Re:needs meeting/RDI

Hi, thanks for your response.

That's a neat question. I do indeed think RDI is needs meeting. I also, for that matter, think that rapport between clinican and client is "needs meeting".

Let me go backward:

In the strict DNMS model, a client "detour" would be interpreted as an "interfering ego state". Slightly perjorative, but there you have it. The clinician would then assess whether the "interfering ego state" could be "tucked in" so that work could continue, or if that ego state itself needed to have "needs met". Neither of those options is quite equivalent to what you describe (at least how I read it), which sounds more like an intuitive attunement to and "following" of the client's experience.

My experience with the strict DNMS model was that there was ALWAYS an interfering ego state. Especially as soon as the word "needs" was mentioned, internal chaos ensued. Any mention of "connecting to resources"... and chaos ensured. Parts did not want to connect to other parts (even or especially resources) they did not want to connect to others. They did not want to admit to having needs. The DNMS model was, in itself, a "trigger". It was a bull in a china shop.

In my standard protocol EMDR therapy I work on desensitizing specific experience, beliefs or feelings. That naturally leads to integration and communication and "connection" which feels good, not coerced or intrusive or premature.

So... all that said, I think RDI is needs meeting, but that the differences outweigh the similarities. Let me go off on another tangent. RDI provides a foundation for work. It is not "the work" of the therapy. My experience with DNMS was that attempting to feel good (eg "connecting to resources") became the "work" of therapy.

Well, I have a lot of stuff inside that doesn't feel good. Trying to "feel good" via resources actually only succeeded in eliciting "parts" that were capable of feeling "good". Then I'd get home, revert to a more "normal" part of self, and go into a tailspin of depression and internal dissonance. The DNMS protocol actually served to pit against each other "parts" that could and could not "feel good" or "connect to resources". In other words, it was further fragmenting.

April Steele, in her imaginal nurturing sequence, provides an example of some needs meeting which is internal, effective and not fragmenting. Rather than "all" parts needing to be ready and willing to allow processing (as in DNMS) Steele's protocol only "needs" an injured and a competent part. It doesn't need the whole "system" to be "on board" for it to work. (I actually used Steele's ideas on my own, found them to be very effective -- google her name and imaginal nurturing, if anyone is interested in and not already aware of her work.)In addition, Steele's protocol uses prefab :) parts of self... you don't have to "create" new "resources" to utilize her ideas.

Some of my other favorite RDI ideas are Joanne Twombly's. Her ideas are almost playful, very gentle and effective. She has various published articles, in ISSD journals, etc. Yet another example of "needs meeting" that does not purport to be it's "own" protocol but which can be incorporated by the individual client/clinician.

So... my point is... other than I love this subject and enjoy writing about it... is that I agree with you, many techniques are needs meeting. In fact, many things are "needs meeting" which are not labeled as such. And DNMS, which purports to be "needs meeting", may not be so, esp for highly dissociative clients.

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