Somatic Therapy in Guelph
Body-based therapy for people working on trauma and anxiety, informed by polyvagal theory
Somatic therapy is a talk therapy approach that treats your body as part of the conversation. After all, you can understand your anxiety completely and still feel it in your body. Maybe it’s a tightness in your chest before a meeting, or that “stomach drop” feeling when a certain name shows up on your phone.
These sensations happen because our bodies react faster than we can think. You might "read the room" or interpret a tone of voice and respond before any other part of your brain can think about it. You might speed up the way you talk or move, or laugh uncontrollably, or want to get up and leave. Or you might just “shut down” altogether. But by the time you’re thinking about the situation, your body has probably already decided what it wants to do.
Polyvagal theory describes those feelings. It says your body scans for signs of safety and danger on a level that's well below thinking, then bases what it decices to do on what it finds out. In polyvagal-informed somatic therapy, you learn to notice what your body is doing while it’s doing it, like holding your breath or clenching your jaw. Then you learn what settles your body, so that a hard moment can pass without ruining the rest of your day.
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We use polyvagal-informed therapy to work with these kinds of issues and more:
Trauma (both relationship trauma and intergenerational trauma)
Anxiety that shows up in your body before it shows up in your head
Panic that leads to tension long after a panic attack
Going "flat" or "far away" when you’d much rather stay present
Burnout
People-pleasing
High sensitivity
Trouble sleeping, such as when your body stays on alert after the day is done
We use somatic therapy alongside other approaches, because noticing what your body does while you talk is important.
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You might be talking, and we’ll stop you, because your shoulders came up or your voice sped up. Where did you feel that? What did your chest just do?
We do this work in small doses. You might go a little way toward something hard, and then come back and let your body settle. Along the way we’ll find out what works for you, like feeling your feet on the floor, or slowing your breath. Together we’ll build a way to bring yourself back down that you can use anywhere.
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For the first while, sessions might not feel like they’re about your main issues at all. You might be noticing your breath, or paying attention to where your shoulders sit while you talk about your week, and you might need a few sessions before you see the point of it. That’s normal.
Questions about somatic therapy in Guelph
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No. You can get a lot from somatic therapy without ever telling stories (especially stories about trauma) in detail. You choose what you tell us, and when.
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No. This is talk therapy that pays attention to physical sensation. No touch is involved.
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Because your body decided that going flat was the best option available, and it decided fast. When something reads as too much to fight and too much to get away from, your system can drop into something quieter, where everything slows down or goes distant. People usually read that in themselves as avoidance, or weakness. It’s neither, and you can’t talk yourself out of it while it’s happening. What helps is catching your own early signs and having something that brings you back.
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That’s common, especially at the start. Your body learned to cope somehow, and that’s where we’ll begin.
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It’s a framework from researcher Stephen Porges. Your body scans for signs of safety and danger constantly, and where it lands changes what you’re able to do: settled and able to be with people, revved up and braced for something, or shut down and far away. Being around somebody whose own system is steady is one of the things that brings you back toward the first. That’s part of why this work happens in a room with a person.
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Yes, Golden Horizons can meet virtually with you anywhere in Ontario or Alberta.
