DvT Expanded My Play Space

People ask me all the time why Developmental Transformations (DvT) sits at the center of SoulGround.

The easy answer is because I'm a drama therapist.

The real answer is much more personal.

I first encountered DvT at the North American Drama Therapy Association conference in 2017.

I had been out of my first extended traumatic hospitalization for less than a week. I still had a fresh PICC line. I was walking with a cane. Most people would have told me to stay home.

I refused.

I worked my ass off to get there.

What I expected was another conference full of lectures, theories, and interventions.

Instead...

We played.

Theater games.

Movement.

Improvisation.

Warm-ups that honestly felt familiar. I remember thinking, "I already know improv. I've done theater."

I had no idea what was about to happen.

At first, DvT looked simple.

Almost too simple.

But over the next few days, I started noticing something I had never had words for before.

Trauma doesn't just leave us with painful memories.

It quietly shrinks our world.

Imagine opening a drop-down menu on your computer.

Most people see dozens of options.

Trauma slowly makes those options disappear.

Not because they no longer exist.

Because your nervous system stops offering them.

You don't think,

"I don't deserve connection."

You think,

"Connection isn't really an option."

You don't think,

"I should ask for help."

You think,

"That's not something people like me get to do."

You don't realize your menu has become smaller.

You simply believe you're seeing all that's available.

DvT began expanding my menu.

Not by convincing me to think differently.

Not by arguing with my beliefs.

By giving me new experiences.

Someone would make an offer.

Instead of one response...

there were two.

Then five.

Then ten.

I realized healing wasn't about finding the right answer.

It was about discovering I had more than one.

That realization changed everything.

Over time, I began noticing another phrase that kept coming to me.

DvT expanded my play space.

Not just my ability to play games.

My ability to experiment.

To be surprised.

To recover after mistakes.

To imagine possibilities I couldn't see before.

To stay in relationship when things became uncertain.

To discover parts of myself that had been organized around survival instead of curiosity.

Trauma had taught me that there was one safe response IF ANY.

DvT reminded me there were many.

One of the most painful things trauma taught me was how to become incredibly polite.

How to smile.

How to accommodate.

How to disappear.

Recently I wrote something in my notebook that surprised even me:

Trauma taught me to politely lie.

Not because I wanted to deceive anyone.

Because somewhere along the way it became safer to say,

"I'm fine."

"It doesn't matter."

"I don't need anything."

Than it was to tell the truth.

DvT didn't challenge those beliefs with logic.

It gently offered another possibility.

Another response.

Another experience.

Another way of being with other people.

That's why DvT sits at the center of SoulGround.

Not because I think everyone should become a drama therapist.

Not because movement is the answer to everything.

Because I believe healing happens when our worlds become bigger than trauma allowed them to be.

When our nervous systems begin offering more than one response.

When curiosity returns.

When play becomes possible again.

When we discover that our future isn't limited to the handful of options trauma left visible.

That's the SoulGround I wanted to build.

A place where people don't just gain insight.

They recover possibilities.

Because healing isn't about becoming someone new.

It's about recovering the parts of yourself trauma convinced you never had.

And maybe that's what play has been doing all along.

Expanding our world, one possibility at a time.