During the 2020 COVID pandemic, I decided to start conducting all therapy sessions by way of telehealth. After reflecting on the Covid-19 situation & the success of that platform, I have continued to offer secure and expanded telehealth sessions both for existing clients and for new client intakes. I am trained in and available for telehealth therapy via HIPAA-compliant, confidential video conference services across Tennessee on a variety of days, evenings and times. Later, we may move to a hybrid schedule and offer both telehealth sessions and also face to face sessions. Look for that announcement in the future.
I am dedicated to serving Tennesseans by offering telehealth therapy.
Face-to Face therapy services opening in the future.
Contact us for a complimentary 15 minute phone consultation to determine how we might work together toward the life you would like to be living and if we might be a good fit to accomplish your goals and what you would like to change.
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing “EMDR” therapy is a well-researched treatment for various mental health issues. EMDR targets traumatic memories that become “locked” in the brain, as well as symptoms associated with these memories, such as flashbacks, recurring nightmares, and disturbing thoughts and emotions. These memories form when an individual is under significant stress, such as experienced during a violent event, abuse, rape, accident, and bullying,
EMDR utilizes a comprehensive, structured, and integrative psychotherapy approach. This therapy integrates techniques from well-established and research supported therapies. Specifically, EMDR therapy relies on changing information processing. During eight phases of treatment, the therapy focuses on healing past disturbing experiences, current experiences that trigger distressing emotions, maladaptive beliefs and uncomfortable bodily sensations, and enhancement of positive behaviors and thinking processes for how you would like to be in the future. Several neuroimaging studies have demonstrated positive neurological changes after EMDR sessions. Many studies support the effectiveness of EMDR therapy as an evidence based therapeutic intervention.
It is believed that trauma does not rest in the past, but in your nervous system and body. By paying attention to your body, we can support you in your experience of a more coherent and resilient system. Trauma is a reality for most of us and presents differently for each person. Trauma may continue to live within us in the form of anxiety or sleep issues, migraines or depression, lack or motivation or relationship problems. The central core of trauma that is true for all is that this trauma is stored in the memory of the body in a variety of ways.
“SOMATIC EXPERIENCING® (SE) psychobiological trauma resolution is a potent method for resolving trauma symptoms and relieving chronic stress. It is the life’s work of Dr. Peter A. Levine, resulting from his multidisciplinary study of stress physiology, psychology, ethology, biology, neuroscience, indigenous healing practices, and medical biophysics, together with over 45 years of successful clinical application. The SE approach releases traumatic shock, which is key to transforming PTSD, Complex PTSD, acute stress and trauma, and the wounds of emotional and early developmental attachment trauma. You can learn more at the” http://www.traumahealing.org/
I am currently a three year student in Dr, Levine’s progam and will complete the three year training in February 2023 and I am a Somatic Experiencing Practitioner(SEP) with additional somatic training in PTSD, Complex Trauma, Developmental and Attachment Trauma.
This freeze response holds the key to understanding trauma. Once aroused, our survival responses of fight or flight need to come to successful completion in order for our nervous systems to come back to a state of rest and balance. When we are unable to complete these responses, our nervous systems become frozen. This frozen, immobilized state may look calm on the outside, but internally the state can be compared to what happens in a car when we step on the brake and the accelerator at the same time. A huge amount of energy is reviving, creating the symptoms of trauma.
The Somatic Experiencing approach, developed by Peter Levine, is a gentle therapy for resolving and discharging unresolved survival energies, thereby healing the symptoms of trauma.
The goal of SE therapy is to offer a safe, trusting holding space where you can engage, complete, and resolve your body’s instinctual fight, flight, and freeze responses. This helps restore inner balance, widens your resiliency to stress, and builds your capacity to actively engage in and enjoy life.
SE can be very effective for individuals who are suffering from toxic stress, PTSD, chronic pain, childhood trauma, shock trauma, invasive dental/medical trauma, accidents, combat, first responder stress/trauma, betrayal tauma, natural disasters, near drownings, and assault. That being said, it is effective for most all of us.
“Trauma is in the nervous system, not in the event.” -Peter Levine, Ph.D, founder of Somatic Experiencing
“Trauma is a fact of life. It does not however have to be a life sentence” -Peter Levine, Ph.D
Dr. Peter Levine working with a Veteran using Somatic Experiencing®
Will return when face-to-face therapy sessions are made available. I study & train with the Southern Sandtray Institute.
Sandtray Therapy with Children and Adolescents
You’re stuck, overwhelmed, and tired, and you need help finding your way forward.
