Treatments
and therapies
Two
broad forms of treatment were used at Craiglockhart: the psychoanalytic methods
of Rivers, William Brown (the second Camp Commandant) and Major Ruggles (an
American who was stationed there for a short time). Brock
and Bryce favoured the personalised, suggestive, cognitive
therapy which kept patients active and treated their behaviour rather than their
psyche.
Rivers,
Brown, and Ruggles felt that shell shock was a result of repression of emotions
and their therapies were designed to remove the repression and get the patients
to release their emotions and channel their experiences into a positive light.
Craiglockhart's pleasant surroundings and its proximity
to Edinburgh were important in getting the patients to re-associate themselves
with a 'normal' environment in order to lessen the personal traumas of the patients.
Sassoon's protests against the War were
themselves regarded as symptoms of an abnormal reaction and diagnosed as indicative
of a nervous breakdown.
Click
on underlined text for more information - click on photograph for a larger image
