Burundi doctor shares trauma counseling success
Dr. David Niyonzima is traveling around the region speaking with counselors and the public about how Burundi, a small country in eastern Africa, is overcoming its shared trauma from war and genocide through mental health services.
Niyonzima, President of Trauma Healing and Reconciliation Services will be speaking at McMinnville Cooperative Ministries Church at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 24.
THARS is the premier mental health organization in Burundi with counselors trained in psychological first aid and other trauma treatment methods, such as Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). With the motto “Healing from the heart of Africa” their mission is to heal trauma through mental health services and capacity building, empowering the community to achieve resilience mentally, culturally and economically.
Niyonzima spoke at Counselors Connect, a monthly networking event for local counselors, on Thursday, Oct. 17.
Burundi is nestled east of Congo and west of Tanzania. Its more well-known neighbor, Rwanda, has faced many of the same political challenges. In the early 1990s, both nations experienced the interethnic violence, primarily between Hutu and Tutsi peoples.
Burundi is one of the poorest country in the world, but rich in mental health, Niyonzima said.
The former French colony has been riddled with trauma, from genocide in the 1970s, to two president assassinations in the 1990s, to a civil war from 1993 to 2005. During the genocide, Niyonzima lost his brother, who was a student at the time.
In 1993, Niyonzima was working at a school when soldiers attacked students and staff.
“Somehow no bullet made it my way,” he said. Niyonzima survived by fleeing and hiding in a garage pit for a day. He then ran three kilometers home to his family.
A few years later, he was informed he was on a hit list and so he fled to Kenya as a refugee.
Once in Kenya, he attended a mental health conference and learned good mental health is necessary in order to relate to one another and interact in everyday life. As a refugee, he had time to reflect and had a nagging question from the grief and trauma he had endured.
“Why did I not die with the students ... and where has God gone? Why did he allow this to happen,” he said. “All these things came to my mind as I come from a Quaker background.”
He then felt called to devote his life to the healing initiative of Burundi.
“It may take a generation, it may take longer than I wish, but at least I will be realizing that is why I am alive,” he said.
He recognized that the unresolved psychological and psychosocial wounds from earlier violence were fundamental causes of ongoing conflict, perpetuating a cycle of violence
He ended up at George Fox University for a doctorate in Leadership and Global Perspectives. When he was there he was classmates with Sandra R. Lucas, now the executive director of Life Counseling in McMinnville.
They were in a cultural class together and their friendship started on one of the most traumatic days for Americans in a generation: Sept. 11, 2001.
They bonded over the cultural trauma of the 9/11 attacks. In recognizing the bitter taste of revenge, a friendship was formed.
At Counselors Connect on Thursday Lucas shared their different perspectives of counseling.
When Lucas first visited Niyonzima in Burundi, he offered to take her to the place the president had been assassinated. She thought it bizarre to go where so much trauma had been inflicted, because in her line of work as a counselor people come to her office to talk.
“He told me, ‘Don’t you know that place has power over people?” she said. This idea had never occurred to her, but Niyonzima will regularly take patients to the place they were raped or where family members were killed during the genocide and civil war for trauma therapy.
Lucas said it is instinctual to avoid places where trauma occurred; however, Niyonzima and THARS operate differently.
Rather than a one-on-one based session, they focus on connecting people in the community to share their stories as a way to talk through their trauma in part due to a lack of resources and because everyone in Burundi has been touched by the cultural trauma. These sessions are called listening centers, which are a public space in all communities where people gather to talk through their trauma and share their stories. Being heard and sharing their own personal suffering is cathartic.
An all-too-common story during times of crisis is murder and rape. Niyonzima said at the listening centers it is common for women to share the details of their rape and to have people actively listen and believe them. Many times having someone there who believes your story is the first step in the right direction for trauma therapy.
Niyonzima has worked the Burundian government, including public health, to train mental health workers.
Their techniques may seem strange to a western mindset, such as using drumming to implement EMDR therapy. EMDR is when a patients recalls a traumatic memory while simultaneously focusing on a rhythmic back-and-forth eye movement or sound, with the goal to reprogram the memory with a more positive belief.
Drumming is part of Burundi heritage, and Niyonzima found playing drums can be used as EMDR therapy.
It is healing for young people as it connects their right and left side of their brains to focus on one activity, he said. The energetic activity causes the audience to dance and clap as an outward expression of happiness, and the drummers see that their actions can invoke happiness.
“The whole country is traumatized and you need a lot of human resources to be able to address the situation,” he said, adding that mental health was not a concept in Burundi in the 1990s, nor was there a word for trauma.
One way he and THARS found to teach communities about trauma was through acting. When they would come to provide resources to a new village they would organize interactive dramas in public squares to simulate traumatic events.
He said there was no real violence implemented, but it was a way for the audience to identify their own experiences. At the end of the play the players announce there is a listening center opening, where community members can come and share and reflect on their trauma.
The actors are also involved in the listening centers as psychosocial assistants and are trained in active listening. They are locals working the front lines of counseling for their communities.
For more information on Niyonzima and his appearance on Oct. 24, visit lifecounselingandtherapy.org.
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