Two people holding hands and feeling connected again after having greatly improved their relationship through trauma therapy

Trauma Therapy in Weston, Connecticut

You can heal the invisible wounds that get in the way of intimacy and connection.

Do your relationships feel distant and unsatisfying? Do you spend so much time managing how others see you that you’ve lost touch with who you truly are?

It doesn’t make sense.

You’ve followed the plan. You’ve done all the things that were expected of you. You’ve built a beautiful life - a stable career, a loving partner, wonderful children, and girlfriends to laugh with over margaritas. Your life is full, busy, and—by all accounts—exactly what it should be.

So why are you not happy?

You do well at everything you take on. Always have.

• Awards and promotions prove it.

• Friends adore you.

• Your family depends on you, and you never miss a beat.

You’re good at holding it all together. It’s what you do.

No matter what life has thrown at you, you’ve kept moving forward—head up, chin high. No one would ever guess the storms you weather inside because you never let them show. You take pride in that. You’re strong, independent, and capable. You don’t need anyone’s help. Or pity. And besides, you wouldn’t even know how to let people in.

But holding it in comes at a cost.

Suffering in silence doesn’t decrease the pain

It leaves you feeling lonely, unseen, and exhausted. No one really knows you—just the version of you they expect. And to keep up that image, you spend so much time and energy making sure you’re the one who’s always put together, always fun, always supportive. You focus on everyone else so no one ever has to focus on you.

Which means no one knows the real you. Not even you.

Asian woman leaning against a wooden table wearing a blue button down shirt with her left hand on her head, thinking about trauma therapy, as a man sits looking down with his head on his hands behind her

Your constant focus on others has left you anxious, exhausted, and disconnected—not just from the people around you, but from yourself.

You want to stop:

• Constantly scanning for signs of how others are feeling so you can adjust your voice, behavior, or even the topic of conversation.

• Overthinking every interaction, replaying conversations, and worrying about how you came across.

• Living with a nagging sense that something bad is about to happen, that you messed up, or that people are annoyed with you.

• Struggling to make decisions because you’re so used to prioritizing everyone else.

• Feeling responsible for keeping everyone happy—even at your own expense.

• Feeling deeply lonely, even in a room full of people.

You’ve been trying to cope on your own for some time.

You’ve told yourself “it’s not so bad; many people have it much worse” - and while this may be true, it hasn’t changed how you feel. 

You’ve pushed your emotions down and pushed through the overwhelm, focusing on what must get done.

You’ve become even more productive, dependable, independent, and “strong” - you reminded yourself that you “can do anything”.

You’ve kept yourself active and busy so there’s no space for “pesky emotions” to seep in.

You’ve scrolled through social media and binged on your favorite shows to distract yourself.

You’ve become even better at taking care of the people around you.

None of these have brought long-term relief.

This is because these methods all rely on distraction, striving and rational thinking to address the effects of complex trauma in your life. But though they bring you momentary relief and help you push away your feelings with logic, your emotional reactions continue to feel out of control and overwhelming.

This makes sense from a neurobiological perspective.

When we allow ourselves to feel and process our emotions, we can naturally release them and reset our minds and bodies. But, when we distract ourselves from pain - by pushing it down, distracting or ignoring it - we interrupt this process. The pain doesn’t just disappear; it waits until the next time it can resurface. And when it inevitably does, it can feel even stronger because our nervous systems have been under a lot of tension to keep holding onto it. 

This is why emotions that have been pushed away for years can feel so overwhelming when they finally break through.

How do I know if I have Complex Trauma (CPTSD)?

Bearded man wearing jeans and a hooded jeans jacket sitting on a wooden park bench alone, looking up at sky and thinking about getting Brainspotting therapy for complex trauma

Complex trauma (CPTSD) affects how you think, feel and behave. It can be difficult to recognize at first, but there are some typical emotions and behaviors that characterize complex trauma, such as:

  • Feeling on edge, numb or like you can’t handle your emotions

  • Experiencing a deep sense of shame and guilt whenever something doesn’t go according to plan 

  • Avoiding your emotions by staying busy or distracting yourself 

  • Saying yes when you want to say no

  • Overexplaining yourself

  • Replaying conversations in your head, worrying that you did something wrong

  • Putting other people’s needs above your own

Recognizing these patterns in yourself can be both validating and unsettling. You may wonder if facing your trauma may make things worse. But healing doesn’t mean reliving what overwhelmed you in the past. It means learning new ways to relate to yourself - mind, body and emotions - so you can finally feel at ease.

