EP 39 Exploring play and Symbolism in Therapy

In this episode of Pondering Play and Therapy, Philippa and Julie dive into the concepts of play and symbolism in therapeutic settings. They discuss how play therapists like Julie use symbolism in sessions with children to explore emotions and experiences. The conversation covers the differences between primary and secondary relationships in play therapy, the use of objects to facilitate play, and the significance of symbolic roles in helping children express and manage feelings. They also touch on the use of sand trays and transitional objects as symbolic tools, and the impact of developmental trauma on children's play. The episode underscores the importance of allowing children to navigate and articulate their emotions through symbolic play, highlighting the therapeutic potential of this approach.

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Transcript

EP41 Exploring Play and Symbolism in Therapy

Philippa: [00:00:00] Welcome to this week's episode of Pondering Play and Therapy with me, Philippa, 

Julie: and me Julie. And this week's episode is about play and symbolism. And we were just discussing before we started the fact that I've got lots and lots of notes written in front of me and Philippa, you've got a blank sheet.

Does tell me why you have a blank sheet when we're talking about plain symbolism. 

Philippa: That probably really does symbolize how I go with life in that I just, most of the time. Wing it. Hope that, the universe is going to give me inspiration and I am gonna get along. I guess for this one, it's really hard for me to get my head around what we're gonna be talking about.

I think it's a really valid conversation that we're gonna have. 'cause we've, we have [00:01:00] had a little bit of conversation a while back about this. But I suppose, I don't know where I think about it would be the thing. Okay. And when you talk, that will help me to start to think about what I think about.

Does that make sense? And then I'll be able to say it. Absolutely. 

Julie: And I think that's the whole point of a podcast, is to listen into another conversation as a listener and to think, oh, I didn't, I haven't thought to think about that yet. And, for listeners to begin to think, oh, where do I sit with this?

So in thinking about play and symbolism I'm a play therapist, which is different to your training and the way you work with families, and a huge amount of what I do in the room with children involves symbolism. And I'll talk a little bit more about what that is. A lot of what you do, I think, in your work with [00:02:00] children and families is about relationship.

Is about the adults and the child. Whether that adult is the parent or carer, grandparent, foster, carer and the child, or whether it's with you and the child, or often I think in Thera plays a practice. We all do. We both do. It's about the relationship between all three, but it's about what we'd sometimes call primary relationship.

Where there may be an object involved, there might be a cotton ball or a balloon or some food that there is an object involved. But that object is the thing that it's meant to be in the sense of we're all calling it a cotton ball. It is a cotton ball. And yeah, we might be using it in slightly different ways, but it doesn't take on another meaning.

So a lot of the work the play [00:03:00] practitioners do, and a lot of work o other therapists do is with the body of the person, the adult or the child. And the play that you are doing is about building that relationship. Noticing when that relationship gets stuck. Bless you. Noticing when that relationship is gritty.

Noticing when that relationship is smooth and perhaps using some objects to be the focus of the play, especially when the focus one-to-one can be too intense. So when we think about primary relationship, it's you and me. My body. Your body. My eyes. Your eyes, my hands, your hands. But when we think about secondary, we are thinking about.

Both of us focusing on an object or a task, and in therapy play, we do both. We do primary and [00:04:00] secondary. So what I'm thinking about though today is in my practice as a child-centered play therapist, where I don't plan anything. So I don't have a list, I don't have a post-it note stuck on the wall that I would do in a thorough play session.

And what I say to a child when they come into the room, whether it's their first time or their 70th time, if it was you coming into this room and this is the room that I have my clients come into, I would say, Philip her, this is your time to do and say just about anything you like, shall we see what happens?

And then I generally sit down and really do see what happens. Yeah, and so often what a child chooses to do involves some sort of [00:05:00] symbolism where an object becomes something that's beyond reality. So they'll pour water into a little plastic teacup and call it hot chocolate. So there's symbolism going on.

Philippa: Yeah. 

Julie: They'll use their whole body as a symbol and say, right now I'm the lion and you are the mass. So they're putting both of us into a symbolic role. Does that make sense? I guess Jordan 

Philippa: play like that in their everyday lives, don't they as well? Yeah. 

Julie: So there's not, in a sense, there's absolutely nothing special about that.

So sometimes as play therapists and lots of people talk about this play being a child's main language. 

Philippa: They'll 

Julie: have a spoken language, they'll have a bodily language. We talk about body language and [00:06:00] cues. But play and especially symbolism, is very much what children do, from under a year a child can do, a baby can do a pretend sip from a cup or a bottle. They can play around with reality. And you've probably heard of Donald Wincott. Is that a, a name you've heard? Yeah, his sort of. Most famous book, or the most famous book I think of is called Play and Reality.

