craniosacral therapy

Craniosacral Therapy can support physical and emotional healing, as well as spiritual/soul development. My role, as Craniosacral Practitioner, is to help guide your body into a place of stillness where healing can take place. Physical healing, emotional healing, and spiritual healing.

Craniosacral bodywork happens while laying face-up on a massage table, fully clothed. I will be gently placing my hands on and holding areas of the body where I can contact the vagus and/or cranial nerves and support relaxation through providing presence and co-regulation, and by working directly with your craniosacral rhythms. Through attuning to the nervous system in a safe and slow way, we can slow the pace and create space for your system to repair.

My background of study and my lived experience of trauma recovery allow me to offer a safe, trauma-informed container for your healing.

what is craniosacral therapy?

Craniosacral Therapy is a form of subtle energy work that supports the healthy flow of cerebrospinal fluid, which bathes the nervous system. It supports nervous system regulation, which can resolve a variety of emotional and physical symptoms, release stored somatic trauma, as well as allow for greater mental clarity and overall vitality.

Craniosacral Therapy is a deeply regulating modality because it stimulates the ventral vegas branch of the nervous system, which calms sympathetic and parasympathetic activation, both in the moment, as well as through creating more regulating patterns over time. Symptoms like chronic anxiety, panic attacks, chronic depression, high inflammation, low immunity, insomnia, and even autoimmune conditions often have their roots in a pattern of nervous system dysregulation. When we have experienced overwhelming events that we were not able to integrate at the time, these experiences throw our nervous system out of regulation, and over time our resilience can lower and we can get stuck in a pattern of chronic activation. Here, our body is thrown out of equilibrium and we can become stuck in chronic illness patterns.

Teacher Myrna Martin eloquently describes this form of Craniosacral Therapy: “the emphasis is to help resolve the trapped forces that underlie and govern patterns of disease and fragmentation in both body and mind. This involves the practitioner ‘listening through the hands’ to the body’s subtle rhythms and any patterns of inertia or congestion. Through the development of subtle palpation skills and the ability to enter a deep quiet presence in themselves, the practitioner can read the story of the body, identify places where issues are held and then follow the natural priorities for healing as directed by the client¹s own physiology. The client’s physiology responds to the quiet resonance in the practitioner to support re-setting it to a slower, calmer pace that is optimal for healing and expression of the health that is already present.” 

what conditions can craniosacral therapy support?

Craniosacral Therapy supports greater resiliency in the nervous system, which can resolve a variety of emotional, mental and physical health issues.  Issues that are chronic often have their origins in the nervous system.  

These are some of the conditions and situations that Craniosacral Therapy can support:

  • Mental health concerns, such as depression, anxiety and insomnia

  • PTSD and shock

  • Chronic stress

  • Concussion recovery

  • Chronic/adrenal fatigue

  • Complex chronic health issues

  • SIBO and other chronic digestive issues

  • Chronic pain or tension 

  • Hormone imbalance for women 

  • Loss of vitality / life purpose

  • Disconnection from self

  • Transitions 

  • Grief and loss 

  • Integration of a major life event or crisis

what can I expect in a session?

We will begin and end each session with a check-in and debrief, during which I may offer somatic tools to support your process. This may last for just a few minutes, unless a deeper process begins to unfold through dialogue, which could take up a larger portion of the session if that if your desire. During the bodywork portion of the session, you will be lying face up on a massage table, fully clothed. There are a variety of sensations and experiences that may come up as a response to the bodywork. You may fall asleep, have memories or emotions surface, feel energy gently moving or releasing from your body, gain insight, or simply fall into deep relaxation. The state that is accessed in a Craniosacral session allows for deep nourishment and repair to occur in the body. I will be making gentle contact with different parts of your body, staying in each place for several minutes at a time, and I choose each Craniosacral “hold” through a combination of intuition and practical application for your unique needs. The internal experience of each session can be quite different from one another, and will build upon the previous session(s) and deepen the effects.

how many sessions will I need in order to notice results?

My approach to Craniosacral Therapy is intended as a medium-term therapy for nervous system repair due to trauma or the impacts of chronic stress.

Making a weekly or bi-weekly commitment for a period of 3-6 months will get you the best results, allowing for the time needed for your nervous system to come out of stress patterns and learn new pathways.  This also gives us the time to develop trust, not just on a cognitive level but for your body to learn to trust me, allowing for any early developmental material to emerge for healing that may be linked to your trauma or nervous system pattern.  

Some clients choose to incorporate regular sessions into their long term self care plan, but if used as a specific treatment protocol for nervous system regeneration, you should expect a minimum  of 6 sessions to start to see lasting results.