Therapy / Trauma Therapy
Trauma-specialized therapy
Trauma-informed therapy is a must if you actually want to heal and transform deeper roots of your trauma.
13+
years specializing in trauma
You’ve tried traditional talk therapy, and it hasn’t felt deep enough.
You understand your trauma(s), but still feel stuck.
You’re constantly toggling between present reality, distressing memories, and/or strategizing to feel safer.
You can’t have the life you want because your brain and body are chronically hyper-sensitive to threat / risk.
Dreaded instinctual states can take over at any moment – like becoming on edge, self-critical, fearful, numb, spaced out, defeated, anticipating rejection, or even worse, several at once.
Trauma-specialized therapy might be right for you if…
Why it matters
I’ve devoted 13+ years of experience and trainings to specializing in trauma.
When therapy isn’t trauma-informed enough, you might find that deeper layers of your challenges and experiences aren’t getting addressed. And in worse cases, therapy that isn’t trauma-informed could inadvertently reinforce triggering and stuckness. Not only would these experiences become barriers to progress, they might also cause you to feel even more frustrated, lost, and hopeless.
Therapy that effectively addresses trauma is informed by research and is sensitive to your subtleties and nuances. And it provides actionable practices to help you heal and move forward.
I’m confident our collaboration can help you achieve more stabilization. We can engage your inner healing intelligence to promote deeper healing and transformation, through practice. And you’ll get to do this sacred work in a therapy space that avoids replicating our dominant colonial cultures’ harmful beliefs (i.e., the roots of many traumatic injuries and intergenerational traumas).
Personalized, actionable practices that engage and cultivate your inner healing intelligence
My trauma-informed practice prioritizes:
Research about trauma, the brain / nervous system, and mind-body unity
Prevention of re-traumatization in therapy by dominant cultures’ harmful influences
The shift I often see
Starting therapy
Constantly overwhelmed and drained by triggering
Confused by distressing inner conflicts
Struggling to stay present
6 months into therapy
Being triggered less intensely and frequently
Equipped with internal maps that help you stay true to yourself
More confident you can get regulated, embodied, and present
A year into therapy
More peaceful and emotionally stable
More sense of choice and direction in your life
More able to invite and enjoy connection, pleasure, joy
Beyond a year
More post-traumatic growth
More mastery, self-assurance, and self-confidence
Alignment and right-relationship with yourself are the norm
Questions
Before we begin
More answers on fees, scheduling and insurance on the FAQ page.
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Trauma-related manifestations include:
Re-experiencing of traumatic memories
Chronic avoidance of potentially triggering situations and stimuli
Recurring nightmares
Patterns of overwhelm and dysregulation
Dissociative experiences
Beliefs about being doomed or about being destined to live a shortened life
Many of the following could also be trauma-related:
Certain manifestations of anxiety, phobias, and depressed mood
Self-sabotaging patterns
Difficulties in relationships
Perfectionism and being overly self-critical
Low self-esteem
People-pleasing
Excessive guilt and shame
Compulsive / addictive behaviors
Suicidal ideation
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With the way I work, it’s not at all a requirement to recover and heal from the effects of trauma. In fact, re-living details of traumatic events in therapy tends to be counter-productive, because it means more re-triggering (during and outside of session). Re-living details also doesn’t address repairing the effects and remnants of trauma.
However, some folks find it meaningful for their experiences to be witnessed by another in a safe enough context. If that’s the case, we will approach this very carefully. My priority is protecting your life outside of therapy from more overwhelm resulting from our work.
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We’ll collaborate on where you’d like to focus for the session, and you’ll ultimately be empowered to decide. Sometimes people choose to stay with ongoing themes and goals. And sometimes people choose to address more immediate challenges that came up prior to session. Sometimes we focus on actionable practices that maximize and further integrate progress.
Throughout the session, I offer opportunities for experiential work (as in live practice of actionable inner work – instead of just “talking about” things). Whatever I propose is always an invitation, never a requirement.
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Yes. This doesn’t mean people never again get triggered. But it can look like the following:
Triggered reactions are way less intense, prolonged, and frequent
Triggered reactions no longer cause additional cascades of reactions or spiraling
Feeling whole, at peace, self-assured, and self-accepting
Experiencing more agency, empowerment, emotional flexibility, and capacity for the range of life’s experiences
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Most often, I see people noticing progress soon (within a month to a few months). And usually, the progress continues to expand and deepen from there.
However, it also depends on the nature of one’s trauma-related adaptations and circumstances. If it takes longer, it never means anything about failure or about one’s character. There are always valid reasons why someone’s trauma-related manifestations are more severe, complex, or layered.
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It’s never too late. The only criterion is that you’re ready enough to do this work.