Eating Disorders and Expressive Arts is a 6-hour continuing education workshop designed for licensed mental health professionals and graduate students interested in expanding their clinical expertise working with eating disorders through expressive arts. This live experiential training blends instruction, hands-on practice, case examples, and group reflection to provide a trauma-informed, evidence-aligned framework for using the arts in eating disorder treatment.

Throughout the workshop, participants will explore how visual art, movement, writing, and symbolic expression can support emotional regulation, body reconnection, and parts-based work with clients experiencing anorexia, bulimia, binge eating disorder, and body image issues. The training emphasizes ethical practice, safety, and cultural humility while integrating expressive arts into established treatment models.

Experiential activities are central to this workshop, helping clinicians experience the tools they will later adapt for clients. Participants will learn to assess readiness for expressive work, structure safe and choice-based interventions, use creative arts for externalization and embodiment, and apply expressive methods for narrative integration and self-compassion.

For those pursuing REAT, this course includes 1 hour of individual, 2 hours of application and 3 hours of approach specific training.

By the end of the training, participants will be able to:

• Identify key considerations in eating disorder treatment and explain the clinical value of expressive arts in accessing nonverbal emotional material. (individual)

• Implement expressive arts interventions within appropriate scope of practice while recognizing eating disorder risks, contraindications, and clinical protocols. (application)

• Select and sequence visual arts materials along an activation continuum and titrate interventions using a trauma-informed approach. (approaches)

• Apply mindfulness-based interventions that support regulation, interoceptive awareness and gentle embodiment practices. (approaches)

• Utilize writing-based interventions to support insight, narrative integration and externalization. (approaches)

• Identify ways to integrate expressive arts interventions into treatment planning and existing clinical practice. (application)

Format: Live experiential training combining instruction, guided activities, and case study discussion offering 6 CEU hours. All art supplies are included in the cost of $235. There will be a 1 hour lunch break and lunch is on your own.

Training Location: My-T-By-Design Therapeutic Art Studio, 392 E. Sunbridge Dr, Fayetteville, Arkansas

Important Note: This course is for educational purposes only. It does not substitute for licensure, supervision, or specialized eating disorder training. Participants are responsible for practicing within their professional scope.