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Wounded Healer

Key Tenets of Addiction as Dissociation Model (ADM) by Dr. Adam O’Brien

The Addiction as Dissociation Model (ADM) represents a significant theoretical contribution, rooted in the author’s phenomenological study exploring the intricate interplay of trauma, dissociation, and addiction, particularly focusing on the concept of “drug use memory”. The core argument of ADM is that the dissociative state, though often misunderstood and poorly defined in medical literature, is

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July 9, 2025 No Comments
Wounded Healer

Healing Trauma Together with Dissociative Understanding and Psychedelic Care

Heal Yourself, Empower Your Practice, and Become the Healer that you already are inside. An inside look at the silent struggles of caregivers and the path to renewal. The Overlooked Crisis in Caregiving and being first responders… Those who dedicate their lives to others often face a silent battle with burnout and vicarious trauma. The

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July 6, 2025 No Comments
Wounded Healer

Addiction as Dissociation Model Dissertation (AI Analysis)

Detailed Summary of our Dissertation This dissertation, “ADDICTION AS TRAUMA-RELATED DISSOCIATION: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL INVESTIGATION OF THE ADDICTIVE STATE” by Adam O’Brien, PhD, LMHC, CASAC presents a groundbreaking argument for redefining addiction as a manifestation of trauma-related dissociation. The author contends that current clinical definitions and models of addiction are incomplete, failing to adequately account for

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July 4, 2025 No Comments
Wounded Healer

Addiction as Dissociation Recovery Model

The Addiction as Dissociation Model presents views addiction as a trauma-related dissociation rather than a disease or moral failing, choice, or a disease. Observing that the drug use is traumatic to the body (and that the body is the psychological unconscious), addiction is an unconscious choice made in the body, and the moral failing are

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July 1, 2025 No Comments
Wounded Healer

Addiction as Dissociation Model OVERVIEW

The DSM lacks an operational definition of addiction, resulting in gaps in different diagnoses because our work found that it is transdiagnostic (O’Brien, 2023a). This disconnect misinforms legal and medical systems interpretations of mental expressions of distress and concern, which are then unable to apply scientific understanding effectively. Understanding that drug use can encode trauma

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July 1, 2025 No Comments
Wounded Healer

Addiction as Dissociation Continued

The Addiction as Dissociation Model (ADM) discussed is called “Addiction as Trauma-Related Dissociation.” This means that when someone becomes addicted to something, whether it’s drugs, alcohol, or even behaviors like gambling, it might be because of underlying trauma that they haven’t processed properly. The idea is that the addiction serves as a coping mechanism for

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May 31, 2025 No Comments
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Wounded Healer

Recovery Made Addiction Simple

Recovery making addiction simple must begin with a critique of current systems– particularly how society has historically failed to treat mental health and addiction equally. They are “separate, but not equal”. Much like in the psychological professions, where newcomers are not always welcomed, inequality persists under the guise of structure; they are separate and not

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May 27, 2025 No Comments
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Uncategorized

Applied Recovery

Introduction As a professional, imagine walking into a new client’s house for the first time and discovering that the parents had a fully functioning prison in their basement (complete with staff, armed guards, and administration) for when their children were misbehaving, and a full lab for drug testing analysis. Now, imagine you are a licensed

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May 19, 2025 No Comments
Wounded Healer

Reducing Implicit Bias

What is implicit bias? What does “reducing implicit bias” mean to the professions and professionals who are legally mandated to take their own bias into consideration when working with citizens in precarious life situations where even psychology cannot agree on what is actually happening or what to do about it?

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April 1, 2025 No Comments
Wounded Healer

Recovery Manifesto

We have been taught that freedom is the freedom to pursue our petty, trivial desires. Real freedom is freedom from our petty, trivial desires. – Russell Brand

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February 21, 2025 No Comments
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Wounded Healer

Recovery Reckoning

Introduction How many clinicians have seen their clients’ most private and intimate parts? How many clinicians regularly see their clients’ literal private parts (e.g., junk)? How many clinicians, probation officers, and staff are legally required to do this as a critical aspect of their jobs? Who legally requires this? And who has to ignore their

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February 21, 2025 No Comments
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Wounded Healer

Racial Addiction

“I don’t want my people to be tricked by mercenaries.” – Bob Marley’s song: Zimbabwe

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February 21, 2025 No Comments
Wounded Healer

Pseudo-Seizures

“It is easier to find men who will volunteer to die, than to find those who are willing to endure pain with patience.” – Julius Caesar Introduction Generally, people know that Julius Caesar had seizures; so, they believe they know what seizures are. Similarly, doctors see medical diagnoses (HERE) and not psychological ones that do

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February 19, 2025 No Comments

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Disclaimer

The Wounded Healers Institute fully complies with all local and New York State laws, and all federal regulations. We are a harm and risk reduction, recovery-based mindfulness healing (non-clinical) program, and an (re)education company.

We do not promote illegal activities or provide resources for obtaining illegal substances or illegal psychedelic psychotherapy services.

The Wounded Healers Institute does not sell THC cannabis for any aspect of our program, training or events, and it is not a retailer, supplier, manufacturer, reseller, distributor, agent, representative or subcontractor of THC cannabis supplier or retailer.

WHI is selling legally allowed to sell CBD now. Our healing services do not constitute medical care, physical therapy, and we do not diagnose or treat mental health. WHI is a wellness and recovery program.

What we do do is provide educational experiences, create positive memories of healing that allow participants to access to their own innate healing and creative process. WHI provides wellness programming, posttraumatic growth opportunities, and skills to build resiliency factors that allow our healing model. WHI employs the spiritual and developmental model of Addiction as Dissociation and uses The Path of the Wounded Healer as our unconscious guide. See our research HERE

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