When am I playing? When am I in reality? And when do those two feel the same? There's a link between them, but there's also a separation between them. 

Philippa: So when so if I'm sometimes doing therapy play or some other games, sometimes children that I work with can accept some [00:07:00] things. By being a cat or a dog or a, tiger pup, they can cope with being nurtured, with being fed, with being touched when they're, when they are that puppy.

But they can't when they are when they are. Yeah. They do You know what I mean? They find it easier. To for whatever experiences they've had as themselves, it's very difficult to accept, nurture care, those sorts of things. But as a poppy, they can curl up on their parent or caregivers's lap, have the blanket over them and be fed more teasers as doggy chocolates.

That that's, manageable for them. So would that be symbolism? I think so. I 

Julie: would count that as symbolism, and it's that sense of safety. It's that symbolic distance. We sometimes think about that. [00:08:00] I can't relate to you entirely as me and you, so say I'm a 7-year-old girl. And you are wanting, you are inviting me with my new adoptive parent to be curled up, to be nurtured, to be fed, to be sung to as 7-year-old me.

I might find that too threatening, too exposing, too vulnerable. But if I pretend to be baby me, or if as you say, I pretend to be. An animal, a creature, a soft creature, a young creature, then I can receive all of that in a way that isn't shaming. Isn't making me feel vulnerable, isn't making me feel scared.

So I think there's a huge safety. That symbolism, 

Philippa: and I guess you [00:09:00] can also be cross and hurt people, can't you? Because you can be a, tiger that kind of scratches out and says, no. I like maybe if you are, I suppose I'm just thinking about this, is that maybe if you are a child or a, a young person.

Who has to mask a lot, has to hold in all those feelings and be really pleasing. And be really compliant because that's how you've learned the world works and keeps you the safest is if you are pleasing and compliant, but actually inside you really got all these feelings that maybe by being.

A, a fierce creature. You can be a bit of both. You can be the the poppy or the lion. That kind of accepts some nurture, but then you can also be quite fierce and lash out at, the at the adults in a way that [00:10:00] maybe you couldn't say no or you couldn't do those things as, you.

Yes, 

Julie: absolutely. And I see that happen a huge amount in this room. Somewhere in that, corner at the back, I have those swimming noodles? Yeah. Big long tubes of foam Yeah. That you use in the swimming pool. And I, cut them in half and they become whatever a child wants to use them for.

So often they'll say. Is this a sword? And I'll say in here, it can be just about anything you want it to be. You want it to be a sword? Yeah, let's go for that. And sometimes a child might come in. They, I see them come up the path. I, work in my house and this is the front room in my house, so I can see them walk from the station or the bus stop or get out of the car and I can see what sort of mood they're in.

And often the child is [00:11:00] stormed off from the parent or the child is 10 yards behind the parent. Something big is going on. And then at my door. I have a normal push button doorbell, but I also have a little ding along Dingling doorbell. And again, I can tell by the way the child rattles that doorbell, what sort of mood they're in, what sort of emotional expression is gonna burst through the door.

So sometimes it's, oh, they're curled up in their coats. They don't want to leave the parent to come in. That can be very hard for them. Other times, they fling the front door open. They throw their shoes down the corridor and they slam the front door, sometimes slam it in the parent's face and I have to reopen the door for the parent and they're in the room and they are absolutely full of rage.

Full of rage at what? Maybe they don't know, maybe I don't know yet. But [00:12:00] there's this enormous rage. And occasionally a child will come in and be very destructive of what's happening in the room. Will push me, will want to bite me. I'm, fairly slender, but I'm fairly strong and it will be a huge amount of physical aggression that comes into the room.

So I will then invite the child. Say let's, and sometimes I'll say, let's put it on the stage. And I'll say, who are you or what are you? And they'll say, perhaps I am the lion and I just want to bite you and I want to throw everything at you. And I'll go, whoa, yeah, you are the lion today. And then I might whisper like a little stage whisper.

What do you want me to be? I want you to be the tiniest ant 'cause I'm gonna squash you and eat you and destroy you and all your friends. I [00:13:00] said okay. I'll be the tiniest ant. So somehow this is much, much safer for me and the child, as you say, to play those big aggressive feelings or those tiny nurturing, vulnerable young feelings.

It's much more kind of acceptable for the child to be able to be that wholly, fully when they're in a symbolic situation. Okay? When they're in a role play. 

Philippa: So, that's, them. So another thing that sometimes I do, certainly sometimes if children can't quite access therapy play because maybe there's a lot of trauma that's preventing it or that we've done therapy.

