The Complicated Work of Treating Trauma - Dr. Bessel Van Der Kolk has spent 30 years figuring out why people behave so strangely.
Time|August 05, 2024
The Body Keeps the Score is not a self-help book; it is a summary of the scientific advances in understanding and treating trauma in the past century and why van der Kolk believes medicine is still not grappling with it effectively. But for many readers, it was an epiphany. As the book has lingered atop best-seller lists for the past five years, trauma has been elevated from a subject discussed mostly in the medical and military communities to a feature of the national conversation.
By Belinda Luscombe - Photograph by Frankie Alduino - Redux
The Complicated Work of Treating Trauma - Dr. Bessel Van Der Kolk has spent 30 years figuring out why people behave so strangely.

Dr. Bessel Van Der Kolk has spent 30 years figuring out why people behave so strangely. His specialty is treating those who have endured traumas so horrific-war, carnage, incredible pain that they couldn't stop-that their brains have not been able to fully process them, and their bodies have reacted to their brain's precarious state in ways they could not explain or control. But many human behaviors still puzzle van der Kolk, 82. He doesn't understand why the medical community doesn't take childhood trauma more seriously. He doesn't understand why leaders still send citizens to war without factoring in how it will deplete their capacity to live normally for decades. And he's not quite sure why a woman recently came up to him on the street and kissed his feet.

"I said, 'What are you doing?" says van der Kolk via video call from his home in the Berkshires. Van der Kolk's is a specific type of fame. Most people haven't heard of him, but for those who began to understand why they― or someone they loved-behaved the way they did via his 2014 book, The Body Keeps the Score, he's a miracle worker. Hence the feet-kissing.

Denne historien er fra August 05, 2024-utgaven av Time.

Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.

Denne historien er fra August 05, 2024-utgaven av Time.

Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.

FLERE HISTORIER FRA TIMESe alt
A timely thriller for a mad, mad world
Time

A timely thriller for a mad, mad world

A’70s-style paranoid thriller grounded in the partisan polarization of today

time-read
2 mins  |
December 09, 2024
Freshwater reserves
Time

Freshwater reserves

A troubling dip

time-read
1 min  |
December 09, 2024
An exuberant ode to human possibility
Time

An exuberant ode to human possibility

VERY RARELY DOES THE RIGHT MOVIE ARRIVE AT precisely the right time, at a moment when compassion is in short supply and the collective human imagination has come to feel shrunken and desiccated.

time-read
3 mins  |
December 09, 2024
Broadcasting a crisis for the world to see
Time

Broadcasting a crisis for the world to see

ON SEPT. 5, 1972, A 32-YEAR-OLD PRODUCER NAMED Geoffrey S. Mason was working in a control room for ABC Sports in Munich while 12 hostages, including several members of the Israeli Olympic delegation, were being held in a building nearby.

time-read
4 mins  |
December 09, 2024
The Power of the Peer
Time

The Power of the Peer

WITH MENTAL-HEALTH CARE IN SHORT SUPPLY, CAN REGULAR PEOPLE FILL THE GAP?

time-read
7 mins  |
December 09, 2024
QUEERING THE STORY
Time

QUEERING THE STORY

Luca Guadagnino directs Daniel Craig in an adaptation of William S. Burroughs' 1985 novella Queer

time-read
6 mins  |
December 09, 2024
Shopping under the influence
Time

Shopping under the influence

LTK CO-FOUNDER AMBER VENZ BOX SAW THE FUTURE OF RETAIL. IT TOOK YEARS FOR THE REST OF THE WORLD TO CATCH UP

time-read
10+ mins  |
December 09, 2024
The Kingmaker
Time

The Kingmaker

Elon Musk's partnership with the President-elect

time-read
10+ mins  |
December 09, 2024
Turkey's Erdogan plots his next power grab
Time

Turkey's Erdogan plots his next power grab

RECEP TAYYIP Erdogan is a political survivor.

time-read
2 mins  |
December 09, 2024
Why maiden names matter in the age of AI and identity
Time

Why maiden names matter in the age of AI and identity

IN THE DIGITAL AGE, A NAME IS MORE THAN JUST A label. It's tied to our professional history and social media presence.

time-read
2 mins  |
December 09, 2024