The Healing Blog
Practical, body-centered tools for calming your nervous system, easing chronic pain, and reconnecting with yourself, drawn from Somatic Experiencing®, Feldenkrais®, Craniosacral Therapy, and Havening Techniques®.
What to Expect in a Trauma-Informed Bodywork Session: How Touch Helps Heal Trauma and Regulate the Nervous System
When people ask me what trauma-informed bodywork looks like, I usually explain that it’s a gentle, hands-on approach that helps the body (and nervous system) find its way back to regulation and safety.
What is Medical Trauma: Why It Stays With You and What You Can Do
You’ve been through a medical procedure or intervention — either planned or unexpected. It’s over and you’re home. It’s been months or even years and you’re still feeling upset about how you were treated or about something that happened, but your rational mind is telling you “it’s over, let it go.” But you can’t.
How to Map Your Own Nervous System
It’s helpful to be able to identify where you are on the nervous system “map,” so that you know what type of tools and exercises will be the most helpful to get to Ventral vagus state of connection and safety.
Somatic Exercises to Take You From Freeze State to Safety and Connection
When working within the Polyvagal nervous system regulation framework, we know that in order to bring someone out of a freeze and dissociated state, we need to gently mobilize their nervous system within their capacity. Here are some effective somatic exercises for working with the freeze state.
Trauma Informed Bodywork and Somatic Experiencing® for Narcissistic Abuse
The Feldenkrais Method® and Somatic Experiencing® are two robust somatic methods that help release chronic muscle tension and regulate the nervous system. One tool helped me learn to sense and feel safety in my body and to trust my own inner guidance again, while the other tool helped me release the powerful thwarted energy that got stuck in my body, causing me chronic pain and fatigue.
Physical Symptoms of Anxiety and Hyper-Vigilance
From a somatic, or body perspective, anxiety refers to the sensations generated by the body’s total response to a threat. Our body reacts to this threat because it will do anything to survive. When we remain in a constant state of hypervigilance, we experience predictable bracing and contracting patterns throughout our system.
How does Somatic Experiencing® Work?
Working with the body is key to allowing the activated charge, that has been trapped in the physical body since the traumatic event, to dissipate or dissolve, especially when the physical symptoms of that traumatic event show up months or years later as chronic physical pain and physiological symptoms of stress and anxiety.
What is Somatic Experiencing®?
Somatic Experiencing® is a body first approach to dealing with the problematic (and oftentimes physical) symptoms of trauma. It helps individuals create new experiences in their bodies; ones that contradict those of tension and overwhelming helplessness.