Thera play over, over the weeks and the months and there's some [00:14:00] trauma still left. But actually the, they've got that sense of felt safety and security and all. So the play isn't the right thing. So the other thing that I do is sand tray. So I've got a sand train, I've got a, load of toys that, you know, and there's rules about, about the sand tray and what and how it's used.

So sometimes the kids will. Very rarely, I would say in my experience, they do, they actually put humanly shaped things into the sand tray. There is a whole range of ethnicities, of ages of, shapes, of sizes of little wooden figures, plastic ones whole, range. But I would say very rarely.

Does a human shaped figure go into the sand tray? It's often a range of other things. Animals go in there. Sometimes [00:15:00] some kids won't even put animals in there for ages. Anything living doesn't go in there. Would you say that symbolism is being played out in there? 'cause that's often a question I get asked by parents is, are they just playing in the sand?

My. Thoughts are no, we are playing the same scene over and over again. But would you say that the symbolism within that? 

Julie: Absolutely. So I'd think about, say the, role play, I would say that's symbolic because me and the child are enacting, being symbolically something different to who we. Are in reality, we are playing somebody else.

Philippa: Yeah. But 

Julie: I'm, embodying it. It's the whole of me that becomes that character. Sometimes it's just the child doing it and the child wants me to witness, I remain Julie, the play therapist, and they are the lion. They don't want me to [00:16:00] interact with the lion, they just need to show me something about the lion.

So I'm not always in the role play. Sometimes it's like I'm watching the stage and I guess that 

Philippa: sorry. I know I've asked you about this re but that, that just made another question come into my head about the importance of witnessing. 'cause that in some ways, I'm guessing, is validating the experience of the child, the lion.

Which then is ex validating the experience of the child. It, would that be right? I, we will come to the sand tray, but I guess so, yeah. I'm 

Julie: gonna go back to that. I'm gonna go back to the sand tray before I forget. 

Philippa: Okay. 

Julie: But I think that issue of witnessing and validating. Is huge as well. So I'll we can come back to that, come 

Philippa: onto to that at the 

Julie: end.

But let's go back to the sand tray. Yeah. So the sand tray, I've got two sand trays, like lots of play therapists would have a dry one [00:17:00] and a damp wet one. The, and the wet one is one that water can go into. The dry, one remains dry because the they, there's different features about those. Yeah. But I, yeah.

To what extent do children put in, put their story into the San Tray? And I often see that. I see it played in the San Tray and outside and around the San Tray. I rarely see a whole story or a whole scene played out in the re. I've got quite small sand trays and I think that might be part of that. I also have a room with a lot of other resources, so I'd say it's used pretty much in every session in some way, things going into the sand tray being buried.

So these facts buried is 

Philippa: a very common [00:18:00] theme is I don't think I have ever worked with a child that hasn't at some point buried and either wanted to find them themselves or wants me to find them. And the level of difficulty depends. Some children, that's all they do for weeks is bury the marbles or bury the stones, and there's a degree of, yeah.

Of difficulty that they want to create in me Finding them? Yeah. Yeah. Or their parent finding them. 'cause mine is always done with the parent and I know yours is, different. Would that be symbolic, do you think? That finding of stuff? 

Julie: Yeah. I think, gosh, we're going off, I'm scribbling loads as we are talking because there's this, it's, there's the meaning that's held for the child.

About the characters, the creatures, the furniture, the stones that they're putting into and arranging [00:19:00] around the sand. So some sand trays are done, a static pictures, and then we look at the picture together. So it's almost like they've created a piece of art, a symbolic piece of art. But in 3D form in the sand tray, that might have people in it, or bicycles or furniture, dinosaurs, insects, and then inanimate objects.

So it might be static, and there are some children who then talk about what they've put in the sand tray. I find that more rare. It's like coming out of the metaphor to talk about what they've just done. 

Philippa: Yeah. 

Julie: Generally I find it's more things moving in and out of the sand tray. 

Philippa: Yeah. 

Julie: That might be part of a story that's mainly happening in the Dolls House or on the roadmap, and this is the den, or this is the [00:20:00] machine that kills all creatures, or it's the sand and its tray.

Is part of a bigger story. So I'd say all of that is very symbolic. But then I think what you've touched on there is very common practice of burying things. Even if I go to the beach and I'm sitting, I dunno, on the beach at Can Sands in the south coast of England and just running my hand through the sand I find myself.

