Trauma-Informed Therapy

By its nature, trauma is that which is too much for us in the moment, and our psyches and nervous systems have evolved ways to protect us and survive that can keep the original experience buried or frozen. Something inside us stays stuck in that moment while other parts of us compensate and move forward. This can lead to a nagging sense of incompleteness or that something is missing in us, while we valiantly go on trying to find ways to feel better or to ignore the sense of something being not quite right. Until we can recover that part of us that is stuck in time and in our tissues, our well-intentioned endeavors can often be missing the spot, and this alone can leave us with a building sense of inadequacy, hopelessness, and fear. Through trauma-informed work, you can begin to recover and unfreeze those lost places, bringing more of you online and unlocking the organic wisdom of the body that is seeking completion.

Some of the signs you may benefit from therapy which is rooted in trauma awareness include:

• a sense of not being quite in your body, or of being disconnected from feelings;

• overwhelm with day-to-day life, and being led by reactions or emotions which are hard to understand;

• finding yourself at the mercy of others, and losing a sense of your own wants and needs;

• muscular tension, irritability, and a difficulty quieting the thinking mind;

• a sudden depression or onset of anxiety brought on by a big life transition, a child reaching a particular age, or by difficulties in a relationship. 

While all my therapy work is rooted in understandings of trauma and the mind-body connection, if we decide together that trauma may be impacting the symptoms you are experiencing, there are specific choices we may decide to make in our work.

Some of the ways I hold work with trauma include: 

• the importance of each individual journey, and that discovering and honoring what your unique body, heart, and story needs to heal is as much a part of the healing process as anything else;

• your experience of the process, of how safe the therapeutic container and our relationship feel, is fundamental, and not a once-and-for-all deal;

• that your body is wise and has been working on your behalf without you knowing, and, yet, that it may take time for you to experience it as your friend.

Most always, trauma impacts how it feels to be in relationship, and our sense of trust in the world and in others can have been shattered by more being asked of us by our environment than we have been able to digest. As such, I work in a way that is gentle and prioritizes agency, but also does not confuse safety with collusion. 

Please contact me to schedule a consultation and see whether we might be the right fit for this powerful work.