expertise spans PTSD treatment, the neuroscience of mental health, forensic assessment, women's issues, anxiety disorders, and legal aspects of mental health. Her approach integrates evidence-based trauma therapies with cutting-edge understanding of neuroplasticity and brain-based healing. She is the developer of Neural Desensitisation and Integration Training (NDIT), an evidence-informed modular psychotherapy for PTSD that specifically targets neuroplasticity in key brain regions. Her specialisation includes complex trauma presentations, forensic evaluations for legal proceedings, and cases where standard trauma treatments have been ineffective.
What sets her training apart is rigorous science combined with practical application. As a world-renowned trauma treatment expert, Sweeton doesn't just teach trauma techniques - she shows practitioners how specific interventions create measurable changes in brain structure and function. Her experience training over 60,000 mental health professionals worldwide demonstrates her exceptional ability to make neuroscience accessible to practicing clinicians.
For your practice, expect to gain brain-based trauma interventions, specific techniques for treatment-resistant PTSD, and forensic assessment skills for legal cases. Her approach particularly benefits clinicians wanting to integrate neuroscience into their trauma work, those dealing with complex forensic cases, or practitioners seeking advanced training in evidence-based PTSD treatment.
Quick Win: Sweeton's "neural pathway mapping" technique helps clients understand how trauma affects specific brain regions - helping to reduce shame and increase treatment engagement by showing that PTSD symptoms reflect brain changes, not personal weakness.
Qualifications
- PsyD, Clinical Psychology, PGSP-Stanford PsyD Consortium, 2012
- MS, Clinical Psychology, PGSP-Stanford PsyD Consortium, 2010
- MA, Personality Psychology (Affective Neuroscience), Stanford University, 2007
- BS, Cognitive Psychology, University of Kansas, 2004
- JD, University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law, 2025
- Licensed Clinical & Forensic Psychologist
- Training: Stanford University School of Medicine, Pacific Graduate School of Psychology, National Center for PTSD
Authored Publications
- Traumatic Stress Recovery Workbook (2025)
- Trauma Treatment Toolbox (Amazon #1 bestseller, Shortform's "100 Best Trauma Books of All Time")
- Eight Key Brain Areas of Mental Health and Illness
- Train Your Brain Card Deck: 100 Techniques to Heal Trauma and Build Resiliency
- Multiple book chapters and professional publications
Leadership & Teaching
- Founder/Co-owner, Kansas City Mental Health Associates (group private practice)
- Former President, Greater Kansas City Psychological Association & Oklahoma Psychological Association
- Adjunct Faculty, University of Kansas School of Medicine & University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center
- Developer, Neural Desensitisation and Integration Training (NDIT) for PTSD
Professional Experience
- Director of Behavioral Health, Clinton Service Unit, Indian Health Service, 2015–2016
- Telemental Health Psychologist, Oklahoma City VA Medical Center, 2013–2015
- Combat Stress Recovery Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center/Oklahoma City VA, 2012–2013
Training & Speaking
- Trained over 60,000 mental health professionals internationally
- Keynote speaker, trainer, and workshop leader worldwide
- Sought-after expert for legal, corporate, government, and community education events
- Developer of continuing education programs serving 50,000+ licensed mental health providers
Ready to integrate cutting-edge neuroscience with trauma treatment? Discover how Dr. Sweeton's brain-based interventions can transform your ability to help trauma survivors achieve lasting recovery through evidence-based approaches that target specific neural pathways.
Feedback & Reviews
This course includes:
- Lessons 2
- Topics 0
- Duration 3 hours
- Quizzes 1
- Language English