Burying my toes or burying my hand, or putting my sunglasses case under the sand. Ju just, there's something about covering up and uncovering, and I think often I, resonate a lot with what you've said there about children who will bury things for many, weeks, but each week it changes slightly.[00:21:00] 

And it's about. I don't know. For each child it can be different. And I'm not somebody who will read a book and say, that means this. If a child does this, it means that I don't work with interpretation like that. I know some practitioners do. I'm interested in what this child means by doing that. So you're right. Sometimes they'll bury things and want to just leave them. And we'll say, I don't want you to pick any of that out for next week. I want you to leave it all in. 

Philippa: Yeah, I think that's the most tricky, don't you? Most of my kids will say, can you just say like this till next time? Oh, I just have to take a photograph.

And then I'll recreate them and say I can't leave them in, but I'll make sure it looks as much as I can like it does now. And I'll take a photograph and re. Re recreate it for the again so they start off [00:22:00] because I suppose for me, I wonder if. And it's different 'cause I have the only thing that we're doing is a sand tray.

We might do a little bit of the play before, we might do a little bit of the play afterwards. But it's almost like the story, like has to keep shifting. Just slight almost like the TA Sands shift, and they, move, like you say, the things that are buried become different. They maybe become more ladybirds or something that I, maybe you could, you might say, oh, I wonder if they're scared under the sun there, or, do you know what I mean? They start off with marbles or stones or and, you just find them and, those sorts of things. Food, I often. Have children who certainly have experienced neglect start to hide food.

I worked with one young man and he made a food mounting with all the food in, but then put a rat in the middle of it so that the [00:23:00] rat would was, the rat's food, which I guess in itself is quite symbolic. 

Julie: I think there's something about what, what is actually buried, and as you said, asking. Or pondering with the child, oh, I wonder what that lady bird or whatever is feeling under there, especially when the big dinosaur comes and sits on top.

I wonder what that feels like for the dinosaur. So we can do all of that, but I also think there's something happening at a primary level between me and the child, because sometimes the child will ask me to look away and they'll say, I'm gonna bury lots and lots of things. Then you have to come and find them.

But they haven't buried anything, so they're putting me in a position of being tricked. And I am in a situation of being laughed at or humiliated by looking around the sand and there's nothing there. [00:24:00] And then there's something there for me, potentially for a child, about the child projecting onto me what they feel or have felt in other situations.

They felt there wasn't anything there for them. They've been tricked. People have promised things and then they haven't been there for them. So I'm often thinking about what's happening in the relationship between us through the game that's going on, around the hiding. So then the actual object isn't that important.

I don't see the symbolism so strongly in that. It could be a pebble, it could be a chair, it could be a spider deck, it could be whatever, but it's the way the child is playing. That will then help us both to think about how they experience the world, or the child that's asking me to find things. But at the same time, at the other end of the [00:25:00] tray, they're feeding more and more things in.

So it's an impossible, they put me in an impossible situation that I'm not gonna be able to find things, or they'll ask me to hide things, but will then whisper. But I want to be able to see them. So don't make it too hard for me. 

Philippa: So think And what about when children, I wonder if you experience, I imagine you do children playing the adult role.

Does that become symbolism? What's that? What, What's that or, or is it just role play? Do you know what I mean? Is it just role play 

Julie: we could say this about anything that happens in a therapy session, what makes it therapy and what makes it just playing. And I think that's for another episode.

Just really think about that. I think my presence as the [00:26:00] adult alongside the child. My not getting too involved in the play, but remaining the therapist can be hugely important for the child. So I know you've asked about when the child plays the adult role. I see that happen often. So they might the classic playing school.

So children will often play the scenarios that are most familiar to them. Bedtime mealtimes things at home. Yeah. School. And it's usually between the teacher and a child or the class and then hospital doctors and shopping tho those are the, sort of common everyday experiences that many children have that they will bring into their clay.

Whether it's in a therapy room or in their living room at home. But they'll play those things [00:27:00] and often they'll take on the adult role. So quite often I am told to be the pupil and the, my client is the teacher. And oh my goodness, do they play those teachers with great gusto? A lot of it. I've experienced recently children who've really got me to feel what it's like, I think to be them or to be one of their friends or their peers in their class.

By being a quite overbearing, almost terrifying teacher, a really strict, demanding teacher who's making it impossible for me. To even dare put my hand up because I've got so nervous this teacher's gonna snap at me. So that will be a really common scenario that a child might play the adult with me [00:28:00] being the pupil.

And I wonder if that's partly for them to see what it feels like to be the teacher. Is this the beginning of empathy? Not well, empathy, putting myself in somebody else's shoes. But also to give me the experience of being them or somebody that they're close to. Now, the tricky thing I find as a therapist, and I know in talking to my students and other therapists is how do I play my part as the frightened pupil?

