Baan Romyen is our center for women here in Northern Thailand. It is for women & children who are at risk , vulnerable or physically/sexually exploited either through the commercial sex industry or sex trafficking. We are situated in the red light district and the name means "a protective space or home that is safe".
Working with women who have been through complex trauma through exploitation needs me to be extremely trauma informed. But, I am learning more everyday that while having these tools help me assist these women navigate daily struggles, it is also a steep learning curve for me in many ways. What more can I do to make these women feel safer?
As a trauma counsellor, I walk into our Women’s Center everyday expecting someone to come to me with tears in her eyes. And everyday, I experience this overwhelming sense of wanting to reach them on a deeper level that can help them heal & re-build their lives powerfully. Yes, I have years of knowledge, experience & tools I have gathered. But, some stories are just too heart breaking to sit through.
What I have learned is this. Every single woman is looking for one thing; someone who will listen and who is willing to just sit with them in their pain.
It sounds simple I know. But it’s not really. There is always that impulse to tell them what to do, and “guide them” to a safer place, a better place, a healed space – however we may call it in our noble effort to want to help them.
The thing is this, a lot of times, her mind is not in a place to receive much input. She is in her safe bubble that aims to protect her from further harm. She is crying for help and reaching out of that bubble, no doubt. But, the most important thing we can do for her in those moments is to create a safer place she can step into. And then we see the walls come down, and the ability to reason & believe that there is help, start to slowly form.
My experience working with women from the commercial sex industry, survivors of sexual exploitation or trafficking has helped give me so much more understanding of trauma and PTSD. Many face various degrees and intensity of symptoms that include crippling fear and feeling absolutely unsafe around people. What I am learning more of, even after years of working in this field, is seeing amazing transformation to the healing journey, when they are surrounded by people who hear them & understand them. People they feel, who may have a shared experience in some way.
We have now gathered a community of women who have experienced exploitation & survived trafficking; many who are still in the commercial sex industry. They come together to talk about life. They talk about shared interest in food, sports, songs, kids and pets. There is always delicious food involved in the mix somewhere! Something about sharing meals together that help bring down walls. There in only one rule we stress during these “meetings”. YOU MUST JUST LISTEN & SHARE. When someone is talking (about anything), everyone listens intently. They nod their heads, saying “I get it” or laugh and smile at each other with a knowing look of encouragement.
We have seen amazing breakthroughs with this. Creating a safe space and then stepping aside to allow for their traumatic experiences to be spoken about without actually talking about it. I have started using this in my one-on-one sessions as well. Start each session with things they may be grateful for that day, and then we just talk about an old friend or a pet that brings fuzzy warm memories. All the while, creating for them a safe space, so we can then slowly move into talking about those traumatic moments that haunt them & cause triggers that disrupt their lives.
Someone walked in to see me the other day, and she excitedly shared about how she “managed a massive trigger attack” that week. She remembered the conversations we would have in our sessions or at the community meeting with the other women, that took her mind to a safe warm place. She shared how going back to those thoughts, calmed her triggers and helped her stop an onset of what could have easily become a major anxiety attack! That to me is amazing. And a massive breakthrough to change how I actually conduct a lot of my trauma counselling sessions. To just be there to share, listen, watch & learn.
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