South Florida





Following my visit to the Post Traumatic Stress Center in New Haven, Connecticut I have travelled onwards to the second destination of my Fellowship; South Florida. I have been gradually adjusting to driving on the right-hand side of the road, and I am captivated by the tropical climate, palm trees and frequent sight of little lizards scuttling around everywhere you go, which is very different to the UK!
I have come to South Florida to learn about the Camp Shine programme, part of Shine MSD. The programme has been developed to meet the needs of community members affected by a mass shooting incident, and Camp Shine offers drama therapy, music therapy and art therapy to support young people from the local area. I have been welcomed by a fantastic team of clinicians and it is a privilege to see such skilled and innovative work taking place.
It feels clear from everything I am learning and observing that arts-based therapies have huge potential for enabling expression and processing of emotions following a traumatic event. Additionally, the use of drama, movement and sound create potential for somatic healing by therapeutically engaging the whole body. There is immense learning to be had from my visit to South Florida and I am really excited to be thinking about how the ideas and approaches that I am seeing here could positively inform the approaches for healing trauma that are offered in the UK.












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