And. Keep being the therapist and have my sort of therapist hat on and do some tracking and some reflecting. How do I not get so involved in the role? 'cause I love a bit of role play and I can be right in there and I embody this character for them. How do I keep being the character and [00:29:00] keep being the therapist?

For me, one of the best ways and is to come out every now and again to come out of the role and I use my own voice, so I try to use a different voice when I'm in a character. So I have, I say I have a client who wants me to be a lion every week. Then I've got my lion voice and I've got my lion hands, and I've got my lion face.

So I'm very clear and my client is very clear when I am the line, but then when I want to come out of it and make a reflective statement or ask something, I sit as Julie, I use my own voice and I'll say, and I'll often do an aside. When you put your hand to the side of your face, and I'll say if you were my client, I'd say Philippa.

This line? Is the line [00:30:00] being too aggressive or do you want the line to be a bit more aggressive? And then you get the chance to say how you want me to play the line? And then I've got a client at the moment who'll say, pause. So we'll pause. PAU, se not. Pause. Pause. And then she'll say, you are being too scary and I want you to do this instead.

I'll say, okay, you've really told me you want me to be scary, but not too scary. Yes. 

And then she'll say, play, and then we'll go back into it. And I think there's something really safe again for both of us. Playing in reality what Winnekot talks about. We are playing and then we come out into reality and then we go back in.

And very occasionally I might, when I'm out of my role, I [00:31:00] might say something that. Reflect on some reality of that child's life that might link to that. I'm really careful about doing that. I very rarely I wouldn't come out and say, do you know what? I think that teacher's a bit like your teacher, and yet you are making me feel what it feels like to be you in class.

Yeah, I wouldn't do that. That absolutely would, scare the child. Break all the. That the relationship, but I might even, as we are putting our coats on at the end or coming out and doing something else, I'll say, you know what? I was thinking about that play. I was wondering that child might be a little bit like how it feels like for you sometimes in class, but I might, but, and then I will wave it when I go, but I might be wrong.

I just, So I think there is something you asked about witnessing. There's something about [00:32:00] witnessing from the outside. So I'm not in the play, the child's in the play, and I can witness and validate what's going on. Gosh, that lion is feeling so, so sleepy. There are no other lions for that lion to play with today.

I wonder if that lion's feeling really lonely sometimes. Even though she's very fierce and she quite likes being fierce, I'm thinking now I might be wrong, but I'm thinking that line might also feel quite sad at being so angry with all the other lines. And I won't ask a question. I won't say, what do you think Lion?

Or I won't say to the client, what do you think? Have I got that right? It's almost like I'm thinking out loud. Yeah. But I am showing the child that I've seen something of what they're offering that [00:33:00] maybe they haven't witnessed in themselves even yet. 

Philippa: And I wonder if sometimes, like with, my little people, I might, so when there's something I might say, oh my goodness, sometimes it's really hard for the puppy to be stroked or it's really.

Tricky for the cat to have this nice food or do you know what, and just leave it as a statement? Yeah, like nothing else, just I'm just think it might be sometimes it's like really tricky or Yeah. Or really hard. Or sometimes like you say that I wonder if it probably really feels really sad and sometimes he just wants to curl up, but maybe he can't and just like move and then say, okay.

And almost that. It's almost that validation that those feelings can occur and they're, and you're okay and safe within them, aren't you? And that actually, I wonder for some children. If [00:34:00] that gives a name to their experience that they, yeah. Sometimes haven't really been able to name.

They just know that this doesn't feel okay or it feels hard or it feels odd or it feels, but there's not really a 'cause. It's always been like that. They don't maybe want it to always be like that, but that's what they feel at that moment. And sometimes just giving that. That statement or that name. Not saying this is what you are feeling, but I wonder if sometimes it's so tricky.

And then just moving on, that allows that them to slowly start to think, actually that might be what I feel. And that somebody's noticed that somebody's noticed me. And that can be really for some children the noticing is really hard, isn't it? 

Julie: Yeah, for that, for them. And I think it's really crucial what you said that you've often used the word, sometimes it's [00:35:00] not all of you and it's not all the time, but sometimes you feel like really, hurting other people.

Sometimes this lion wants to bite and destroy and scratch and kill and its feelings get so angry. That it wants to just get rid of all the other animals in the prairie in the field. And as you say, sometimes that's the very first time the child has even recognized within themselves that's what's going on, that they can begin to separate out feelings that I'm not always all angry.

There are sometimes when I feel destructive and angry. There are some times where I feel small and vulnerable. There are some times when I feel sad and lonely. [00:36:00] And it begins to un mesh some of those complex feelings that, up to that point may have been just all held as I, I'm this total ball of mess.

That's when I often see the child who can't stop moving because it's almost like they're trying to get rid of or sort out this yucky sense of mixed up stuff within them. 

