An Embodied Approach

I believe that healing takes place in the mind, body, and spirit.

I incorporate body-based interventions that help you increase your interoception (the perception of the sensations within your body) in order to help you better understand your experience as a whole. By exploring tools such as breathwork, yoga postures, mindful movements, and stillness, we are able to develop a working relationship between our minds and bodies; increasing the awareness of our experience.

Here is some more information about the body-based techniques that I use when working with trauma:

Brainspotting

“Where we look affects how we feel.”

Brainspotting (BSP) locates points in the client’s visual field that help to access unprocessed trauma in the subcortical brain. BSP makes use of this natural phenomenon through its use of relevant eye positions. This helps the BSP therapist locate, focus, process and release a wide range of emotionally and bodily-based conditions. BSP is also a brain-based tool to support the therapy relationship. We believe that BSP taps into and harnesses the body’s natural self-scanning, self-healing ability. When a Brainspot is stimulated, the deep brain appears to reflexively signal the therapist that the source of the problem has been found. BSP can also be used to find and strengthen our natural resources and resilience.

Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR)

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a psychotherapy that enables people to heal from the symptoms and emotional distress that are the result of disturbing life experiences. Repeated studies show that by using EMDR therapy people can experience the benefits of psychotherapy that once took years to make a difference. It is widely assumed that severe emotional pain requires a long time to heal. EMDR therapy shows that the mind can in fact heal from psychological trauma much as the body recovers from physical trauma. When you cut your hand, your body works to close the wound. If a foreign object or repeated injury irritates the wound, it festers and causes pain. Once the block is removed, healing resumes. EMDR therapy demonstrates that a similar sequence of events occurs with mental processes. The brain’s information processing system naturally moves toward mental health. If the system is blocked or imbalanced by the impact of a disturbing event, the emotional wound festers and can cause intense suffering. Once the block is removed, healing resumes. Using the detailed protocols and procedures learned in EMDR therapy training sessions, clinicians help clients activate their natural healing processes.