RECLAIM YOUR SENSE OF FREEDOM AND SAFETY

Therapy for trauma in Vermont   

What would it feel like to put the past behind you?

Does this sound familiar? 
  • Moments where you suddenly feel hijacked by a younger version of yourself – instead of the adult you know you are, it feels like you are a scared 10 year old again, small and powerless 
  •  Traumatic or stressful memories that seem to play on a loop in your mind
  • Panic attacks that seem to hit out of the blue
  • Being constantly stuck in fight-flight-or-freeze mode
  • Feeling triggered or anxious when you try to move towards goals in your life 
  • Intrusive, cycling thoughts that make it hard to your true self or intuition

Trauma changes our sense of ourselves and the world around us 

Many people know they have experienced trauma – particularly the hard to miss things like emotional, physical, or sexual abuse or assault, chaotic childhoods with parents struggling with alcoholism or untreated mental health problems, or experiences of traumatic loss. 
Others, though, don’t initially see the more subtle experiences that nonetheless changed their view of themselves or the world around them – the divorce when they were 10 that shattered their view of the world as predictable and safe, the bullying when they were 8 that left them with a belief they will never belong – but these events still leave their mark, and restrict the ways we move through and respond to life, often leaving our nervous system stuck in a state of fight-flight or freeze, or cycling between the two. 
Many of my clients have engaged in talk therapy in the past, which has helped them gain insight into their experiences and how those have shaped their relationships and patterns of moving through life and begin to shift some of those patterns. 
Yet many folks – myself included – have had the experience of hitting an invisible ceiling in talk therapy. 
No matter how skilled the therapist, sometimes there are places that words alone just do not reach.

Trauma therapy can help

The beauty of an integrative approach to healing trauma that goes beyond talk therapy is that it brings in the wisdom of the body to help bring accelerated, lasting change. 

Instead of trying to wrangle your thoughts into overriding the trauma imprints in your body, we do this by engaging the self-healing mechanisms in the brain and nervous system that allow healing to ripple out from the deepest parts of you. As your brain and nervous system begin to rewire, you begin to find freedom from the limiting, constricting patterns of trauma. 

My approach to trauma therapy is integrative and tailored to each client, their needs, and their starting point on this journey. As a certified EMDR therapist, I am highly trained in using EMDR to treat a range of symptoms and problems, including anxiety, PTSD, complex PTSD, and intrusive thoughts/ memories. I engage in regular training and consultation so that I can provide the best care possible, am trained in using EMDR with dissociation, and stay on the edge of developments in the field, including adaptations like the EMDR processing continuum and EMDR 2.0. Don’t worry, you don’t need to know what those are – the point is, helping people heal from trauma is what I love to do, and I love to do it well.
I also incorporate other trauma-informed approaches to my work, including polyvagal theory to help you understand and regulate your nervous system, and parts work to help you build more self-compassion and understanding. 
  • Understand your body's responses in the here and now, and how they are shaped by your past traumatic experience, so you can make sense of what you are experiencing and increase your capacity for self-compassion 
  • Unwind negative beliefs about yourself that are imprinted with the memory of trauma, like "this is my fault,” "I can't trust myself,” and "I am not in control”
  • Teach you tools to help soothe and settle your body’s reactions to stress and reminders of trauma 
  • Release the trauma from your mind and body, so you can move forward again with a sense of safety and trust in your body and yourself

Therapy for trauma can help you…

I’ll help through this process, tailoring each step to your unique needs and circumstances. My approach to trauma therapy comes from a place of deep compassion: I believe that your current symptoms are the side effects of your body’s survival response that helped you get through something awful - not a sign that you are broken or that there is something wrong with you. AND I believe that it is possible to feel safe and free again.

It’s time to reclaim a sense of ease and freedom.

I can help you get there.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT TRAUMA THERAPY

FAQs

  • Initial therapy sessions are a chance for us to get to know each other and for me to learn about who you are: how your experience of trauma is impacting you now, the history around your current problems, AND who you are as a whole person, including beyond your difficulties.

    I am also a trained EMDR therapist and often use this in trauma treatment. EMDR is an evidence-based treatment for trauma that helps your mind and body reprocess the memory of traumatic experience so that it is no longer linked to the fight-flight-freeze response from the past. This results in you being able to think about what happened or be around things that remind you of that experience without feeling your body hijacked by negative emotions and thoughts. Benefits of EMDR are that it is highly effective, often more efficient than talk therapy, and does not require that you talk in detail about the event. To learn more about EMDR and how it works, click here.

    Whether or not we use EMDR, I often begin trauma therapy by teaching you tools to understand and begin to regulate your body and nervous system so you can start feeling more in control. Because every person is unique, sessions are customized to each person’s needs. I fully believe the most important thing in therapy is the relationship you have with your therapist, and my therapeutic style is collaborative, open, and non-judgmental. I will work with you to help you figure out what session structure and approach is most helpful and effective for you.

  • My approach to therapy is focused on your individual needs, so how long you need to be in therapy will be specific to you. When we first start to work together, we will clarify your goals and identify the benchmarks that will let you know when you will be ready to end. My hope is to help you reach your goals, AND to find relief and make changes throughout the process of working towards them.

    Generally speaking, trauma that occurred one time, like a car crash or a single sexual assault can be shorter to treat, while more complex trauma that happened many times, while someone was a child, or by a trusted person takes longer. Each person’s treatment is unique - what’s most important to me is that you get what YOU need.

  • Trauma therapy is a good fit for people who are insightful, curious, and open to new perspectives and experiences. Clients who benefit from this work are open to exploring their emotions, thoughts, somatic (body-based) experiences, and ways that past experiences may be shaping their current struggles.

  • Reach out to schedule a free initial 15 minute consultation. During that call, we will talk briefly about what is going on for you and what you’re needing help with. I will also ask you about any past experiences of therapy so that I can learn what has or has not worked for you before. I will also talk more about how I work and answer any questions you have to make sure we are a good fit. If so, we will schedule our first session and discuss any logistics you need to know in advance.