If you’re ready to get support, reach out for therapy for complex trauma (CPTSD) in Weston, CT.

How Complex Trauma Therapy Can Help You

Brunette trauma therapist wearing a white tank and beige linen pants, sitting with her legs crossed on a fluffy white rug, with both hands over her heart, smiling

Rather than focusing on going over the details of your trauma, our work will focus on helping you identify the ways in which it affects your life now, and release the burdens you carry as a result of CPTSD. It may include:

  • Learning gentle, manageable ways to recognize what you're feeling and find the words to talk about it so you can feel more in control of your emotions

  • Identifying how your feelings show up in the body (for example, where you feel tension when you're anxious or what happens in your chest when you're afraid) so we can address these experiences directly, helping you find relief that thinking alone can't bring

  • Helping you gradually get comfortable with the different sensations related to your trauma so they become less overwhelming over time 

  • Practicing techniques to help you stay grounded for those moments when you feel overwhelmed and need quick relief

  • Helping you understand and heal the different parts of yourself that may have been hurt or stuck in the past

  • Using your eyes to help you connect with and process the emotions that keep you feeling on edge, overwhelmed, and unable to trust or fully connect in relationships

In all of our work, we will move at the speed of trust so that you don’t feel overwhelmed during sessions, and make gradual and sustainable progress. 

Trauma therapy with me is different from (all of) the things you’ve tried.

I use approaches like Somatic Experiencing, IFS and Brainspotting not only because they’re trauma treatment modalities, but because they’re gentle yet effective; helping you work through the effects of trauma by engaging the natural healing processes of your brain, body and mind.

I’ve been specifically trained to work with these deeper levels of emotional experience, which is where the effects of trauma are usually felt most intensely - not in the thinking mind.

I can help you:

  • Recognize and work with body sensations so you can catch emotions before they escalate and create overwhelm for you and conflict in your relationships.

  • Change your automatic responses so you can choose how to react rather than let your emotions make you blow up or freeze - and then drown in regret.

  • Acknowledge competing needs within yourself - such as your longing for connection and your urge to protect your heart - and find ways to meet them both so you can make decisions that feel good and right. 

  • Heal your emotional wounds, not just understand where they come from, so you can experience your emotions and body responses without feeling consumed by them.

I’ve dedicated my practice to understanding emotions and healing at deeper levels because I’ve seen how transformative these approaches are. 

When we work together at these deeper levels, you’ll notice changes like:

  • Feeling calmer in your body and mind

  • Reacting differently in situations that cause you to blow up or shut down

  • Feeling at ease in conversations and letting go of the pressure to look like you have it all together

  • Being surprised at the positive emotions that will start to show up and how sustainable they begin to feel 

Working directly with the physical and emotional effects of trauma in your life (rather than trying to control or change them) helps us go beyond understanding the reason why they happen and instead be able to work through and release them. 

A black and white figure in the shape of a heart and a brain, where half of the image is one hemisphere of the brain and the other half is the right side of the heart (the body organ, not a cartoon)

How Trauma Therapy With Me Works 

Take charge of your life.

A black woman in braids, wearing a green turtleneck and a brown blazer, waving at the laptop on her lap, saying hello to her trauma therapist at the beginning of a somatic therapy session

We’re a good fit to work together if:

You’ve been in therapy before, but feel like there are things that you haven’t been able to address or change with traditional talk therapy;

You have learned some skills to cope with your trauma, but still live with a pervasive sense that the other shoe is about to drop;

By all external measures, you have a “good life”. But you still feel uneasy, disconnected from yourself, uncomfortable with how intense your emotions are - and how they affect your behavior, unable to have the emotional intimacy you desire in your relationships, and feel like you’re always worried about people walking away from you;

You take a holistic approach to healing and want to go beyond exploring your thoughts and incorporate mind-body modalities into your healing.

Trauma Therapy FAQs

If you have more questions have a look at the FAQ page or reach out.

