ABSTRACT

Surviving trauma, going on each day as if nothing has happened, coping with both the normal challenges of daily life and the abnormal challenges of traumatogenic environments—all tax an individual's belief in safety and erode the determination to live. It is not surprising that trauma and self-destructive behavior go hand-in-hand. It is no wonder that the prospect of death can be comforting as an alternative to entrapment, not surprising that wishing to die rather than live with such pain could be procedurally learned as a way of surviving. There is scientific support for this hypothesis as well as clinical evidence. Suicidal ideation, threats of suicide, and suicide attempts have all been statistically correlated with a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), as have substance abuse, eating disorders, and self-injury. Trauma-informed stabilization treatment (TIST) is a treatment model developed to stabilize severe self-destructive behavior unresponsive to conventional treatments.