The useless therapist: music therapy and dramatherapy with traumatised children

– The purpose of this paper is to discuss the use of music therapy and dramatherapy with traumatised children in a residential school through examining the therapists’ experience of feeling useless.

– Using clinical examples, the paper explores the therapists’ feelings of uselessness and how this experience informs and enables the progression of the work.

– The paper suggests that feelings of uselessness are a necessary and useful part of the clinical process when working with traumatised children.

– This paper offers an insight into application of music therapy and dramatherapy in this environment, and also into the therapists experience of working with highly traumatised children.