Hey, my counselor did this.  Every so often I read something that a therapist should do and it is exactly what my therapist did do but didn’t spell out exactly.

https://www.blueknot.org.au/Workers-Practitioners/For-Health-Professionals/Resources-for-Health-Professionals/Best-Practice-Guidelines

Phase 1 – Make sure the client is safe and stabilized.

If they are still in an abuse situation and in danger, the whole healing thing is not going to happen very well.  There are a few amazing cases where they survived and thrived any way but I learned they are the exception not the rule.

Phase 2 – Processing.

Phase 3 – Integration.

I’m going to spend the next several post exploring these a bit more than a paragraph.  Too often, people try to skip phases.  They try to jump to integration before they find out who they are or where they are going.  Some of the phases blend together and sometimes you need to drop back to phase 1 of making sure I am safe and stable.  This was a big part of how my therapist treated me.