Somatic Experiencing® In Denver, CO
You’ve experienced some tough stuff
When really hard things happen in life, they impact you mentally, physically and emotionally. How you react to challenging experiences can further impact your well-being.
Unfortunately, trauma won’t resolve on it’s own and you can’t just think your way out of it. Because trauma is something that happens to the body, it needs a body-centered approach for true resolution. If you could have already thought your way out of trauma, I trust that you would have. However, with the help of a trained and compassionate therapist, you can find relief through Somatic Experiencing® and you can get back to living your best life possible.
Get A Free 20 Minute Consultation With Your Next Therapist.
Who Is Somatic Experiencing® For?
Maybe you’re here because ever since that hard event happened, you’ve changed, and not in ways that feel good. You may be:
re-experiencing the trauma through intrusive, distressing memories of the event, flashbacks, and/or nightmares.
emotionally numb and actively avoiding places, people, and activities that are reminders of the trauma.
having difficulty sleeping and concentrating, feeling jumpy, and/or being easily irritated and angered.
Untreated trauma can also leave you feeling highly anxious, depressed, feeling guilty or struggling to feel emotions like joy and ease. Often, my clients talk about feeling “stuck” in negative thought patterns, in life and in their relationships.
And when it feels like you can’t escape the physical and emotional pain, you may do what so many others do: bury it, ignore it, or try to medicate it away.
Somatic Experiencing® and how it can help you move forward
Somatic Experiencing® is a particularly helpful approach to treating shock trauma, a specific event or experience that was scary, life-threatening and overwhelming. The SE™ approach releases traumatic shock held in the body, which is key to transforming PTSD and helping your nervous system come back into balance.
Somatic Experiencing® is a short-term naturalistic approach to help resolve trauma in the body and restore goodness.
SE™ professes a body first approach to dealing with the problematic (and, oftentimes, physical) symptoms of trauma. This means that therapy isn’t about reclaiming memories or changing our thoughts and beliefs about how we feel but looking at the sensations that lie underneath our feelings and uncovering our habitual behavior patterns in reaction to these feelings.
Somatic Experiencing® Approach
The Somatic Experiencing® approach facilitates the completion of survival behaviors and the release of thwarted survival energy bound in the body, thus addressing the root cause of trauma symptoms. This occurs by gently guiding clients to develop increasing tolerance for difficult bodily sensations and suppressed emotions.
In addition, Somatic Experiencing®:
- employs awareness of body sensations to help people “renegotiate” and heal rather than re-live or re-enact trauma.
- allows the big survival energies of fight and flight survival to be safely experienced and gradually discharged.
- supports slowing you down to titrate or break down into small, incremental steps, your experience rather than evoking large experiences of release – which can feel overwhelming.
- may employ touch in support of the renegotiation process.
- helps you harness the power of your biology and befriend your body in order to heal from the inside out.
The Positive benefits INclude:
- Relief of traumatic stress symptoms
- Increased resiliency
- Stronger sense of self
- Feeling resourced from the inside-out
- Feeling more at ease in the world
- Having a healthier relationship with your body.
Like any other treatment, it may also have unintended negative side effects such as sleep disturbances, frightening memories, or unfamiliar and uncomfortable body sensations. Such reactions are not uncommon and can be attended to in the course of our work together.
You Can Heal From the Hard Stuff
If it sounds like Somatic Therapy Partners would be a good fit, please reach out to learn more and/or schedule your first session. We look forward to serving you.
There is so much love for you here!
Comparison Chart
Feature
Approach
Focus
Techniques
Physical Symptoms
Long-term Results
Empowerment
Somatic Therapy Partners
Holistic Mind-body integration
Enhancing the regulation of the somatic nervous system
Somatic exercises, mindfulness, cognitive strategies
Directly addressed
Sustainable bodily changes
Learn to self-regulate
Traditional Talk Therapy
Primarily cognitive
Thought patterns
Cognitive restructuring, discussion
May be overlooked
May require ongoing sessions
Dependent on therapist insights
From Our Clients
“My son now experiences ‘calm’ during the table work, and he is now able to reference that calm state when he is away from her office. I was so impressed with the effect of Coregulating Touch work with my son that when I experienced a significant stressor in my life, I started doing table work too. So far, I see changes in my sleep, dream life, and waking access to previously buried memories, among other benefits.”
Frequently Asked Questions
Whatever affects your body affects your mind and whatever impacts your mind lives in your body. So, to make positive changes, Somatic Experiencing® sessions revolve around transformation through the following means
1. SE™ helps you learn to listen to your body, through sensations, behaviors, impulses, physiological shifts and changes in your posture. Since trauma is in the body, the more you become aware of your body’s responses, the more effective you can be resolving it.
2. SE™ helps you reframe and re-negotiate your traumatic experience. Experiencing less stress and feeling less affected by triggers improves concentration and your ability to be productive and resilient. Moreover, hope, self-confidence, and renewed interest in your abilities and life possibilities resurface.
3. SE™ helps your body discharge excess survival energy that got trapped in the body. The release allows for a return to a more balanced state. In the end, this leads to a sense of freedom, rejuvenation, stability, and persistent calm. Also, discomfort is no longer a way of life. In addition, concentration and engagement with others improve.
Sessions may involve body-focused practices such as breathwork, movement, and therapeutic touch, combined with traditional talk therapy to address both physical and emotional aspects of depression.
The simple answer is that it will take less time the more you practice the skills and mindset shifts that you will learn in sessions. Consistent weekly or bi-weekly sessions also helps.
We do not accept insurance currently. However, if you are looking for reimbursement, we can provide you with the appropriate documentation to submit. We also encourage you to contact your insurance provider to confirm what your benefits are with “out of network providers.”
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