My Story
Beginning as a Licensed Massage Therapist in 1999, I began cultivating my intention around my role as a healer. I found I was able to communicate through touch and presence that there is safety and it is okay to let down.
Building on my touch and presence skills, I later wanted to incorporate all aspects of the psyche beyond the physical to healing. I knew that there was not a separation, but I did not have the scope or training to understand how it all comes together. Now, as a Somatic Experiencing Practitioner, Licensed Professional Counselor, and certified in Touch Skills for Trauma Therapists, I can understand how all channels of experience are rooted in physiology.
As the culmination of the years of studying and experiences come together, I see that creating more peacefulness in myself, it ripples out and touches the world. Similarly, with clients, small, titrated change ripples out. We don't need big shifts or changes as these can be difficult to integrate. We need small bites that are digestible. From there settling happens.
My Approach
Utilizing a body-oriented approach to therapy with Somatic Experiencing and Touch Skills for Trauma Therapists allows for a bottom-up method of processing. My approach to Somatic Experiencing is grounded in acceptance, non-judgmental, non-invasive and supportive presence. I believe that in safety, we heal, ground ourselves, and rest. Our nervous system recovers and learns new, less demanding patterns of operating.
My approach to treating trauma begins with establishing regulation. Once a stable baseline has been established in the physiology, trauma resolution work can occur which typically involves skill building around increasing one's window of tolerance and letting stored survival energy move through and out. Sessions typically include touch which can directly work with trauma that occurred early in life as well as provide support to the structures most affected by chronic stress physiology.
I believe that we can heal if in the right conditions. Like a broken bone held just held in the right position, and the body takes care of itself. It knows what to do. I see my role as being a conductor of safety, acceptance, and co-regulation.