Somatic Therapies

RELEASE TRAUMA & RESTORE BALANCE

You feel overwhelmed. 

One moment you are overstimulated and feel frantic, another you shut down and everything is hard.  

Maybe stress shows up in your body with muscle tension, fatigue, or inability to relax.  Perhaps it shows up in your mind as mood swings, irritability, worries, intrusive thoughts, or memory and attention problems.

What are Somatic Therapies? 

Somatic Therapies recognizes that traumatic experiences leave physiological imprints in our bodies and nervous systems.  Soma refers to the body.  Emotion shows up differently in our body and once experienced will dissipate and we return to a neutral resting state. If we encounter situations where we have to withhold or lock down a part of ourselves, those experiences leave an imprint in our system that over time can build into a pathway.  Every bowed head in disappointment, caught breath in fear, or tension as we hold our tongue gets remembered.  At the hint of danger, our system instinctually recognizes what a situation looks like and will act on that. Only if we slow down and explore can we realize there are other options - ones that can lead us to empowerment and possibility.

Our minds try to make sense of what we feel and can create deeply rooted beliefs like “I’m a bad person” or “I’ll never be successful.” These thoughts take root in our consciousness and keep us stuck in our distress, but where they come from is lost in the unconscious, the unprocessed and fragmented memories.  Like a song you can’t quite remember - the lyrics and tune are just out of reach, but the sense that it reminds you of a feeling of freedom and joy is there.  Because the words aren’t there to guide us, we tune into the body, the sensations, the emotions, and suddenly it clicks.  A memory of a summer vacation and the wind blowing in your hair as the song played in the car emerges and the smile on your face no longer feels out of place.  Integrating our mind and body can connect us to the root of what holds us stuck and the strengths that lie within us that we forgot.   

Somatic Therapies like Somatic Experiencing and Sensorimotor Therapy can help symptoms that may manifest as:

  • Persistent anxiety or hypervigilance

  • Unexplained physical symptoms

  • Emotional numbness or disconnection

  • Overwhelming feelings or reactivity

  • Sleep disturbances or nightmares

  • Difficulties with focus and concentration

How it works

Our body naturally is able to process and integrate difficult experiences.

When this is disrupted, trauma energy becomes "trapped" in the body, leading to ongoing symptoms and dysregulation.  Through Somatic Therapies, I help you identify and release these stored trauma patterns, allowing your body to complete its natural healing process. Similar to if you’re lost in the woods, the words are often not necessary or available.  Instead we observe the signs that the body presents, the clues that will lead us back out.

  1. Tracking bodily sensations - Developing awareness of physical sensations as entry points to healing

  2. Transforming trapped energy - Stored tension and stress responses no longer burden you and you find energy towards your goals

  3. Restoring nervous system balance - Rebuilding the natural rhythm between activation and relaxation

  4. Creating new somatic resources - Reconnecting to and developing internal and external resources for ongoing regulation

This "bottom-up processing" approach allows for profound healing by addressing trauma at its physiological source, rather than trying to resolve it through cognitive understanding alone.  Like learning a new language, you’ll learn how to interpret what your body and nervous system are communicating.  My approach integrates multiple modalities to help you listen and understand your system to process and integrate difficult experiences, while connecting you to internal and external resources that will leave you feeling empowered and able to expand your capacity for experiencing both pleasant and challenging feelings.

How We’ll Work Together

We’ll start with a complimentary 30-minute video consultation.  Taking the first step can be scary and I want you to feel like you’re with the right person to guide you on this journey.  If we decide to work together, we’ll have an in-depth intake session. This will give me an opportunity to learn more about you and your goals, answer any questions you have, and co-create a plan to track your progress throughout our work together.

You choose the format that works best for you:

  • If you prefer to make progress steadily over time, we can meet on a weekly or bi-weekly basis for 50-minute sessions.

  • For accelerated results, concentrated therapy in the form of intensives may be a good fit for you. Like a large dose of therapy at once, you can experience rapid relief and healing with a relatively small time investment. 1- and 2-day options available. Click here to learn more.

Why I do this work

Somatic therapies connect you to knowing the rest of yourself, beyond the words.  

Thoughts only present part of the picture.  Learning to listen to the body allows us to fill in the gaps and only with a more complete understanding can knowing emerge.