Somatic Therapy Bodywork
Somatic Therapy Bodywork is grounded in Somatic Experiencing®, a body-based, therapeutic approach designed to help release trauma stored in the nervous system and realign inner balance of mind, body and spirit. Supporting clients to move away from living in a cycle of fight, flight and freeze physiology. Somatic Therapy Bodywork sessions help build client somatic skills, release tension, access life energy, find safety again by restoring self regulation and reuniting clients with their innate resilience.
Shauna Coxe is a Somatic Experiencing® Practitioner and Therapeutic Touch provider at AIM with over 25 years of experience in working with chronic stress and trauma. Each session supports the foundations needed in the nervous system to resolve trauma and treat the effects that living with chronic stress takes on us. The effects of untreated trauma lives in your nervous system and body as a result of experiencing shock trauma, early developmental trauma and inter-generationally transmitted or ancestral trauma. Shauna's scope of practice includes neonatal and birth trauma, sleep disturbances, migraines, PMS, chronic pain, autoimmune disorders, ADHD & neurodivergence, symptoms of anxiety, low mood, surgeries, medical trauma, women’s health, stress illnesses, including the impact of compounded shock traumas, loss and grief and symptoms that arise without medical origin. Supporting her clients as they unravel ancestral and intergenerational trauma in a gentle way is a passion for Shauna, as this is a way forward in healing and preventing trauma from continuing in future generations. You can read more about Shauna's approach and experience here.
Who can benefit from Somatic Therapy Bodywork?
Many of us are experiencing symptoms that stem from untreated trauma and chronic stress. Sessions are especially indicated for clients who have experienced:
- Chronic stress or traumatic stress (past or present)
- Burnout / Dysregulation (physical, mental, emotional)
- Unexplained illness and syndromes
- Shock trauma (including PTSD, sexual assault, surgeries, accidents)
- Lack of support / feeling unsafe in early years and adolescence
- Early life trauma emotional / birth or surgeries
How can Somatic Therapy Bodywork support me?
The idea that emotions and trauma conscious or unconscious, store in our body and manifest in tension patterns and dis “ease” physically, psychologically emotionally and spiritually, has been well researched. Shock traumas such as surgery, pregnancy, assaults, traumatic birthing, chronic stress, traumatic stressors that compound and MVAs create thwarted fight or flight patterns. Early traumas, intergenerational and ancestral histories embody in us through our nervous systems, often creating survival dilemmas in our immune system and arise in our hormone and metabolic systems. We do not always have clear stories about this kind of trauma but the effects of this, show up in syndromes and dis ease, physically and emotionally. Humans get stuck in survival patterns, activated through traumatic stress physiology and fight, flight or conservation protective states in our nervous system. Many common physical, mental and spiritual complaints that have bio biological or physical origin are symptoms of imbalance and untreated traumatic stress.
Somatic Therapy Bodywork at AIM
These sessions provide an educational element to learning about your nervous system through a “body centred” therapy that encourages a deeper exploration of what your physical body is experiencing as a result of being stuck in “fight, flight and freeze” and how mind body and spirit can exist in harmony. Therapeutic Somatic Touch or Somatic Experiencing® techniques in session, invite gentle noticing of body awareness, sensation, imagery, emotions and narratives to support the client in gaining increasingly more awareness and regulation in their nervous system. The goal of this therapy is to resolve traumatic stress in your nervous system and restore your natural human resiliency. Many recognize that after the recent pandemic or after a time of traumatic stress that our nervous systems responded in a “survival” way. Leaving us feeling bereft and experiencing an array of symptoms such as:
- Sleeplessness
- Weight gain & early onset metabolic disorders
- Burnout
- Anxiety
- Depression
- Chronic pain and inflammation
- Unexplained illness or syndromes
What can I expect in a Somatic Therapy Bodywork Session?
Each session is different for each client due to their unique life experiences and nervous system. Sessions are eclectic and combine Somatic Experiencing® body based psychotherapeutic practice as well as Therapeutic Touch, which supports restoring regulation in your nervous system, while clients are fully clothed or seated in a chair or laying face up on the table. Online sessions are also available.
What does Somatic Touch entail and how is this different from other bodywork or physical care?
Somatic Therapeutic touch is a modality used in session that supports a clients nervous system directly by restoring regulation in a client’s nervous system and building capacity. This is offered in both in person and online sessions. The client remains fully clothed, seated in a chair or laying face up on a table or in a place of comfort in a setting of their choice in an online session. Your practitioner places their hands to set the conditions for co regulation, that will best support your nervous system such as adrenals, brainstem or at the neck, back, shoulder, arm, foot or an area that is agreed upon ahead of time and that serves as support for regulation or specific trauma renegotiation work. Sessions in the beginning may include some discussion about the work, the treatment process and focus of the session. Informed consent is an important and active part of the therapeutic relationship as well as consent for touch work. Consent can begin the healing journey for many of us who have not experienced safe touch or have a history of not being able to stay embodied and present during other physical touch practices in the past.
What does the “Talk” component entail in a Somatic Session?
Somatic Experiencing® “talk” in a session is focused on moving away from the thinking left brain and accessing your body, right brain. The effects of traumatic stress in our developmental years interrupts the pathways that help us communicate between the two sides of our brain and managing our emotions. Consequently unresolved trauma at any point in our lives can affect this communication and our ability to regulate our emotional brain and create connection with our thinking brain. Thereby leaving us feeling reactive, easily triggered without knowing why and not well regulated. Somatic Therapy is especially helpful for those of us with early life trauma as it helps to heal the early foundations in our nervous system including attachment and safety though co regulation. For many who are seeking relief from a specific trauma, the intention of “talk” in a somatic session is to invite body awareness while tracking or creating room for the client to safely feel sensation, explore imagery that arises, experience emotions from the body’s memory, that may be different than the labeling, thinking part of our brain has assessed. Noticing narratives that may not be serving the client in healing from traumatic stress and working on new meaning is an integral part of sessions. Somatic “talk” invites the client to support increasingly more capacity and regulation in their nervous system. While working through an event or shock trauma, your practitioner may pair aspects of “talk” as well as Somatic Touch work together in session.
What is the goal of these sessions?
Clients will learn to become more aware of their breath, sensations, behaviours, emotions and narratives in their mind and body, while building capacity for noticing activation. Including, where and how they may be holding tension patterns in their bodies and how dysregulation shows up for them. Clients will notice their own nervous system, in these sessions, supporting access to more parasympathetic, rest and digest awareness in their system and a sense of self with an increased capacity to notice their body. Building capacity to be present with uncomfortable traumatic memory or activation in their nervous system, including emotions such as grief, loss, shame, guilt, sadness and anger. This insight and connection to your own body is the greatest resource for trauma work as this supports clients in coming out of costly conservation physiology that impacts us organismically and epigenetically. The goal is to gently take apart the layers of traumatic stress and reunite our mind and body with missing elements that had been lost through having to manage overwhelming life events. Gathering important somatic skills that can empower clients to truly heal, find flexibility in your system instead of rigidity and move towards life that is not focused exclusively on “trauma” but rather living life with love, joy and connection.
How many sessions do I need to have?
4-6 sessions are recommended in the beginning for supporting traumatic event or shock trauma. With complex developmental trauma or intergenerational traumas, we may be looking at biweekly or monthly sessions over a longer time frame (monthly for six months to a year).
All SBT sessions can be booked directly online, or through reaching out to us by phone (604-558-2288) or email (info@auroramed.ca).