Trauma Therapy

Healing From Trauma Is Possible!

The goal in trauma therapy is NOT to relive the event(s) but to regain a sense of control and access to your natural defensive (fight/flight/freeze) responses. Trauma happens when we experience an overwhelming response to a perceived life threat with an element of feeling helpless. It does not always turn into full blown PTSD and yet the effects can be devastating. Some examples include:

  • Accidents
  • Assaults
  • Animal Attacks
  • Witnessing/experiencing violence
  • Invasions
  • Childhood emotional, physical, or sexual abuse
  • Neglect
  • Medical procedures
  • Grief and loss 
  • Accumulation of unresolved stress
  • Betrayal
  • Abandonment

Trauma occurs when we are unable to release blocked energies. It is about what happens in the body that makes an even traumatic. 

Trauma Therapy Tucson

Somatic Experiencing

Somatic Experiencing is an approach to work with traumatic stress on a deeper, body based level of the nervous system. Somatic Experiencing aims to guide the client to complete defensive responses and release survival energy which has been bound up in the body. Using a somatic approach, I will guide you to increase your capacity for distressing sensations in a manageable way. This engagement with your body can lead to an increase in self-awareness, self-acceptance, and release the stress chemicals. Body-awareness can also offer distance between distressing thoughts and emotions. The narrative and story which you have been living from (identity) begin to change once the relationship between your mind/body evolve. Have your heard, “the only way out is through”. 

Attachment Focused Therapy

Trauma is a disrupter of connection and healthy relationships in adulthood. We repeat patterns unconsciously which leave us suffering in unhappy and unsatisfying relationships and lives. Through neuroscience and learning your primary attachment style, we can begin to resolve those core wounds and move towards a more secure relationship style. 

We Can Not Think Our Way To Vitality, We Must Engage The Body

What results when trauma is experienced and not integrated are fragmented memories experienced in the form of emotional/visual/somatic flashbacks. Other symptoms include: persistent physical health issues, sleep disturbance, hypervigilance, intrusive thoughts, addictions, nightmares, dissociation, or relationship/interpersonal problems. When we are unable to carry out the fight or flight response, this “stuck” energy remains locked in the autonomic nervous system which continues to cause havoc on the body and mind. 

C-PTSD is a psychological reaction to multiple, prolonged traumatic events over the course of many months or years. Most people who develop C-PTSD have experienced prolonged childhood trauma, though some adults can also develop C-PTSD. When children experience repeated trauma as their brains are still developing, they learn messages about themselves in relation to their caregivers that result in beliefs such as “I am not safe” or “I am bad” or “I am unlovable”. They can develop significant issues and have difficulty with trust and intimacy in relationships later in life. 

Scientific evidence also points to a link between chronic and acute health conditions and adverse childhood traumatic experiences. Read more about the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) study HERE.

See the Resources page for more information on my favorite reads on trauma. I specialize in working with adults who have been impacted by trauma and/or dysfunction in their childhood years. contact me today to discuss how I might be able to help you become unstuck and build on your innate resiliency.