Philippa: So that brings me to another thought really is that sometimes with. Children when we are talking about feelings it's really hard.

They might be able to name the feelings. Yes, I feel angry today because, but actually, what does anger mean? And where does it come from? And to feel it 

Julie: first. They need to have the experience of it first. 

Philippa: Yeah. And, it's all just in it. Sometimes I'll talk about anger as sadness, his bodyguard and and all these sort of [00:37:00] things.

But sometimes I'll say, shall we create it? Shall we draw it? Shall we make it, shall we, what would anger if you, if your anger, what would your anger look like? So it's, I guess it's that winning caught that third thing or. There's a kind of the narrative family therapy. Michael White often talks about the, that taking it as a, an external thing, so taking it out of the child.

So externalization really is what we're doing, aren't we? So we're taking anger away from the child and starting to think about anger as. What would it look like? What would it do? What's, helpful for anger? What's, so is sadness helpful for anger? Is frustration helpful for anger? What makes anger smaller or disappear?

Happiness, joy, so you taken it away from the child. And would that be symbolization? 'cause you are, be them creating anger as something [00:38:00] else or not? 

Julie: Yeah, I was thinking that would, be a very different way to, the way I would work. I think I would always start with the symbolism that the child brings.

So I would stay, say we've got onto this lion thing, so let's say this child is. Being a lion, and this lion is sometimes very, angry and aggressive and destructive, but is also quite lonely and sad and feels quite vulnerable. So let's say that's the story, the symbolic story that the child has brought to the room.

I think I would stay within that metaphor. I would stay with that as if. For the child and maybe introduce some of what you've just spoken about or what does this anger need? What does this lion need? What would help this lion to not feel so lonely? [00:39:00] I would keep within that because I think that's at a much more bodily emotional level.

I suppose 

Philippa: what I'm wondering is, if. If you are not doing play therapy, do you know what I mean? If you are a a teenager and you're coming and you are wanting to, think about these emotions and externalizing them and creating something else with them, would that still be symbolic?

Or would that not be? 

Julie: I think, yeah. That what you are talking about then is, Starting with the cognitive and then creating a symbol outta it. Yeah. Yeah. Because 

Philippa: often kids can name, can't they? Yeah. I've got anger, you know how many kids I see and say, got anger management problems and they haven't, they've got big feelings that are unresolved and, big people that haven't always scaffolded them.

There's lots of reasons for it, but they come with this story of, yeah. Anger management school have said that I've got anger management. They've so they've come along [00:40:00] to deal with, anger or to deal with anxiety. Yeah. It, and, but it's cognitive that, they know that. Yeah. They, so we are trying, yeah.

It's trying to help them connect to, okay. What? What is that like for you? Not for school. Not for mom? Yes. Not for your siblings. What is that? Yeah, like for you? What makes it easier? What makes it harder? And sometimes taking it out of them. It's almost going back to that child. We've talked, we've done some episodes haven't it about, I think when we were talking about rupture and repair, about separating The The toddler from their behavior in that you are okay. The behavior's not, and in some ways I think when you are talking about big feelings, sometimes for me it's helpful to separate. It's not that they are angry, it's that they experience anger. [00:41:00] And those are, that it's a different thing and almost taking anger out and creating and looking 

Julie: at 

Philippa: it.

Yeah. 

Julie: Yeah. And I'm reminded of a client who exactly had come. He was about a, probably about an eight or 9-year-old boy. I've got anger management. Problems. Yeah, that's what I've been told. I've been sent to you. You need to teach me how to deal with my anger. I want some. And he was saying, I want some strategies.

Philippa: Yeah. Yeah. 

Julie: I said whoa, Let's get to know your anger first. Yeah. Yeah. But what do I have to do about it? I said, but I don't know what anger looks like for you. Feels and then he created just on his own. I, hadn't prompted him to do this islands. It was on big sheets of paper and he had a sadness island and an anger island and.

A content happy, [00:42:00] joyful island. And then he placed objects on that island and then it was like suddenly the two of us could look symbolically 

Philippa: Yeah. At 

Julie: what all of those feelings are for him. He can't we, he can't get me to be inside his body and inside his head and feel it as it feels for him. We don't yet have a mechanism to do that.

To really get inside somebody else's body and feel what anger or what we are naming as anger actually feels like, 

Philippa: yeah, 

Julie: we can ask a child or a child might show us where in their body they, something's happening. My fingers wanna do this. We can see it. The child is doing this when they're angry or their feet are kicking, their extremities, start going.

