What Is Somatic Experiencing Therapy?

Somatic therapy does not only treat the mind, it also focuses on treating the body and the nervous system for complete and long-term wellness. At times, your body holds on to the memories of the trauma, which makes treatment difficult. Start somatic therapy with Dr. Zlatin Ivanov to address trauma and stress using body-based techniques. Dr. Ivanov focuses on the mind-body connection and releases any pent-up trauma stuck in the body. Using the right therapies and techniques, he strives to heal chronic tension and painful emotions at a cellular level to help you start feeling better faster. 

 Somatic experiencing therapy is an alternative therapy that helps people heal from trauma. It works on the principle that trauma gets trapped in the body, leading to anxiety, panic, and inability to calm down, among other trauma symptoms. With this method, healthcare providers strive to release stress from the body.

Many people who have been through trauma, particularly physical trauma such as domestic violence or sexual assault, can dissociate or disconnect from their bodies and may need somatic experiencing for increased awareness of their internal experience.

What is Somatic Experiencing Therapy?

Somatic counseling, also known as somatic experiencing therapy or SE therapy, treats post-traumatic stress, past trauma, and effects from other mental health conditions. The therapist helps to connect a person’s mind and body to apply psychotherapy and physical therapies during treatment. It has proved effective by combining mindfulness, grounding techniques, and traditional talk therapy.

Somatic means relating to the body, so somatic therapy is about the mind-body connection. Experts believe that a person’s inner feelings impact their physical form, and mind-body exercises can help to release pent-up trauma from the mind and the body. As these bodily sensations are released, a somatic therapist can work towards healing trauma from the inside out with this form of trauma therapy.

Read on to find out more about the techniques involved in somatic therapies and how they can help you deal with trauma.

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How Does Somatic Therapy Work?

Somatic therapy approaches aim to address both physical and mental health simultaneously so that you can find relief more quickly. The therapy addresses the feelings of being trapped by personal physical and emotional stress, which leads to anxiety, panic, and inability to calm down. It treats any deeply rooted negative emotions stored in the body.

While traditional talk therapies can effectively deal with many emotional and mental health challenges, they do not address the physical symptoms. Experts believe that somatic therapy can help an individual find relief from the stress and chronic pain that prevents them from fully experiencing life.

Somatic experiencing therapy is a specific approach to somatic therapy. It is based on the idea that traumatic experiences cause dysfunction in the nervous system, which prevents it from processing experience. Thus, somatic experiencing therapy helps notice psychical sensations resulting from mental health issues and use this awareness to work through painful feelings and emotions. The physical sensations can be in the form of chronic pain and other unpleasant symptoms.

When Somatic Therapy Works Effectively?

Somatic trauma healing therapy focuses on an individual’s mental and physical connection during treatment and can be performed in individual and group therapy settings. This type of trauma therapy can effectively address both physical and psychological symptoms of certain mental health issues, including:

• Chronic stress
• Anxiety
• Depression
• Grief
• Addiction
• Trauma and abuse
• Problems with relationships
• Sexual function

The somatic approach encourages the body to re-negotiate past events physically, facilitating relief from intrusive images, thoughts, tension, panic, unhealthy relationships, and feelings of sadness or despair.

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Somatic Therapy Exercises and Techniques

A therapist uses techniques that release trauma or negative emotions from the body. They can include:

• Breathing exercises for anxiety
• Sensation awareness
• Physical exercise
• Message
• Dance therapy
• Grounding exercises

These exercises and techniques emphasize developing new thinking patterns and behaviors which help an individual better respond to various experiences or emotions as they come up.

Somatic therapy focuses on engaging an individual’s body as a therapy technique and draws from the basic functions of the nervous system during the treatment. Over time, somatic trauma healing therapy helps individuals improve their body awareness and learn techniques to release physical tension.

Somatic therapy techniques include:

Grounding

This approach involves a person sensing their physical form, engaging their senses, feeling their feet on the earth, and ultimately calming down their nervous system. It is the act of connecting deeply to your body and the earth, at that moment.

Boundary Development

It helps individuals focus on the present moment, empowering them to stay responsive to their changing needs and develop clear boundaries to deal with relationships and other people, be it family, friends, or coworkers. This technique prepares them to respond in a way that makes them feel strong and protected.

Self-Regulation

This technique highlights the significance of staying connected to the body during emotional situations or sensations. Self-regulation aims to develop an awareness of physical sensations to respond to emotions effectively.

Movement and process

Somatic therapies focus on an individual’s capacity to heal by listening to their body and incorporating what is known as body psychotherapy. Postures, gestures, and the use of space all offer insight into individual experiences, and in SE therapy, they are encouraged to mindfully engage with their impulses to drive a resolution.

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Sequencing

As the tension is released, the movement of emotion can occur throughout the body. Tension starts building in the belly, moves to the chest, and finally settles into the tightness of the throat or is released via tears. It helps one to breathe more freely.

Titration

It refers to the process of experiencing small amounts of distress to relieve pain from a past traumatic event or experience. As you slowly begin to revisit your past trauma, the therapist will track your body’s response and sensations. They check how you feel in addition to watching your physical response, breathing changes, clenched hands, or a shift in tone of voice.

Somatic experiencing therapy has proved beneficial in cases where traditional treatment methods did not work. People who were going through physical pain, digestive disorders, sleep problems, and other medical issues after their traumatic experience found relief with somatic experiencing therapy. The idea behind using this somatic technique is that once the physical symptoms are resolved, it is easy to address psychological symptoms.

Searching for a Somatic Therapist – What to Look For?

Finding a licensed and experienced mental health professional with specialized training in somatic therapy techniques is the first step towards getting started with this form of treatment. The right therapist identifies the strong connection between a person’s mind and body and comes up with the best techniques for treating mental health issues. Somatic therapy can be easily integrated into other counseling and psychotherapy practices.

Your thoughts and feelings can impact your physical well-being, and body-mind exercises can help to release pent-up tension. Thus, you must look for a therapist who works with you to understand your trauma and enables you to overcome the challenges you are going through.

If you want to take a more body-focused approach to your mental health, call Online Psychiatrists to schedule an appointment. Dr. Zlatin Ivanov is a licensed and board-certified mental health professional with years of experience. He has helped people heal better by managing the physical tension in their bodies and addressing their past traumatic experiences and painful emotions successfully. He uses special techniques to release any repressed trauma that has become trapped in your body to improve your mental health condition and as a result, enhance your quality of life.