Embodied Heart Somatics

10/29/2025

Hi, I'm Catherine (she/they)

I companion people who long to understand themselves more deeply—those living with anxiety, trauma, pain, sensitivity, or loss—to rediscover the wholeness already within them.

My approach is rooted in presence and attunement.

My intention is to offer a space of safety and collaboration where your body’s wisdom leads the way.

Instead of trying to fix what feels broken, we learn to listen—trusting your symptoms as invitations to heal and integrate.

My own healing from chronic pain and trauma has been a journey of coming home to my body through movement and somatic practices.

It’s my honor to walk alongside others as they reclaim connection, capacity, and inner freedom.

I have advanced training in Hakomi Somatic Therapy, Somatic Trauma Therapy, and Pain Reprocessing Therapy, and as a Licensed Massage Therapist with a strong foundation in Craniosacral work.

I also serve as a Teaching Assistant for Hakomi trainings and am completing my Master’s in Clinical Mental Health Counseling with a specialization in Dance Movement Therapy at Lesley University.

I just moved to the lovely city of Portland, Maine. And I am building my practice here.

I'm currently working with people over Zoom, and can work with people who are in other states.

If you or someone you know needs support, and somatic therapy is of interest to you, please reach out.

10/27/2025

Your breath-work, your meditation, your journaling practice, your movement practice, your (fill-in-the-blank) practice...

Are you using these to avoid or manage what's uncomfortable?

It's okay if you are. I do too. We all do. Because we are humans and we are trying our best.

Cultivating authentic safety within oneself requires that we feel safe enough to experience that within that feels scary. What is typically avoided or managed.

Then, we can reorient to the discomfort from a more resourced place.

Sometimes, this requires the co-regulation and safety of the therapeutic relationship.

Reach out if you need support. ❤️

10/21/2025

Are the healing practices you're engaging in helping to create space inside of you, or are they creating more constriction?

In somatic therapy, we work the felt sense of the body in the present moment - a process that engages so much more of our brain, and therefore has a deeper, long-lasting impact.

When insight arises from an embodied experience, it is often more meaningful, and can hit with a much more impactful "aha!"

However, for many of us, access to our internal sensations and emotions is hindered. It may not feel so safe inside.

Instead, what we experience in our internal world is a panel of critical voices, and internal pressure to fix or avoid everything inside that's so messed up.

If what you are doing to try to help yourself - whether it's meditation, journaling, yoga, art, etc - is creating more constriction inside of you, then it's important to remember that it's less about what you are doing, and more about the how.

The critical voices and ways that we pressure ourselves are often a result of introjection.

When we are in a situation in which we have to attach to survive - whether that's to a world that doesn't honor our dignity as a person of a marginalized identity, or a child who needs a neglectful or abusive caregiver to survive - our boundaries and identity become diffused.

The negative, critical, or dismissive voices projected onto us from the outside world are then taken by us and unconsciously introjected into our internal world.

Next time you notice a judgemental voice or an internal sense of pressure inside of you, slow down and ask where it's coming from.

How familiar is this? How far back in time does this go? Whose voice is this?

And if you need some support, please reach out.

10/16/2025

10/16/2025

My intention is to cultivate a safe, nonjudgmental space that welcomes all aspects of your experience.

We can slow down, and feel what's happening in your BODY as you share about your experience. And get to the deeper truth of what's happening underneath the layers of conscious thinking.

10/07/2025

We can thoroughly understand all of the reasons why we are suffering, yet still feel stuck.

We can GET why we struggle - Everything that has happened that has shaped us, for better or worse. The how and the why of it all makes sense.

Maybe you have worked hard to get to the bottom of it all - you see the psychological patterns, and you have come to understand why they are there.

Yet, insight alone doesn't allow for transformation.

In Buddhist philosophy, there are the two wings: insight and compassion. We cannot have one without the other for a true sense of healing to emerge.

It's the emotional experience paired with insight that truly enables us to transmute our suffering into wisdom at an embodied level that encompasses our full being, not just our rational minds.

This is the difference between talk therapy and somatic therapy. In talk therapy, we may gain significant insight into our suffering, which is incredibly valuable and necessary - and it only engages one small part of our brain.

In somatic therapy, we work the felt sense of the body in the present moment - a process that engages so much more of our brain, and therefore has a deeper, long-lasting impact.

I am continuing my practice here in Portland, Maine as a somatic practitioner and coach while I obtain my Master's degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling with a Dance Movement Therapy specialization.

If you need support or know anyone who is interested in somatic therapy, please reach out.

09/02/2025

Thank you Mount Washington Valley of New Hampshire for holding me these last 8 years! Tomorrow I move to Portland, Maine.

These forests and mountains have held me in a refuge of solitude during this chapter of my life when I needed it, and now I am ready to move forward.

This is the last hike I did while living here, and this rainbow stayed in view for about an hour - the longest time I have ever witnessed a rainbow.

A reminder to stay present. To not take things for granted, but to appreciate the awe that's here.

Everything is temporary.

08/29/2025

Transitions are coming. But before I share more about that, I want to share how grateful I am for all that this summer has brought.

First of all, I started graduate school! I am officially in the process of obtaining my master's degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling with a Specialization in Dance Movement Therapy at Lesley University! I just completed my summer residency in Cambridge, MA.

I had the wonderful opportunity to assistant teach in the Hakomi Somatic Psychotherapy Level 2 training in PA, and to learn new skills in the Innate Somatic Intelligence Trauma Therapy training in Berkeley, CA.

I spent some time with my family in Tennessee.

And I also spent some time in ceremonial community in New York after attending a Laban Movement Analysis course.

I'm grateful for all of the people who have been with me on this path, walking towards what is in alignment with my heart as I grow personally and professionally in this world of somatic therapy and healing.

I think the deeper we are willing to FEEL our grief and trauma, the deeper we can access gut wrenching belly laughs and tears of joy. I wouldn't trade my sensitivity for all of the comforts in the world.

More to come.. but for now, here are some fun photos from the highlights this summer...