Somatic Experiencing ® and NeuroAffective Touch® work directly with the nervous system to bring greater resiliency, which increases our capacity to hold steadiness and joy through the inevitable stressors of life.
When I first experienced Somatic Experiencing® and NeuroAffective Touch® as a client, it was the first time in my long healing journey that I felt like I had found the roots responsible for ongoing unwanted reactions, patterns, and anxieties. The shifts I have experienced from this work have been profound.
My background is in Early Childhood Education, I was a Montessori teacher here on Maui, I am a Hospice Maui volunteer, I have used my master Reiki attunement for animals as end of life support, and am an avid student of birth and death.
Our body remembers everything even when our brain does not. This keeps us safe and is of perfect design. It can also be maladaptive when survival stress gets stuck, trapped, or it continues in a loop. This can happen when we experience something that was too much, too fast, too soon, or not enough, and we didn’t have the support we needed in the moment to process that experience. We see this expressed as things like anxiety, fear, rage, disregulation, addiction, depression, ptsd, etc.
I use the modalities of NeuroAffective Touch® and Somatic Experiencing® with my understanding of early childhood development to help others feel the messages coming from their bodies via sensations and emotions so that maladaptive strategies and outdated energies can move through. Simply stated, I help you feel your feelings so they can be released and not stuffed down inside.
This work builds self trust and expands our capacity for all that life brings us so that when we experience the inevitable waves of hardships and joys we have more space for it all and can float on top of it without sinking.
We are so much more than an individual having individual issues. We are part of a vast web of cultures, communities, systems, and collective experiences. We will call on the strengths of these systems as we hold the both/and understanding that these same systems can also cause harm. Understanding that both can be true, we move towards creating new possibilities for ourselves and the collective.
This is heart work. This is healing work. By being brave and showing up for ourselves in this way, everything around us transforms as well. We feel it to heal it. We do this together. A more loving world is being born because of it. Keep going. I know it’s hard. I am here to support you through it.
FAQ’s
What kind of clients do you take?
I see people of all ages who are going through a variety of stresses, anxiety, depression, addiction, ailments, night terrors, big emotions, neglect, etc. My background is with working with young kids so I am very comfortable working with all ages, from infants to adults.
How do I know if this is for me?
Everyone receives a complementary 15 min introductory phone call before booking your first appointment to discuss what our sessions may look like and see if it feels like a good fit. There is no obligation commit to a session. It can be that simply considering this work is the first seed planted and your readiness comes with time. I am here for you when you are ready.
How long are the sessions?
My sessions are between 60-90 minutes. Each session is different, some days feel complete in 60min, many need a little more time.
How much are your sessions?
I am offering a sliding scale of $125-$185 for each session.
What can I expect a session to be like?
We will find a comfortable place to sit. I will be listening to all that you want to share while noticing what the body is wanting to say as well.
Our work explores how our adaptations to hard things show up in the body and in our unconscious behavior patterns.
Somatic Experiencing® is a very dynamic experience so each day may bring forward something new to the surface. This work resolves symptoms of stress, shock, and other traumas that accumulate in our bodies and get stuck in patterns of fight, flight, freeze, and fawn. SE™ and NA Touch® help us release and recover and integrate so that a new way of responding to stress can evolve. We may use light touch, with explicit consent, to help soothe the nervous system and heal foundational developmental attachment ruptures. This may happen through small weighted pillows, stuffed animals, and light supportive touch from my hands. This may be experienced in a chair, couch or on a massage table. I make sure to hear consent from your mind through words and through your body’s language. Consent is revisited multiple times throughout the session as comfort can and will change and that will always be honored without judgement.
If I am working with younger humans, or the young version of yourself that still resides within your adult body and subconscious mind, there may be art, or writing, or movement involved, which allows the subconscious part of their brain help to tell the stories that the conscious mind doesn’t have the words for. This is dynamic, in the moment work. We show up for what is present that day and work from there.
Who are your teachers for this trauma work?
My intensive trainings and courses include:
Dr. Raja Selvam of Integral Somatic Psychology and Somatic Experiencing International®
Linda Stelte and Mahshid Hagar of Somatic Experiencing International®
Dr. Aline LaPierre’s NeuroAffective Touch®
Dr. Abi Blakeslee and Kate White’s Advanced Somatic Resolution Skills for Perinatal Trauma
Dra. Rocia Rosales Meza’s Unlearning and Healing the White Colonial Mind and Decolonial Shadow work
Kimberly Ann Johnson’s Trauma and Transcendence and The Fourth Trimester,
Ariel Giarretto’s Advanced Strategies for Working with Sexual Trauma and Sexuality
Flor Cruz and Lia Berquist’s Your Badass Natural Birth Class.
Additionally, there are many books that have supported my learning. A few of my favorite and most influential authors are: Resmaa Menakem, Renee Linklater, Gabor Maté, Peter Levine, Stephen Jenkinson, Maggie Klein, and Babette Rothschild.
Somatic Experiencing® is the work of Dr. Peter Levine.
SE™ is based on the notion that traditional talk therapy does not fully take into account the body, the place where trauma is most commonly held.
This is approached as a collaboration between the practitioner and client as they gently learn the unique language of the client’s body, develop tools for self regulation, and restore balance and ease within the nervous system. This results in the body’s nervous system becoming more resilient, and becomes a space where nervous system renegotiation and healing can come.
You can read more about SE™ by following the links below:
Somatic Experiencing® International
NeuroAffective Touch® is the work of Dr. Aline LaPierre.
This gentle therapeutic touch helps repair developmental trauma by offering clients the fundamental missing nonverbal experiences of connection, support, attunement, and nurturing.
NeuroAffective Touch®
Contact Me.
I am continually amazed and impressed by the transformative power of nervous system health and cannot wait to support you in your journey. Please reach out with your questions, I am so looking forward to hearing from you.
I will respond with 24hrs. If you do not see my email, please check your spam folder.