But this young lad, he was able to. Begin to put out in symbolic form what those feelings [00:43:00] meant to him. And then we could begin to look at them and he could tell me about them. He for him it was in islands and what sort of greenery was on the islands and what sort of rocks were on the island and so on.

And then actually, he didn't need me to teach him any strategies. Because he had got to know and befriend his islands. He'd got to befriend his own anger, so then he wasn't so scared of it. Yeah. And I think then he noticed it coming up and then he almost said hello to it and thought, all right, okay, we don't, but we don't.

He was talking to his own anger. And that was his strategy. Yeah. He didn't need to have a cognitive strategy. 

Philippa: Yeah, and I suppose one of the things for me is when we are thinking about feelings and symbolizing them in that, is [00:44:00] like we talk about them as positive and negative feelings, don't we?

And I that it's really I think when you can get them out, you can begin to think with a child around, actually these all have a purpose. They your, anger is really helpful to you. It lets you know when something's not right. It helps to protect you when you are feeling really overwhelmed.

It helps to keep you safe in lots of different ways. We just need to be able to help it to know when, it needs to come out and be your bodyguard or when it needs to come out. Do you know what I mean? Or, however you phrase it. Because I think we talk about anger management. Managing anxiety, and of course when they're at the extremes, we do need to think about how do we support children and young people to have strategies because it's impacting negatively on their lives.

But I think that's what we're [00:45:00] talking about is the impact is. Having, being negative on their lives, that they are being kicked outta class because they're punching somebody or they're throwing the tables or they can't enter school. Those are negative, but the feelings themselves aren't negative, are they?

Those are just what we have, and it's about. Being able to acknowledge them, understand them, know when they're coming up, thinking about, and we can do a whole episode on this. But I suppose I wonder if symbolism in some ways helps us to take them out of ourselves and look at them a little bit more objectively.

Yeah. And think about, okay, yeah. So when this island is flooded with, sadness or whatever it is, or all these demands then, it rises up in the volcano. I don't know if that's what you did, but do you know what I mean? Yeah. It can help you objectively begin to understand what is going on for you.[00:46:00] 

Yes. 

Julie: And I think that's the most important thing, for you because my anger and your anger are different. The things that bug you and irritate you. Thankfully not the things that bug and irritate me. Yeah. Hence we managed to get a newsletter out because you write it and then I ti it up because that bit bugs you and the other bit bugs me.

Knowing what's, what are the things that bring me joy and what are the things that bring you annoyance? And they can be quite different, but we need to put it out there to have something. An example. Yeah. I think when adults are working in therapy, if, especially if it's a talking therapy rather than a creative arts or bodily movement therapy, there's still a lot of symbolism in that sort of free association.

I thought about this and then that made me think of that. And if [00:47:00] there is still, I think that free association, that playful. Symbolic work, even in adult talking therapies. 

Philippa: I just have one more question. I'm just aware that we've probably only got about five minutes left, so I just have one more, one more thought that came to me when we were talking about this.

Sometimes, children may be who, or going somewhere or maybe going to school and they're a bit anxious about it or something like that. And we give them something, a trend. We would call it a transitional object, wouldn't we? So there was a, little girl that, that I worked with, and she used to have she really struggled to leave a carer.

And so she had this little heart and we put some glitter in it. So when it was in her pocket and when she got anxious, she could squeeze it and then the glitter would be on her hand. And that was. [00:48:00] The love of the foster carer. Do you know what I mean? So it would remind her that actually my foster care is still thinking about me.

I'm still there, I'm still all those sorts of things. And I, guess those are symbolic things, aren't they? Where we have these transitional objects that help us move from one thing to another or I know some things might be concrete, but we kind have symbolic things that help us. Just, yeah.

Move around and, hold people close to us in a way. 

Julie: Yeah. And I think there is that sort of stage of needing that to be an actual object a, handkerchief or a sock that's got mom's perfume on it that I can sniff at school during the day. It could be an actual object like your glitter heart as a.

As a step [00:49:00] towards being able to internalize the other emotionally and bring them to mind without needing to have the object. I can remember my mum without having to have an object or a photograph of her. I have internalized her. But then do 

Philippa: we move I suppose I'm just thinking about when people pass and then you get their ashes made into jewelry or things like that.

Is that not a symbolic thing as well? 

Julie: It is a symbolic, but it's also an actual thing. Yeah. Because it's the ashes of the person I, that, that makes me shiver. So I, I can call my mom up without having to have her ashes on a, in a ring, but I know for other people that's different. They want the physical thing.[00:50:00] 

But I think our lives are so rich with symbols. Through objects that remind us of something that isn't that object. I might have a necklace belonging to a relative that will remind me of them, but it isn't them. 

Philippa: Yeah. 

