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I specialize in supporting women and couples during the perinatal period.
So if you are looking for support on your journey of trying to conceive, navigating pregnancy, adjusting to parenthood, or healing from trauma - and all of the feelings that come along with this process - this just might be the space for you.
Look over the following lists of some of the feelings and experiences that people can have during the perinatal period. Do any of them resonate with you?
If so, you are not alone; many parents and prospective parents feel overwhelmed during this time of life. But it is possible to get help, to begin to heal, and to find a way to move courageously forward and love deeply. There is hope!
I understand that admitting you are not okay and that you want help requires such bravery and vulnerability. If you would like to schedule an appointment – or even just learn more about the process of therapy – you are more than welcome to reach out to me, and together we can begin the next steps.
Can you relate to any of these feelings?
Are you feeling anxious or deeply sad?
Are you feeling overwhelmed?
Are you feeling more tearful than usual, and as though you enjoy things less than you did before?
Are you feeling angry and irritable?
Are you feeling afraid of loss?
Are you feeling depleted and exhausted?
Are you feeling as though you don’t have enough, or aren’t enough?
Are you feeling overwhelmed by how your own personal story and trauma might be getting stirred up by the perinatal process?
Are you feeling emotionally, physically, mentally, and/or financially strained by the many costs of parenthood?
Are you feeling a bit lost in this new stage of life?
Are you feeling uncertain about how to make sense of your new identity?
Do you not feel like yourself?
Do you just feel like you really need some help?
Can you relate to any of these experiences?
Have you been struggling with infertility?
Have you experienced loss?
Are you pregnant but overwhelmed?
Is your own experience of being a parent stirring up painful memories from your own childhood?
Are you finding it hard to adjust to having a new baby?
Have you been having scary thoughts about your baby or about yourself?
Are you having repetitive, distressing thoughts that feel out of your control?
Are you having a hard time coping?
Are you struggling to feel connected to your baby or your partner?
Are you trying to make sense of your identity as a mom?
Are you and your partner finding it challenging to adjust to life as parents and as a couple?
Are you a single parent trying to cope with the many changes of parenthood?
Are you struggling to meet the expectations you or others have for you in parenthood?
Are you struggling to figure out how to take care of yourself in the midst of trying to take care of your baby?
hurt…
Trauma can make it difficult to trust and to feel present in our bodies, in our relationships, and in our lives.
Trauma is the emotional and physical distress that someone continues to feel after experiencing or witnessing a stressful, dangerous, or upsetting event. Trauma is defined by our body’s responses, not the specific distressing event/s; someone is traumatized if their brain and body express that they are. Whether or not someone experiences the lingering effects of trauma after an upsetting event depends on a myriad of factors, including both contextual and genetic predispositions, levels of support and agency, and more. Trauma can occur after a single identifiable event (such as the loss of a pregnancy, the death of a loved one, an accident, a medical event, a difficult birth, having a baby in the NICU, etc.), or can occur slowly over time (such as when experiencing chronic neglect or abuse as a child, or living in an ongoing state of feeling unsafe).
Trauma impacts our brains and our bodies, and makes our bodies very sensitive to the fight/flight/freeze response in a way that can make it difficult for us to accurately judge whether or not our present moment is actually safe. Our brains and bodies are naturally resilient, and develop ways of coping that help us survive difficulty. However, these ways of surviving often come at a cost. The impacts of our trauma may leave us feeling easily threatened in situations that remind us of past negative experiences, or may make it difficult to deal with our own emotions or the emotions of others (like our children). We might get flashbacks, or might suddenly feel very emotional. We might suddenly go numb, or find it difficult to access any emotion at all. We might have nightmares or difficultly sleeping, we might find it difficult to go to certain places or be around certain people. We might feel hypervigilant and on guard, or irritable and easily angered. We might feel anxious and have difficulty concentrating or completing everyday tasks. We might not feel like ourselves.
Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders (PMADS) can make it difficult to feel connected, capable, and joyful as parents.
Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders is a term given to a variety of mental health conditions that can arise in or be exacerbated by the pregnancy and postpartum experience. Becoming a parent is a huge transition, and can be both exquisitely beautiful and incredibly hard. It is normal for us as new parents to feel a wide range of emotions, to wrestle with a shift in our identity, to feel tired, to occasionally feel like we don’t know what we are doing, and to sometimes cry, worry, or feel overwhelmed. However, if the frequency, intensity, and duration of our symptoms are distressing enough to interfere with our overall well-being and ability to function and feel present in our life, we may be experiencing PMADS.
