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The License To Touch with Audrey Burke · The Trauma Therapist

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  Speaker 1: Trauma Theverist podcast Plus listeners can listen to episodes early
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  Speaker 1: and ad free right now. Become a Plus listener by
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  Speaker 1: going to Apple Podcasts, searching for the Trauma Theverist podcast
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  Speaker 1: and signing up today. Welcome to the Trauma Nevers podcast,
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  Speaker 1: a show about the incredible people dedicated to helping those
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  Speaker 1: who experienced trauma. My name is Got macpherson, and my
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  Speaker 1: mission is to raise awareness of trauma and to inspire
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  Speaker 1: each of us to help those around us. Audrey ready
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  Speaker 1: to do it?
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  Speaker 2: I'm ready, all right.
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  Speaker 1: So here we go. So five four, three, two and one,
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  Speaker 1: our folks, welcome back to the podcast. Very excited to
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  Speaker 1: have us my guests today. Audrey Burke, Audrey welcome.
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  Speaker 2: Thanks so much for having me guys. It's good to
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  Speaker 2: be with you.
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  Speaker 1: Awesome.
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  Speaker 3: So.
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  Speaker 1: Audrey is a somatic practitioner and body worker specializing and
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  Speaker 1: helping highly sensitive people heal from trauma, trauma, and chronic stress.
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  Speaker 1: Drawn from her own experiences as an HSP, Audrey understands
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  Speaker 1: unique challenges of navigating the world with heightened sensitivity. With
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  Speaker 1: over fifteen years of experience and body based practices, she
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  Speaker 1: began her journey as restorative yoga teacher, which eventually led
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  Speaker 1: her to become a practitioner of Transforming Touch for Developmental trauma,
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  Speaker 1: a licensed massage therapist, and now a student in her
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  Speaker 1: advanced year of sematic Experiencing training. Audrey's trauma informed approach
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  Speaker 1: supports clients and regulating their nervous systems, reconnecting with their bodies,
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  Speaker 1: and building resilients, helping them feel more grounded and at
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  Speaker 1: ease in their daily lives. Audrey, Awesome, before we go
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  Speaker 1: in here, share with our listeners where you're from originally
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  Speaker 1: and where you are currently.
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  Speaker 3: Okay, I'm originally from Long Island, New York, and now
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  Speaker 3: I'm based in Durham, North Carolina.
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  Speaker 1: I used to live in Long Island from New York originally,
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  Speaker 1: but used to live in Long Island.
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  Speaker 2: Oh nice. So yeah, I thought maybe I knew New York,
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  Speaker 2: but it wasn't true. It was Long Island, it was
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  Speaker 2: somewhere else.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah awesome. Okay, so you have a really interesting background.
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  Speaker 1: Touch is one of those things that's kind of like
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  Speaker 1: a lightning rod. I feel in this in the healing industry.
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  Speaker 1: We're going to get there, but before we do, how
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  Speaker 1: did all this start for you?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah?
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  Speaker 3: So I think The big catalyst for me was what
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  Speaker 3: I call a nervous breakdown. It was about eleven years ago.
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  Speaker 3: I was right around my twenty ninth birthday, and I
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  Speaker 3: was actually living in Italy at the time. I moved
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  Speaker 3: over there with my ex boyfriend for his job. And
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  Speaker 3: while so much of our time in Italy was like
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  Speaker 3: beautiful and delicious and all the things you would expect
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  Speaker 3: Italy to be, right around, like when we had been
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  Speaker 3: there about two and a half years, I got really sick.
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  Speaker 3: I got a bad cold for a few weeks, and
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  Speaker 3: then after that point I started having more somatic symptoms
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  Speaker 3: that were like pretty regular and just like affecting my
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  Speaker 3: everyday life. Yeah, like after that bad cold, I ended
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  Speaker 3: up losing like thirty pounds pretty rapidly. I got like
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  Speaker 3: irritable bowel syndrome, just like alternating constipation diarrhea. There was
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  Speaker 3: a period of time I was so anxious it was
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  Speaker 3: hard to even go outside. Just we lived in Bologna,
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  Speaker 3: which is this like small medieval city and like medieval walls,
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  Speaker 3: and just like going outside fell overwhelming with the like
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  Speaker 3: bus fumes, like the smell of the cement, just like
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  Speaker 3: everything was overwhelming, and I did try to.
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  Speaker 2: Get some help in Italy.
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  Speaker 3: But at some point I was like, I really want
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  Speaker 3: to work with practitioners who are speaking my language.
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  Speaker 2: So at that point I decided to leave Italy. I
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  Speaker 2: moved to me let.
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  Speaker 1: Me just h sorry interrupting cars. So, prior to this
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  Speaker 1: onset of symptoms, had you had anything other experiences like this?
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  Speaker 3: Well, looking back now, it's pretty clear that I even
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  Speaker 3: have like very early birth trauma. Even I am a
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  Speaker 3: C section baby. I was also putting an incubator after birth,
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  Speaker 3: and so I had always been a pretty sensitive kid.
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  Speaker 2: Even as a baby.
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  Speaker 3: There was a time where my mom picked me up
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  Speaker 3: out of bed and like I turned blue, my eyes
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  Speaker 3: rolled back in my head.
