Somatic Therapy

Somatic therapy looks specifically at what is occurring in the body and encourages somatic self-awareness. By taking note of our self-protective physical responses and processing emotions, memories, and traumatic events that have been stored in the body, we can increase our own tolerance and ability to deal with unpleasant body sensations.

Therapy sessions include tracking sensations in the body related to trauma and releasing the physical tension. The goal is to connect body and mind, taking ourselves off auto-pilot and becoming more attuned to our internal experiences.

Mind-Body Approach

The mind-body approach embraces mindfulness, the mastery of being fully present. Practicing mindfulness allows us to be more cognizant of our surroundings as well as attentive in our interactions and relationships. It can also help us be more relaxed by engaging the parasympathetic nervous system, which is responsible for our stress responses. 

Mindfulness helps with:

• Chronic pain.
• Anxiety, stress, depression, and trauma.
• Cancer and chronic disease.
• Sleeping disorders and eating disturbances.

With the mind-body approach, you will learn to divert attention away from thoughts lingering on the past and be more attentive to what is happening in the present.

CBT

Cognitive-behavioral therapy, or CBT, works off the belief that situations prompt automatic thoughts, which in turn trigger emotions, physiological responses, and behaviors. The CBT model necessitates that we look closely at our thoughts, challenge them, and begin to reframe and reshape them. There is a relationship between what we think, feel, and behave and understanding how our core beliefs were established early on, will also let us manipulate and change our behavior. 

EMDR

Experiencing trauma can block or jam the mechanism in the hippocampus that works with unprocessed memory. Consequently, memories are unable to fully process, causing re-traumatization.
EMDR, which stands for eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, uses bilateral stimulation such as eye movements or tapping, to bring out past memories and triggers. Once brought out, we are able to correctly process the memory. 

Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

Trauma-focused cognitive-behavioral therapy (TF-CBT) is an evidence-based form of CBT aimed at addressing trauma in children and adolescents. TF-CBT seeks to provide both children and their caregivers with psychoeducation to help them explore and cope with their emotions, thoughts, and behaviors. Therapy usually includes sessions with children and caregivers together, alongside individual sessions.