types of therapy

The thinking, emotional and behavior patterns that keep us stuck are encoded in our bodies, brains and nervous systems. The survival response: Fight Flight, Freeze, or Feign is initiated from deep within the primitive parts of the brain called the amygdala in the limbic system and the brain stem. These primitive brain responses are completely unconscious. Once the amygdala/brain stem perceives or experiences a traumatic event a cascade of neurochemicals and stress hormones initiates the fight flight and freeze or feign survival cycle. If the traumatic or overwhelming experiences go unprocessed and unsupported these experiences are encoded in the subconscious brain-body-nervous system. This primitive survival mechanism is designed to warn us and prepare us for possible threats to our survival. It is very good at doing its job and it takes over our rational thinking brain (prefrontal cortex) when threat is perceived or detected. Whole Mind-Body Psychotherapy is designed to help you reprocess and repattern the traumatic and overwhelming experiences/memories that live in your body-mind: such as impulsive behaviors/habits, negative thinking patterns, intense or numbing sensations, and overwhelming/lack of emotions.

You will learn how to map your own unique nervous system responses and identify when your nervous system moves into a dysregulated state (hyperreactivity anxiety, panic, intense anger, irritation or hypo-reactivity depression/fatigue/numbing). I will teach you specific practices to help you move into your Window of Resilience, a state of calm, curiosity, confidence, and connection. Together we will support the reprocessing and resolution of these ‘stuck’ responses/energies allowing you to heal and create a life that you love and deserve.

The Internal Family Systems Model (IFS) is an integrative approach to individual psychotherapy developed by Richard C. Schwartz, Ph.D. We all experience different states of being such as independence, creativity, anger, love, insecurity, fear, shame, joy, desire, numbing, controlling, etc. These states of being are expressed through our thoughts, feelings, actions, and habits. Our states of being or “parts” can support our lives if they are in our conscious awareness or can wreak havoc if they live in the subconscious mind.

The IFS Model helps bring our parts (the rageful teenager, the abandoned 4 year old, the independent go-getter, the controlling manager, the joy filled child) into our conscious awareness. IFS therapy is designed to tap into our innate compassion, curiosity, and creativity that lie beneath our protective defenses and wounded parts. In the therapy process, you will be invited to release your parts’ extreme beliefs, emotions, and sensations that burden your life, allowing for your own self-led transformation. You will find that you are able to move through your life with more clarity, calmness, and confidence. You will make life giving choices from a place of self-energy versus the habituated patterns of the past.

Individual Somatic IFS Consultation will provide you the opportunity to deepen your IFS clinical skills while expanding your ability to track how parts within yourself and your clients communicate through the body. You will learn how to utilize breath, movement, and somatic practices to access Self energy. You will learn how the Autonomic Nervous System’s danger response system can create dysregulation in your clients through somatic patterns of anxiety, panic, chronic pain, fatigue, numbing, hyper/hypoactivity, digestive problems, immune over/under response cycles etc. Through individual IFS consultation, you will be invited to deepen your embodied experience, navigating your parts’ somatic experiences, and develop confidence and curiosity exploring the deeper realms of how parts communicate and hold burdens within the body.

I am a certified IFS therapist and IFS consultant with over 25 years of experience in the field. I invite you to contact me to set up an initial phone call to discuss your professional goals and answer any questions. In the beginning I suggest a 6 series format, starting with weekly IFS consultation for the first three sessions, then moving to every other week for the remaining three sessions. If you would like to continue, we would contract for additional sessions.

The HeartMath Institute has developed reliable, scientifically validated tools to help people reduce and avoid chronic/toxic stress while cultivating increased calm, satisfaction, and self-security.

Your ability to self-regulate the quality of feeling and emotion of your moment-to-moment experience influences your physiology and the reciprocal interactions between your physiological, cognitive, and emotional systems. Positive and stressful emotions are reflected in the pattern of your heart’s rhythm, which in turn impacts your bodily functions/processes (immune system, digestive system, hormonal systems, gene expression, detoxification pathways, microbiome health, intestinal wall integrity and more).

In our sessions, you will learn how to shift your heart rhythm into a coherent state. Increased Heart coherence plays an important role in facilitating higher cognitive functions, improved physiological functions, creating emotional flexibility, and facilitating social connectedness in your life.

HeartMath provides practical tools to help you lower your stress, revitalize your energy and resilience and restore your mental, emotional, relational and physical balance.

The Somatic Experiencing® method is a body-oriented approach to the healing of trauma and other chronic stress disorders. It stems from the research and life’s work of Peter A. Levine, PhD, resulting from his study of stress physiology, ethology, biology, neuroscience, psychology, and indigenous healing practices. Trauma and chronic stress affect the brain, mind, body, and nervous system. However, the body is often neglected in treating trauma. SE teaches that trauma is not caused by the event itself, but develops by the failure of the body, brain, spirit, and nervous system to process and discharge the physiological activation stemming from these overwhelming experiences. The SE™ approach releases traumatic shock and restores the mind-body connection, which is key to transforming PTSD and the wounds of emotional and early developmental attachment wounds. SE offers a framework to assess where a person is “stuck” in the fight, flight, feign or freeze responses. SE provides practices and tools to discharge and resolve these activated physiological states reestablishing the inherent health and wellbeing of the body-mind.

“Trauma is a fact of life. It does not however, have to be a life sentence.” - Peter Levine

Polyvagal Theory and Vagal Nerve Attunement will provide you with the tools and pathways to befriend and consciously care for your nervous system. You will learn the skills to track your body sensations, thoughts, and actions associated with how your nervous system perceives threat/danger or safety/connection. You will no longer feel victim to your Autonomic Nervous System: the fight/flight response (bouts of anger, increased frustration/irritation, racing thoughts, unable to relax without using substances/media, panicky feelings, difficulty sleeping) or trapped by the freeze/feign/hide response (isolating, numbing, brain fog, heavy unrelenting exhaustion). You will learn how to expand your window of resilience in times of stress and navigate your life from a place of calm, curiosity, enthusiasm, creativity and connection. You will begin to feel, think, and act in alignment with your core self and core values.