Common trauma responses include high levels of mistrust, fear, perceived threat, seeking to control to feel safe, self-doubt, disconnection, “not knowing how I feel,” with more serious experiences being nightmares, flashbacks, avoidance of thinking about or recalling trauma experiences, intense emotional/psychological or physiological symptoms when “triggered.”

I’ll help you build coping skills to manage these expeiences in more healthy and effective ways so you can experience less intense responses, or even “notice” the trigges and not feel “out of it.”

If traumatic experiences feels like the title of your book of life, we’ll work together to make it only a chapter.

Religious trauma is defined as “the physical, emotional, or psychological response to religious beliefs, practices, or structures that overwhelms an individual’s ability to cope or return to baseline safety and stability.”

High-demand religious organizations (some churches and all cults) can be damaging in that they require and compel  ‘obedience’ to restrictive behaviors using shame and guilt. This can have lasting influences on psychological, social, relational, and sexual development.

If this is something relevant for you, I will walk with you through the deconstruction process of unpacking these beliefs and practices and how “outsourcing” worth and value” hurt and impacted you. I’ll also support the rebuilding or ‘reconstruction’ process identifying your personal values, beliefs, goals, wants, thoughts, and opinions to reclaim yourself.

Our “inner child” is that part of us which houses all our unmet childhood needs, wounds, core beliefs, and subconscious thoughts. This happens because our critical thinking brains weren’t fully developed yet, but our emotional/survival brain was and stored these experiences. This is why you might say, “I know (xyz) isn’t true, but it just feels that way.” This helps us understand how our inner child experiences are primarily emotional, not logical and can create feelings of guilt, shame, and confusion.

Unresolved childhood wounds lead to both depression and anxiety as both are processes of disconnection. If anxious, we learned to disconnect from overwhelming feelings or emotions, and instead began to overthink, over-solve, over-anticiate every possible scenario to ‘be prepared’ or ‘be safe.’ If depressed, we maybe felt far too overwhelmed to do all that prep and instead dropped into disconnection from people, withdrawal from activitites, hopelessness, and a sense of worthlessness.

I help by providing support with “reparenting” the inner child thorugh emotional processing skills, visualizations, and somatic (body-based) techniques. Over time, you’ll learn how to feel whole, compassioante, and connected to that younger version of yourself.

Self-reflective journals, boundary affirmations, Daily Dose of DBT, planners, and guided journals all designed with your healing in mind. Click here to check them out on Amazon.

As a seasoned, mature therapist with over 30 years experience, I’m honored to “pay it forward” and share with other clinicians the knowledge, guidance, support, and wisdom taught to me.

I can provide professional consultation regarding:

• Case Conceptualizations & Modality Implementation
• Scheduling and Documentation Management
• Therapeutic Relationship Factors
• Self-Reflective/Process-oriented work with clients and colleagues
• Risk Management

My consultation fee is $150/hour. Please contact me at shannan@sbmftservices.com if this interests you.