Somatic Transformation

Domain IV · Body-oriented psychotherapy · Sharon A. Stanley · 2010 · Bainbridge Island, Washington

What it is

Sharon Stanley, PhD, is a psychotherapist and educator on Bainbridge Island, Washington. She founded ST as "a trauma model and educational curriculum" for the physiological, psychological and spiritual effects of relational trauma and shock trauma. It grew out of her doctoral research on empathy…

Format

• No formal phase model, session count or transition criteria appear in the sources. The 2010 paper describes no phase sequence, and the book's contents list is organised by practice, not by stage. What the sources do give is a practice sequence. The book and the 2013 workshop both run in the same…
• Format. Individual, couple and (2nd edition) community settings. The 2010 case is a conjoint couple session in which the partner provides consented touch. Face-to-face seating is central, because the face is the main channel of social engagement.

Who practises it, and how they are trained or regulated

• Move from (a) to (b) when the client reliably tracks sensation without flooding or shutting down. Step back whenever signs of hyper- or hypo-arousal persist after regulation. Stanley gives no session number; typical trauma-focused psychodynamic/somatic work runs months to years.
• What it is. Sharon Stanley, PhD, is a psychotherapist and educator on Bainbridge Island, Washington. She founded ST as "a trauma model and educational curriculum" for the physiological, psychological and spiritual effects of relational trauma and shock trauma. It grew out of her doctoral research on empathy with traumatised young people, her work with First Nations/Indigenous communities, her study of Afro-Brazilian…

Questions to explore with your client

• What drew you to it, and what are you hoping it will change?
• Is there physical contact? Was it explained beforehand, and do you feel free to say no or stop at any point?
• Does it involve any substance, plant preparation, remedy or supplement? Has your doctor or prescriber been told, especially about any medication you take?
• Does it involve intense or unusual breathing? Have you been told about the medical conditions for which that is not advised?
• Is it a group, retreat or community? How do they respond if someone wants to leave or raises a concern?
• Who runs it, and what training or registration do they hold?
• What actually happens in a session or meeting, and how often?
• What does it cost, and is there pressure to commit to more?
• How do you feel afterwards, in the hours and days that follow?
• Does it fit with, or clash with, the work we do here?

What practitioners of it watch for

• practising with someone unsafe, or turning it into a test of the relationship. Only use partners the client experiences as safe.
• forcing the image past the block. The block is information. Working signs: warmth or movement spreads, the face changes, emotion arrives.
• awkwardness. Offer the option of doing it inwardly first. Working signs: visible warmth between the two, and the client reports it landed.
• imagery that turns into vivid re-living, which means you should slow down and ground. Working signs: sensations change quality and images change shape as attention moves.
• reflection that starts too early and cuts off the felt process, or that becomes intellectual detachment. Working signs: coherent, felt narrative ("now I understand why I go dead when…").

When to involve someone else

• New or worsening physical symptoms, or advice to stop or change prescribed medication: involve the client's doctor or prescriber.
• Signs of coercion, isolation from family and friends, escalating costs or secrecy: discuss openly and consider safeguarding.
• A crisis or thoughts of suicide: follow your crisis protocol. In the US, call or text 988; in the UK and Ireland, Samaritans on 116 123.

Drawn automatically from the guide's own sections. Stay curious: neither endorse nor dismiss what the client values, and check anything that matters against the full guide and its sources. Not medical advice.