Hey! Jenny here with Somatic Therapy Partners. This is part two of “What to Expect in a 1st CRT, or Co-Regulating therapeutic Touch, session. Today what I’m going to talk about is a question that we get quite a bit and that is: how long is this going to take? Right? How long is this going to take for me to feel better? For me to feel healed? The honest answer is: I don’t totally know. And I know that’s probably not what you want to hear. A lot of us want to know like, okay is it going to take 4 sessions? Or 8 sessions? Or 12 sessions?
The reality is we want it to go quickly as well. And when working with developmental trauma and working with folks in this very specific somatic way, we have to go as slow as we need to in order for the healing to happen. What I mean by that is so often we’re expected in our lives and our families, at our jobs, to push through our discomfort. To push through what feels really bad in our bodies and just go on to the next thing: get the next task done, make the dinner anyway, take the kids to school. Whatever it is instead of really slowing down, listening to what our body is telling us, and actively trying to meet the needs of our body in that moment. So, with our first session that’s something that I really bring into the work that I do. It can be and needs to be as slow as it needs to be for you. And that’s so dependent on each individual who walks into my office. It’s really difficult to say how long something’s going to take until I get a better knowing of you and knowing of your system and how you operate.
For some folks they begin to see even just slight nuanced shifts in themselves after the first couple sessions or four sessions. I often encourage folks to try at least four sessions to just get a good feel and actually understand a little bit more about what’s showing up, getting connected with their clinician, and just kind of getting the feel for it. And I never expect life-changing things to happen after four sessions. That would be wonderful and sometimes things happen that are pretty miraculous. And what I do expect and encourage is that this is a longer process because you’ve been living in a certain patterned way of being in your body.
Your nervous system has learned to be in a certain survival pattern for often decades. If we’re going to shift that the shift can’t happen from way up here to down here in a very short time. It’s more this process where it comes down and up and down and up. Slowly we begin to see that change where you get into this new pattern and that’s what the healing is. It’s not fast. It’s meaningful and it happens when we slow down, take a pause, and allow our bodies to be heard and listened to. That’s my job – to help you learn to listen to what your body is saying. Not push through it but really let it be present and have a say and know that we’re going to be here to listen as best as we can.
I hope that kind of gives you a little bit more understanding about why that question is so difficult for us to answer. Of course, we understand why the question is important. We can continue that conversation, and you can continue that conversation with your clinician, as you work together with them. I appreciate you joining us in our video today and look forward to seeing you in future videos.