How best can I help you?

Stress and anxiety have been described as a ‘fight and flight’ response, which has become switched on in situations where it is not actually helpful. In these activated states, symptoms might include tense muscles, fast breathing and a rapid heartbeat or a racing mind.

Using a variety of Somatic (body-based) approaches, you can learn simple and effective ways to calm your nervous system so that you feel more comfortable in your body. With practice this can lead to increased ease, capacity and resilience in your life.

When you feel ready, we can work on any deeper issues underlying the anxiety, with the aim of releasing the activation in the lower parts of the brain that lie below conscious awareness. This in turn helps to change thought patterns and mindsets that exist in the connections between the lower brain and the ‘thinking mind’ located in the upper parts of the brain.

Somatic Therapies can help to resolve the effects of frightening or difficult things that have happened in your life. With a structured approach over several sessions, you can learn techniques to practice at home to bring your nervous system back into a more comfortable balance. In our sessions you may choose to work with reducing any hypervigilance or PTSD symptoms, building positive resources and completing the protective responses that were not available to you at the time of the trauma.

Examples of the kind of traumas that people ask for help with are accidents, medical trauma, assaults, childhood traumas and many others. The physiology of the body and the process of memory storage are similar in a wide range of situations, and the principles of Somatic Therapy can be followed regardless of what caused the distress.

Somatic Experiencing™ forms the foundation of the way I work, and is especially suited for working with single events that have happened in adult life. When needed, and especially for early childhood and developmental trauma, I bring in other approaches such as Somatic Attachment, NeuroAffective Touch™ and Deep Brain Reorienting™.

We all wish for every baby to have a perfect bond with their main carer, but sometimes it’s not so easy – perhaps the carer is worried about money or safety, perhaps the home environment is in some way frightening to the baby or child. If there are difficulties with early bonding the baby or child adapts to their circumstances, and this can set up patterns of relating that continue into adult relationships.

Even in the most nurturing families, a baby or young child may experience other difficult events, such as being born prematurely or needing to have major surgery. This is known as developmental trauma, and along with difficulties arising in early attachment, can be helped with techniques from Somatic Experiencing, Somatic Attachment, Neuroaffective Touch, and Deep Brain Reorienting.

While we know a lot about the effects of adverse early experience (ACE study, Dunedin study), new research shows that having a few protective experiences in childhood, for example having a trusted adult you could talk to, or belonging to a sports team, greatly reduces the effects of difficult experiences.

Are you curious to learn about your nervous system from the inside out? With exercises using movement, imagination and other experiential approaches connecting to the ‘felt sense’ of the body, you can get in touch with your instinctive protective responses in a safe environment and check that they are in good shape just in case you need them.

I like to think of it as a course in ‘Life-quake preparedness’, or a ‘tune-up’ for your nervous system. About six sessions would be a good number, though more might be helpful if we encounter any significant past traumas along the way.

If you have already experienced counselling or psychotherapy for a period of time, and are curious to find the somatic ‘piece of the puzzle’, I can help you deepen your awareness in a more embodied way. It is a privilege to work with people who have a high level of self awareness, and to witness fresh understandings emerge from a new somatic perspective.

Low mood and depression can be seen as a ‘conservation’ state, with low energy and reduced motivation. This is sometimes connected to the ‘freeze’ response in the nervous system.

I can teach you simple ways to feel more present and energised; which can lead to increased capacity and enjoyment in your life. Anxiety and depression may both originate in past trauma, and using Somatic Therapy to release the imprints of difficult events in your life, can help restore a feeling of wellbeing and vitality.

Please note, that if you have moderate or severe problems with anxiety and depression, I recommend an assessment with your General Practitioner or a mental health professional. Mainstream treatments including medication can be very helpful and often life-transforming.

Some of my clients are aware that they are more sensitive and perceptive than most people they know. There can be many reasons for people’s different levels of sensory and emotional awareness including genetic variations, the environment during the growing-up years and opportunities in life to encourage and cultivate these qualities. Sometimes the high sensitivity is connected to hypervigilance arising in past trauma.

With a gentle titrated approach, you can learn to calm any over-active responses in your nervous system, leaving you free to appreciate your high level of natural sensitivity. The finely attuned techniques from Aline LaPierre’s NeuroAffective Touch™ can be especially helpful here.

Becoming a parent is a time of enormous transition, and can bring issues from the past into awareness now. These can show up as anxiety or low mood, memories of past traumas, relationship difficulties, or being easily triggered to intense emotions. With a Somatic Therapy approach, you can learn simple skills to smooth out the ups and downs of nervous system activation, increase tolerance and capacity, and more appreciate the joys of your new life. We can also work on any deeper issues that surface at this time.

For those who have given birth, even a natural birth experience can be challenging and interventions in labour often need to happen quickly without time for preparation or integration. I can help you to process these difficult experiences so that you can be more present in your life, and with your new baby.

For me, ‘parent’ includes anyone who is caring for babies and young children, and acknowledge that all parents are doing their best and intuitively know that babies thrive with gentle and consistent care from someone who is emotionally available to them. But it is not always easy – each child is a unique person with their own needs, and sometimes present circumstances or past experience make parenting extra hard. Please know that it is OK to ask for help, and that many new parents face similar challenges – you are not alone.

I am available to give talks in person or on Zoom to small groups and individuals such as Medical professionals, Counsellors, Yoga teachers and other therapists who would like a deeper understanding of the mind-body connection. My approach is both practical, with Somatic exercises for you to embody, and with plenty of neuroscience to satisfy your cerebral cortex.

As well as techniques to help your clients, the embodiment skills learned will help your own capacity and resilience and reduce the risk of burnout. Having worked as a first-responder for many years in rural Scotland, I understand the importance of good self-care.

I occasionally run a six week course, with the chance to learn techniques from a wide range of approaches including mindfulness, ‘body-fulness’, conscious movement, Somatic Therapy techniques and simple relaxations.

Along with wellbeing tips learned from many years of helping people achieve better health and happiness, and a sprinkling of neuroscience theory, these courses can help you to build embodied resilience, leading to more ease and enjoyment of life.

Let me know if you are interested, and I can send you more information when the next course is running.