ABSTRACT

Dreamwork with Latinos seeking Psychological Services in Urban Health Centers

Christina Dresp, MSW

Christina Dresp is a bilingual social worker in a community health center in the Boston, Massachusetts area. She received her MSW degree from Smith School for Social Work. She has been a clinical field instructor to social work students for many years. She is currently introducing co-workers, psychology and social work interns to dream work. She has been working with Latino immigrants, refugees and with people from Puerto Rico throughout her professional career of 20 years.

Summary of Presentation

This presentation will show how low income Latino refugee women and men use dream work to help reconnect with feelings of family and with their familiar environments. It will show how they use it to feel and express homesickness and to digest traumas of assault, murder, and poverty.

Learning Objectives.

• Usefulness of dream work with Latino people

• Learn about the use of dream work to help with nightmares and traumatic memories

• Learn about the use of dream work to help with cultural alienation of Latino immigrants and refuges.

Evaluation questions:

• Do Latino traumatized refugees and immigrants benefit from dream work?

• What did you learn is the most helpful aspect regarding the use of dreams in culturally sensitive work with latinos?

• Does dream work help us as clinicians become aware of our client’s deep family connections and disconnections, if so, how?

Abstract

The idea of this presentation came about from noticing for some years the way Latino clients from different Central American countries and from Puerto Rico would spontaneously, tell me their dreams, usually nightmares, as part of their presenting problems when seeking mental health services.

Once I started working on my own dreams a few years ago and experienced how helpful that work was for digesting my own trauma experience, I gradually began to pay more attention to my client’s dreams. To my surprise, men and women eagerly began to tell me their dreams, usually nightmares, on a more regular basis. I soon learned that some of them had been living with much fear worrying that what they dreamt would become reality. Others began to tell me their painful dreams about a long departed loved one, which in some instances was causing them much guilt. Women clients often told of their nightmares of being persecuted by their abusing husbands, or just in general being chased by attacking men.

Once I formerly began asking my clients whether they would like to work on their dreams since I was learning a new way to work with them, most of them liked the idea and eagerly wanted to try it out. Soon I noticed that my work with my mostly traumatized clients became more exhilarating. I noticed shifts in how they used their therapy hour. They became more curious about their own internal life. Their usual way of talking about their symptoms and hardships expanded. By working on their dreams using Robert Bosnak’s method many more aspects of their personalities came alive, usually those of strength and deep inner resources. My clients began to express a much wider range of affect and more intense feelings during the session. Through the dream work some of my women often for the first time in their lives spoke of atrocities they witnessed and experienced during the war.

Most noticeably, since working with dreams I get a much deeper sense of my client’s family network and of their spiritual and cultural environment in which they are deeply rooted. I also have noticed a much richer use of their Spanish language than before I used to work with them on their dreams.

In summary, what has been most noticeable since I started using Robbie Bosnak’s way of working with dreams is that my clients come alive in my room much more than before.

During the presentation, I will mention among other examples the work I have been doing with a young mother of four children, who has an extensive history of trauma, poverty, abandonment and who is now raising her children in a new culture different from her own. I will show how another young woman worked on her dreams to begin the healing process of a brutal attack on her and on her family in her country of origin. I will mention how a young homeless Latino man made use of a dream session that helped confirm a mayor decision he was making in his life.

 [abstracts index]  [conference index]  [member pages]