If we are experiencing Perinatal Depression, we might experience feelings of deep sadness, guilt, shame, and hopelessness, and may lack a sense of connection with our baby. We may eat/sleep too much or too little, and may have thoughts of hurting ourselves or our baby. We might feel easily irritated, angry, or even rageful. If we are experiencing Perinatal Anxiety, we may feel a sense of constant worry or dread, have racing thoughts, feel restless or on edge, and have physical symptoms such as dizziness, hot flashes, nausea, or a racing pulse. If we are experiencing Perinatal OCD, we might have obsessive and upsetting intrusive thoughts, and may feel the need to engage in compulsive, repetitive actions in order to decrease our sense of fear/obsessions. We may be hyper-vigilant of our baby, or afraid of being alone with our baby.
Symptoms of PMADS can make it feel difficult for us to trust ourselves, our experience, and even our ability to be a parent, and can also make us feel terribly alone and hopeless.
…and healing
I see therapy as a place to rebuild trust - and through doing so, to heal.
Trust - in ourselves, in others, in the world around us – is often lost when we experience trauma or difficulty. This loss of trust can make it difficult for us to feel safe in our body, in our relationships (including in parenthood), and in our environments. Our bodies and our brains are so good at being adaptive and resilient, and often develop ways of coping that help us survive but also that can come at a high cost. Surviving is not the same as thriving.
Because I firmly believe in our innate ability as humans to heal and adapt, I will help you compassionately explore the different ways you have been surviving in the world while also extending the invitation to perhaps do things differently – in a way that feels more wholehearted and present.
Two primary therapeutic modalities I use to foster healing are Internal Family Systems (IFS) and Brainspotting.
Internal Family Systems is an experiential therapy that helps us learn how to trust ourselves and become more Self-led.
Internal Family Systems (IFS) is a lovely therapeutic modality created by Richard Schwartz that essentially helps people feel more able to trust themselves in the world. This model trusts that we all have a core Self that is curious, kind, compassionate, and wise. We are all remarkably resilient and adaptive, and we all have different “parts” that serve various functions intended to keep us safe. For example, we might have “parts” that are task oriented, parts that are good at keeping the peace, parts that keep our feelings at bay. And these parts are intended to help us, and often do, but they also come at a cost (especially when we are distressed).
IFS provides a framework for me as the therapist to utilize to compassionately support you in learning to feel more like your Self. This includes gently exploring why these “parts” of you act the way they do, what they are afraid might happen if their role/s were to change, and what deeper hurts may be in need of some healing. Over time, it becomes increasingly possible to learn to compassionately interact with these various parts from a place of Self. This is called learning to be “Self-led”, and includes learning how to appreciate the wisdom of these various parts/ways of coping while finding ways to move in the world that are more life-giving and in alignment with what you define as a wholehearted life.
(There are many helpful resources about Internal Family Systems, including the book No Bad Parts by Richard Schwartz.)
Brainspotting is a trauma-focused therapy that supports our brains in their natural abilities to heal.
Brainspotting is a brain and body based approach developed by David Grand that supports people in trauma reintegration. This essentially means that brainspotting is an approach that allows us to help heal and reintegrate the neural networks in the brain where trauma is stored at a subcortical level. This allows our brains to create new, more adaptive connections in the present moment instead of slipping into old “frozen” trauma networks. This shift can be incredibly freeing, as instead of just “trying harder” to implement “top down” cognitive techniques in moments of distress (something that can feel incredibly difficult if not impossible once fight/flight/freeze responses are activated), it allows “bottom up” healing to occur from the emotional areas of our brain where trauma is stored. This means that over time you will begin to feel more free to respond in new ways organically instead of trying to force yourself to do so. This allows you to work with your body (and brain) instead of against it, and creates a unique place to rebuild trust in yourself.
As the therapist, I create a safe space for “dual attunement” – attuning to you on a relational level and on a neurobiological level and holding your experience. I support you in finding the eye position where you feel most connected to whatever emotion, thought pattern, or experience/trauma that you want to work on, and I hold the space while we trust your brain and body to process in the ways they need to. Because our bodies and brains are naturally “plastic” and adaptive, they naturally move towards healing when provided with the right support. Brainspotting is gentle, supportive, and client led, and I have found it to be an incredibly powerful tool in helping clients feel more like themselves again.
“We shake with joy, we shake with grief.
What a time they have, these two
housed as they are in the same body.
”
— Mary Oliver