TRAUMA THERAPY – SOMATIC EXPERIENCING ® (SE)

What is Somatic Experiencing®?
Somatic Experiencing (SE) is a body-oriented therapy, which assimilates traumatic experiences and shock. It is based on the neuro-physiological understanding that traumatic experiences are “stored” in the nervous system.
Dr. Peter A. Levine, the founder and president of the “Foundation for Human Enrichment” in Colorado USA, developed this method after extensive observation of the behavior of the life of wild animals, realizing that these animals are not traumatized, even though they are constantly exposed to traumatic situations.

What is Trauma?
Trauma is a violation of a person’s boundaries and protective layers, and is an overwhelm of the ordinary human adaptations to life. An event happens too fast, too strongly and too suddenly for the body to have its natural response (fighting or fleeing). The body is left with the only other response: freezing. The activated stress energy remains caught in the nervous system without being released. The necessary physiological rhythm from activation to discharge, from tightening to releasing is interrupted, and the body loses its balance.

What are the causes of Trauma?
The causes of trauma can be: psychological wounds like abandonment, loss, abuse, verbal violence, physical violence, war, natural disasters, accidents plus toxic and medical influences.
“Trauma is in the nervous system, not in the event”. (Dr. P.A. Levine)

What are the consequences of trauma?
Because the build-up of energy has no opportunity to discharge, it remains “stored” in the nervous system, and the body reacts as if the frightening experience of the past continues to exist. Psychic and physical symptoms such as fear, hypersensitivity, sleep disorders, depression, lack of efficiency, fatigue, sweating and chronic pain are the results. Such conditions are often confusing and disturbing for the affected person and those close to them, because at first the resulting conditions are not seen as connected to the trauma.

How does Somatic Experiencing® help?
With SE it is possible to process the traumatic experience without knowing or speaking about the causal content. This is of importance especially if the event appears too threatening or burdening. Therefore, a possible re-traumatism can be avoided.
Through gentle tracking of the body sensations and the development of those resources (possibilities and sources of strength), which during the event were not available to the client, a discharge of the blocked and frozen life energy happens step by step. The natural physical responses, which were interrupted through the traumatic impact, are completed and thus the nervous system returns to its natural self-regulation and the balance between activation and relief is restored. Images, behaviors, thought patterns, and emotional responses receive new meanings and the person affected regains his sense of security and trust in himself and his environment.

DREAMS AND TRAUMA
In these related sessions, I offer a combination of SE and gestalt therapeutic work with dreams, which is designed to process reoccurring alarming dreams. Often these dreams appear in important and challenging life situations, and are meaningful indications of the subconscious, which help us in understanding and accepting challenges.

I offer individual sessions in both German and English.

Deutsche Fassung