Trauma Treatment Course

Live Virtually: October 9th at 9 AM MTN - Denver

Available for on-demand learning after the live date

Trauma and addiction are powerfully linked—and understanding this connection is essential for effective treatment.

Addiction often masks deep, unresolved trauma—yet many treatment approaches miss this critical connection. This trauma-informed addictions training empowers therapists to address substance use and compulsive behaviors through a whole-person, neuro-informed lens. You’ll gain practical strategies to help clients build safety, stabilize recovery, and break survival loops rooted in trauma.

Walk away with a clear roadmap for integrating trauma-focused care, harm reduction, and evidence-based modalities into your clinical work—so you can confidently support clients on their path to lasting healing.

This advanced CE course is for therapists, counselors, and mental health professionals ready to deepen their trauma-informed work with addiction.

What You’ll Learn in This Trauma-Informed Addiction Training

This advanced continuing education course provides mental health professionals with a comprehensive, trauma-informed understanding of addiction and its deep roots in unresolved trauma. Participants will examine how adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), complex trauma, and attachment wounds shape the brain and nervous system in ways that make individuals more vulnerable to substance use and compulsive behaviors. The training explains how addiction can function as a dissociative coping mechanism, helping clients manage unbearable emotions or memories when they lack safer alternatives.

Through a clear, research-based framework, the course explores the neurobiology of addiction, covering how trauma affects key brain structures such as the hippocampus, amygdala, and prefrontal cortex — and how this wiring drives craving, seeking, and numbing behaviors. Clinicians will learn how to recognize maladaptive positive feeling states that reinforce addictive patterns, use history taking to uncover hidden trauma, and assess for risk factors that may complicate recovery.

The course also provides practical, trauma-informed strategies for harm reduction, stabilization, and treatment planning. Participants will learn how to build safety and trust in the therapeutic relationship, understand unique considerations during early recovery when biological and chemical deficiencies are common, and develop interventions that keep clients within their window of tolerance. By the end of this training, therapists will feel more confident addressing addiction as part of a whole-person, trauma-informed approach — helping clients break free from survival loops and develop healthier, adaptive coping skills for long-term healing.

About Your Trainer, Sarah Osborne, LPC, LADC, NCC

Sarah Osborne, LPC, LADC, NCC, is a compassionate and dedicated Licensed Professional Counselor, Licensed Alcohol and Drug Counselor, and Nationally Certified Counselor. She is also a Certified EMDR Therapist, EMDRIA Approved Consultant & Advanced Credit Provider, and an HAP Accredited Facilitator.

Sarah specializes in the treatment of addiction, complex trauma, and dissociation. With experience in both community mental health settings and private addiction treatment centers, she is passionate about integrating EMDR therapy into addiction care at all levels. Sarah has been practicing EMDR therapy for over 10 years and is deeply committed to the intersection of trauma and addiction treatment.  

In her private EMDR practice, Sarah provides a safe, supportive space for individuals from all walks of life to heal and grow. She offers both individual and group consultation to EMDR clinicians and consultants-in-training, fostering development and connection within the professional community. Sarah also sponsors a local EMDR professional group to support ongoing learning and collaboration.

Dedicated to service, Sarah works closely with a local trauma response team, offering presentations and debriefings to support first responders in her community. Additionally, she is the co-owner of a perinatal group practice that focuses on helping families navigate the transitions of parenthood.

Through all aspects of her work, Sarah brings warmth, knowledge, and a steadfast commitment to helping others heal.