  • Trauma can show up in different ways, and is not always easy to recognize. You may have experienced a difficult event in the past that still affects their daily life or you may have grown up in an environment where ongoing stress or emotional harm was present. A few signs that you may have experienced trauma include being easily overwhelmed, struggling with intense emotional reactions, being easily overwhelmed, having trust issues in relationships, and feeling numb or disconnected from yourself. I’ve written a blog post about this, which you can read by clicking here.

    Trauma therapy can help if you feel like things you experienced in the past still affect your emotions and relationships, if you find it hard to take next steps and move forward in life, and if you feel disconnected from your body and sense of self. If you have questions about whether trauma therapy can benefit you, have a conversation with a therapist. They can help you explore your experiences, identify if trauma might be present, and, if needed, guide you on the path to healing.

  • CPTSD is trauma that results from prolonged or repeated exposure to situations where people feel trapped or from which they can’t escape (for example, growing up with abusive or neglectful parents). PTSD, on the other hand, typically results from a single traumatic event (for example, a car accident or being robbed). CPTSD affects people’s sense of self and safety as well as their relationships. It also makes emotions hard to manage - people with a history of CPTSD tend to struggle with emotional numbness or very intense emotions. Therapy using approaches like IFS, Somatic Experiencing, and Brainspotting can help you process these deep-rooted traumas and rebuild a sense of safety and connection within yourself.

  • The purpose of trauma therapy is to help you process and release the emotional and physical effects of trauma so they no longer control your life. In my work, I use Somatic Experiencing (SE) to explore how trauma is stored in the body and release trapped emotions and tension. I also use Internal Family Systems (IFS) to help you understand the different parts of yourself that you developed in response to trauma. The other method I use is Brainspotting, which helps us access memories and emotions held in parts of the brain that talking and analytical thinking can’t reach. All three of these methods approach trauma work gently, and allow for healing at your pace.

  • While it's not necessary to recount the specific details of your trauma, we will still work with the emotions, sensations, and memories related to it. The focus is not on understanding or analyzing the story of what happened to you; but on helping you process the feelings and experiences stored in your body and mind. Through some of the methods I’m trained in (for example, Brainspotting and Somatic Experiencing), we can access and heal trauma in ways that minimize re-traumatization and discomfort, helping you feel more settled during your healing process.

  • Because everyone’s experience of trauma is unique, the timeline for healing varies from person to person. Some clients start noticing differences in the intensity of their emotions or the frequency in which they feel triggered in a few sessions. For others, it may take much longer, which is completely natural. The work we do together is focused on building lasting change and helping you feel more at ease in your body and mind. Healing is a gradual and ongoing process, but with consistent effort, most clients start to feel a sense of relief and progress over time.

  • My trauma therapy work aims to help you process the emotional, mental, and physical impacts of trauma. That can look differently, depending on your needs. For example, with Brainspotting, I will guide you to notice where your eyes naturally go when you're feeling stressed or triggered. This helps us access emotions and memories stored in your brain, and process them without having to talk through the painful details. In a Somatic Experiencing session, we focus on how trauma is held in the body (for example, tension, discomfort, or a sense of being stuck) and work to gently release those sensations so you feel more grounded and at ease. IFS work aims to help you identify different parts of yourself that you developed in response to trauma—such as an inner critic or a scared part—and help you reconnect with them in a different, compassionate way, so they can experience healing and you can feel more balanced and at peace as a result.

  • Click here to send me a message so we can schedule a time to chat.

Reasons you need Trauma Therapy in CT

You want to be able to:

  • Have conversations without fear instead of reading and responding to everyone’s emotions

  • Feel comfortable being spontaneous

  • Express your thoughts, feelings and needs without worrying about upsetting others

  • Have relationships that feel mutual, safe, supportive and connected

  • Let go of the need to constantly monitor others to feel safe or accepted

  • Feel more trusting in relationships

  • Feel good being you!

The back of a long, straight-haired woman in a white cotton dress on a green field during sunset, raising her arms in celebration of the changes she's made in Brainspotting trauma therapy, feeling free and at ease in her skin

Imagine finally feeling at peace with yourself and comfortable in your relationships

Reach out today to get started!