Julie: So I think as adults. Symbolism is a huge part of our lives.

Even just seeing a big letter m that represents a fast food chain that symbolism, you show that to many people, adults and children across the world, they'll know what that indicates. But I think I know we we're coming towards an end now, but perhaps another episode is thinking about.

Children who've experienced trauma, and you and I work [00:51:00] primarily with children who've experienced that developmental trauma, that long term, chronic trauma of neglect, abuse, multiple carers and so on, which sometimes we think of that as the yeah, the chronic trauma. Not to make it any bigger or smaller than a trauma, that might be things were going along nicely.

And then a big bad thing happened, trauma. But the children who will play out their experiences often their early years experiences, nonverbal experiences, pre-birth, pre-verbal experiences in a symbolic way. So they, they role play, they do it in the sand tray, they do it through a story, but the children are, something I'd really like to talk about [00:52:00] on another episode is the children who get stuck in a story, they are reenacting the trauma and how as a therapist or as an adult, the carer with that child.

I can be alert to that. When is the play moving on? And potentially helping them relieve some of the feelings around that chronic trauma and when is the reenacting of it actually making things worse? They're stuck. So I think for another episode I'd really like to talk about the how we've. We discern that difference.

So that trauma loop really where you're going round and round in the same trauma. And that can be re I think with siblings that can, particularly, that trauma loop can particularly be their content is that they, are stuck in that pattern of interacting. They have become. [00:53:00] The the thing that's the most consistent in one another's lives, but they're also the thing that constantly reminds of those early life experiences.

Philippa: So there's that trauma loop of, I need you close. But I can't stand you near me. And that is so tricky, isn't it? Yeah. When along with Yeah. Being I think Besa Vander call talks a lot about it being just really stuck in your body and in your nervous system and, how, we support children, families to Yeah.

Shift, yeah. Move on from that. Create a different, so not, to invalidate that, story, but to add to it and find different scenarios, different endings, different pathways. Because often a child is only on one pathway. And any attempt by me as the therapist [00:54:00] to say, I wonder what would happen if they went, Nope.

Julie: They can only go one way. Yeah, And I can see how, oh, it's heartbreaking. They are really stuck in constantly telling that one story and there isn't another view. There isn't another way out. So I think, yeah, doing an episode about particularly symbolic play and trauma, because I think there's the safety of the symbolism for trauma work.

But also the nuance of knowing when to stay with and when to invite in other directions. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's a real skill as a therapist to be able to know what's there. Yeah. 

Philippa: Yeah. Yeah. I'll just give you one little last about it's a, bit of trauma. Symbolism. So I worked with [00:55:00] a child for a long time in sand and they used to, at the end of every, session, put sum animals into this container with a lid on, and they would give it to me to take away.

The animals were babies. This in this little tiny tub. And they would take, it away for months and months, and they would play out particularly the same, scene variations, but the same scenes. So it was a bit of a over and over again until one day with tears this young person put.

The babies in the, tub and then put an adult in and said, they'll [00:56:00] now be safe. And he gave me the, tub. And actually we only did a few more sessions and, it ended. But that was the, adult wasn't human but, he, but that was their words, is that they will now be safe and and that was.

Yeah, I guess that was trauma. It was symbolism. It was, the shifting towards the end. And it was quite a lovely moment really, that you just sometimes have to stick with, don't you? Because it can sometimes it can have you wonder what on earth is going on here. 

Julie: That's it. The trust of just week after week after week of a same or similar story and just noticing those tiny nuance differences.

And then every now and again, there might be a massive difference. 

Philippa: Yeah. 

Julie: Yeah. And I don't try and interpret what that means. I can have my [00:57:00] own thoughts about what that might mean for the child, but ultimately. It's for the child to over time make their own sense of that. 

Philippa: Yeah. 

Julie: And it might not come with words or cognition.

It'll be a sense. No, and I think 

Philippa: it's just an honor to be part of that process, isn't it? It is just such a privilege to be able to witness someone's journey and have that trust that they, will come back and play that each week, or Yeah. Connect with you each week even when it's been a hard week.

And that in itself, and 

Julie: they'll take it where they need it to go. Yeah. I, can guide, I can invite, I can notice, but ultimately, the child takes that where they need it to go and, that's powerful to, to trust a five-year-old to take their own healing under him. I, just find that amazing. But it does happen.

Philippa: So that is a great place to end. So [00:58:00] thank you for listening to this episode of Pondering Play and Therapy. If you have enjoyed it, please subscribe to our channel. If you're watching on YouTube, click leave us a comment. We really appreciate it all and it helps other people know that we are around.

So thank you very much and goodbye. 

Julie: Bye-bye.