Somatic Therapy &
Embodied Processing
For when talking about it is not enough, and your body is not getting the memo.
What is somatic therapy?
If you have ever felt like your body is freaking out while your brain is saying “I am fine,” or “trying to keep up”, then you might know what I’m talking about. Your nervous system is doing its best to protect you so we need to show it that it can do something different.
When something happens, you feel it first in your body. Anxious? You feel it in your chest, probably. Angry? You can feel the heat rising. Sadness? You can feel the heaviness in the body.
Somatic therapy pays attention to that. It works with what your body is showing you, how your nervous system learned to keep you safe, and the patterns it built along the way. Mind and body together, because they were never really separate.
How is this different from talk therapy?
Talk therapy helps you understand yourself. You look at the story, join the dots, and make sense of why you do what you do. That matters, and it’s really helpful in certain cases.
But sometimes you already know the story. You understand the pattern. And you still feel stuck.
That is usually because your nervous system is running an old survival pattern that insight alone cannot reach. Working with what you actually feel in your body gives that deeper layer a chance to shift.
Embodied Processing.
The approach I use is called Embodied Processing. It works directly with your nervous system and the parts of you who are involved in those patterns, at a pace that feels workable for you.
We still talk - a lot actually, but we also invite the be body in. We start with what is going on in your life, what you want help with, and what you have already tried. I will explain a bit about how your nervous system works, in plain language, so your experience starts to feel more understandable.
At the beginning of many sessions, we spend a few minutes helping your body settle. That might look like feeling your feet on the floor, noticing your breath, or where your body is supported. Often, I will invite you to gently close your eyes, if that feels safe enough, so you can tune in to what is happening inside. There is no “right” way to do this.
When you feel settled enough, we get curious about what is coming up. We notice where you feel it, what it is like, and what might be underneath. We follow the thread back, because what is happening now is often linked to something your body has been holding for a long time.
We work with the parts of you that are hurting, and the parts that have been trying to protect you. Little by little, something moves. Not just in your mind, but in how you feel, react, and relate.
This is not about pushing you into the deep end. We keep checking in, and we slow down if things feel too much.
This approach can help with
Anxiety or chronic stress that won't shift, no matter how much you understand it
Burnout that doesn’t go away with sleeping or even a holiday
Trauma or PTSD, where your body still feels on alert
Patterns you can see but can't change
Feeling numb, disconnected, or not quite like yourself