The Trauma Therapist

Ruth Wilkey is the author of Sociable Bunny, a children’s book and character-based brand that focuses on helping children develop emotional health, friendship skills, kindness, trust, and positive character traits through stories, activities, songs, and animated-style bunny characters.

Ruth says the idea emerged during a healing journey after depression and unresolved childhood trauma, while attending a writing school in Hawaii. She describes The Sociable Bunny as an expression of bringing “light and love to the hearts of children.”

Links
Sociable Bunny Website
Ruth Wilkey LinkedIn
Sociable Bunny Instagram

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Maayan Aviv is a nonprofit executive and the CEO of American Friends of NATAL (AFN), the U.S. partner of NATAL: The Israel Trauma and Resiliency Center. Established in 1998, NATAL is an apolitical, internationally recognized organization specializing in war- and terror-related trauma, having served over 450,000 individuals. Under Aviv’s leadership, AFN has mobilized critical funding and strategic partnerships to address the unprecedented mental health crisis stemming from recent conflicts, with a specific focus on scaling up crisis operations, workplace reintegration, and helping the surged demographic of traumatized young adults and first responders.

NATALAFN on IGLiving Alongside Trauma (Post-Traumatic Growth): Aviv champions a shift from merely "fixing" PTSD to fostering post-traumatic growth (PTG). She emphasizes that successful therapy empowers individuals to rebuild meaningful lives and safely coexist with their history, rather than waiting for its complete erasure.
Non-Traditional Innovation (Healing Ink): Highlighting the need for multi-sensory healing, Aviv advocates for innovative, somatic therapies. A prime example is NATAL’s support of initiatives like "Healing Ink," where terror survivors use tattooing as a cathartic, physical vehicle to externalize internal pain and reclaim ownership over their bodies.https://www.afnatal.org/post/healing-ink-x-afn-february-26-2026

Cross-Border Innovation (The TURN Model): Demonstrating the universal language of trauma, NATAL’s clinical architecture serves as the blueprint for Chicago’s South Side via The TURN Model (Bright Star Community Outreach).  https://www.brightstarcommunityoutreach.com/turn-model

Peer Support & "Helping the Helpers": To combat strained clinical infrastructure, Aviv champions NATAL's Peer Support networks, which train trauma survivors to deliver immediate emotional first aid.  https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/healing-power-of-peers-how-israelis-are-supporting-each-other-through-trauma/

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Alanna Bell has spent over two decades as a trauma-informed therapist, school counselor, and healing arts practitioner. But her most powerful credentials weren’t earned in classrooms—they were shaped in the quiet, painful spaces of her own recovery.Like so many helpers, Alanna was trained to listen, hold, and guide others toward healing. What she wasn’t trained for was how to fall apart.

Years into her career, she found herself facing the very thing she’d helped others navigate: addiction, shame, and the unraveling of a carefully held-together life.What followed was not a clean or linear redemption story—but a raw, deeply human journey back to wholeness. Through treatment, truth-telling, and long-term recovery, Alanna discovered what she now shares with others: healing is possible, but it doesn’t come through perfection. It comes through honesty, community, and grace.Today, she blends clinical insight, lived experience, and spiritual depth to support others—especially those in helping professions—who find themselves on roads they never meant to take.

The Road I Never Meant to Take is her first book, and the beginning of many overdue conversations.The Road I Never Meant to Take, unfolds through a series of deeply personal letters written by a character known only as L—a therapist in recovery whose voice carries the lived experiences of Alanna and countless others she has worked with along the way. Through L, readers are invited into the quiet truths that often go unspoken in the lives of helpers and healers. The result is a memoir that is both intimately personal and universally relatable.

Links
Allana Writes
www.AlannaBellWrites.com 
www.SoulWiseInstitute.com
alannajbell@gmailcom

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Shigeko Ito is a Japanese-born educator and mental health advocate with a PhD in Education from Stanford University. She is the author of The Pond Beyond the Forest, a memoir exploring childhood emotional neglect, intergenerational trauma, and the long path toward healing. Drawing on lived experience and cross-cultural insight, she offers a deeply honest and moving story of resilience, punctuated by moments of levity and hope.

In This Episode
Shigeko’s website
Shigeko Ito on Instagram
The Pond Beyond the Forest

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Romain Daumont is an entrepreneur and founder of Luminara, a digital platform designed to make energy healing and biofield therapies more accessible worldwide. He created Luminara to bridge ancient healing practices with modern technology, curating vetted practitioners and delivering one-to-one sessions through a remote, immersive experience. His work is driven by a personal journey of loss, which led him to focus on creating spaces for healing, connection, and transformation at scale.

LinksLuminara website: https://www.luminara.care/
About Luminara: https://www.luminara.care/about-us/
Luminara (company profile): https://www.linkedin.com/company/luminara-care/

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-trauma-therapist--5739761/support.

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Thank you to our Sponsors: 

Jane App - use code GUY1MO at https://janesoftware.partnerlinks.io/ngvcwcxqt2jx-4afv8i (https://jane.app/book_a_demo)

Beducated - Complete the quiz for one month free https://beduc.at/pd2633-traumatherapist