Somatic Psychotherapy

Somatic Psychotherapy

The Holistic Approach

Somatic psychotherapy, a holistic therapeutic approach, incorporates a person’s mind, body, spirit, and emotions in the healing process. This approach may be able to quickly address deep emotional issues not revealed through traditional talk therapy, simply by paying attention to the communication of the body. Past trauma or other psychological concerns may potentially have a negative effect on a person’s autonomic nervous system, people experiencing emotional and psychological issues may also be affected by physical concerns such as sexual dysfunction, hormonal issues, digestive issues, or tension in specific parts of the body such as the head, neck, shoulders, or stomach.

Somatic psychotherapy can help individuals both become more aware of these bodily sensations and learn to use therapeutic techniques to release any tension the body is holding. Techniques often used in therapy include breathing exercise and sensation awareness, physical exercise such as yoga or other movement, and grounding exercises.

Birchwood Therapeutic Services offers multiple interventions to help a client release stored tension and deep rooted emotional pain:

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a psychotherapy that enables people to heal from the symptoms and emotional distress that are the result of disturbing life experiences.

Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) relieves symptoms by an unusual (but scientific) routine of tapping with the fingertips on a short series of points on the body that correspond to acupuncture points on the energy meridians.

Trauma Sensitive Yoga, or TSY, is different from a traditional yoga practice in that it encourages awareness and positive regard for the body through gentle movement and simple breathing exercises.