Psychoterapeutic Work with The Trauma Of Immigration in Transactional Analysis Approach

Abstract

This article contains the author’s reflections on how looking at emigration through the lens of traumatic experience can help expand the understanding of a client’s life script and support the client in overcoming difficulties in adaptation in a new country. The meaning of «trauma» allows us to draw an analogy between the emigration experience and those possible changes in the life script that the emigration provokes. The emigration experience can greatly contribute to regression to the Child ego state, which can also interfere with the adaptation of the client. The article considers the possible causes of regression and how this may affect the design of new decisions in the present and future. The article offers the practical experience of working with emigrants, which reflects the tendency to strengthen the driver ”Be strong”, and also explains the reasons for such behavior among respondents, participants of the experiment. The author suggests using the existential position ”I’m OK — You’re OK” as a formula for overcoming cultural difficulties of adaptation and as a lens for perceiving the difference of cultures during the process of mastering a new system of norms and rules. Awareness of the practical experience acquired through emigration can help a person overcome difficulties in adapting to a new country. The article was prepared on the basis of a speech at the MIR-TA (International Institute of Developing TA) Conference in 2023.