“You can’t do what you want until you know what you are doing.”
Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais
Because trauma is often held in the body, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy is an approach that aims to understand how your experience shows up in your movements and sensations. This understanding, which we'll explore together in a curious, safe and respectful way, with a mix of talking and some exercises, gives us a framework for your healing. The body has the questions but it also has the answers. When new ways of sitting, talking, standing, breathing, are used, feelings of safety are evoked, and a person feels more regulated, this can reduce overwhelming feelings of anxiety, distressing reminders of a trauma, or debilitating effects of depression, making meaningful connections with others feel possible. SP invites the past into the present, so it can be reorganized and incorporated into expectations for similar situations in the future, as a pathway toward healing.
More about sensorimotor psychotherapy
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a psychotherapy that helps people to heal from the symptoms and emotional distress that are the result of disturbing life experiences. Traumas can be a one off event, such as a car accident, or they can be the result of a sustained and damaging events that happened repeatedly in childhood – abuse, neglect, bullying, for example. EMDR research demonstrates that the mind can heal from psychological trauma in the same way the body does – if you cut your hand, your body knows what to do to mend the wound. Similarly, your brain has the same capacity to move towards resolution and well-being. If the system is blocked, however, the emotional wound can fester and cause intense suffering. Once the block is resolved, normal healing resumes. The processes used by a trained practitioner in EMDR activate this natural healing process. There are a number of phases in EMDR work – we begin by looking at your present difficulties, your past experiences, and your future wishes. We check that you have the ability to keep one foot in the present, while stepping into the past to briefly think about the disturbing event, and provide what is called resourcing – techniques to ensure safety and regulation during process. I explain what you can expect and how it can result in emotional material rising to the surface in form of memories, emotion, dreams, as your brain integrates the experience. The goal is that the emotional charge and distress, body sensations, negative beliefs associated with the trauma will subside and can you can begin to live more fully.