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  Speaker 2: She had to like rush me to the hospital because
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  Speaker 2: I wasn't breathing.
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  Speaker 3: So I think there were little clues throughout my life
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  Speaker 3: that there was some nervous system disregulation, but we just
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  Speaker 3: didn't have the words to put to it.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and this situation, itly was kind of what like
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  Speaker 1: an explosion of these symptoms.
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  Speaker 3: Or Yeah, Like looking back, I feel like things were
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  Speaker 3: building up a little bit.
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  Speaker 2: I spent some.
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  Speaker 3: Time when we were in in Italy, I would go
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  Speaker 3: and volunteer on organic farms, and that time was like
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  Speaker 3: so amazing for me. I would get to like be
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  Speaker 3: in connection with nature, like off of my computer, like living.
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  Speaker 2: In community, growing food, like cooking with people.
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  Speaker 3: And then I would go back to this apartment in
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  Speaker 3: Bologna where I didn't have a regular job and we
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  Speaker 3: didn't have a yard or a balcony. So I was
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  Speaker 3: just like inside this tiny apartment by myself a lot
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  Speaker 3: of the time. And I did start to notice I
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  Speaker 3: was just like having more negative thought spirals of like, oh,
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  Speaker 3: I really want to get back to like the country life,
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  Speaker 3: Like I don't want to be in the city anymore.
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  Speaker 3: So I think it was building up slowly. But then
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  Speaker 3: something about I think that that cough or that illness
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  Speaker 3: maybe was like the final straw that just kind of
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  Speaker 3: had my nervous system break down or go into that
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  Speaker 3: survival mode where I couldn't digest my food anymore.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, so continue on.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, So I had to get some help in Italy.
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  Speaker 3: At some point I was like, I just want to
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  Speaker 3: go back to the US where I can see practitioners
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  Speaker 3: who speak my language. And I decided to move to
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  Speaker 3: California because I at that point I had done my
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  Speaker 3: first yoga teacher training. So I did have an idea
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  Speaker 3: that there was this thing of like mind body healing.
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  Speaker 3: There was also one practitioner in Italy who had me
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  Speaker 3: read a book called The Body Has Its Reasons, which
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  Speaker 3: is written by a frenchwoman, and so I had this
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  Speaker 3: idea like, this is something to do with my body.
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  Speaker 3: So I thought I had an ann I could stay
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  Speaker 3: within California and thought, you know, I'll try to figure
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  Speaker 3: this out in California. And in California I did start
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  Speaker 3: going to acupuncture, which was really helpful for me. Part
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  Speaker 3: of my physical symptoms was I also stopped getting my periods,
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  Speaker 3: so acupuncture was really helpful for me to like take
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  Speaker 3: herbs to build blood and work on that. But it
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  Speaker 3: wasn't until twenty seventeen I moved to Asheville, Caroline. I
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  Speaker 3: wanted to get back to the East Coast because that's
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  Speaker 3: my family's on the East Coast, and.
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  Speaker 2: There I made an appointment an integrative.
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  Speaker 3: Doctor and he was the first one at the end
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  Speaker 3: of our first appointment who split me a piece of
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  Speaker 3: paper with a list of some therapists and was like,
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  Speaker 3: I think you should probably read these books by Peter Levine,
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  Speaker 3: and so that was when sematic experiencing really came on
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  Speaker 3: my radar.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, so we're and how does the highly sensitive person
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  Speaker 1: or HSP what diagnosis label title, how do you want
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  Speaker 1: to refer to that?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, so highly sensitive person, it's not a diagnosis, it's
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  Speaker 3: like a personality trait. I do feel like there's you know,
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  Speaker 3: it's a little bit tricky because some of the signs
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  Speaker 3: of being a highly sensitive person have overlapped with other conditions,
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  Speaker 3: like such as trauma, and so for me, it is
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  Speaker 3: this kind of unpacking like what parts of this or
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  Speaker 3: maybe early trauma, what parts are hypervigilance, and what part
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  Speaker 3: is this like innate personality trait that I have that
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  Speaker 3: is just my high sensitivity. So I consider myself like
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  Speaker 3: highly sensitive person with trauma, and there's definitely overlap with
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  Speaker 3: some of the symptoms.
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  Speaker 2: And I feel like probably a lot of highly.
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  Speaker 3: Sensitive people do have trauma because we are so sensitive
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  Speaker 3: and we live in a world, especially in the Western world,
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  Speaker 3: that's not really designed for sensitive people. But highly sensitive
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  Speaker 3: people have something called differential susceptibility, so we're more susceptible
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  Speaker 3: to both positive and negative experiences. So that means if
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  Speaker 3: we grew up in a household where there was chaos
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  Speaker 3: or there was.
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  Speaker 2: You know, an angry caregiver.
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  Speaker 3: We're going to be more negatively impacted by that than
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  Speaker 3: a nonsensitive kid. Like a nonsensitive kid might grow up
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  Speaker 3: in that environment and it doesn't really affect them at all.
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  Speaker 3: So we're taking in every everything, We're taking in all
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  Speaker 3: the subtleties of our environment, and we're processing that all
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  Speaker 3: more deeply. So we are more impacted, I think, by
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  Speaker 3: stressful events than other people.
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  Speaker 2: But the good news is we're also.
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  Speaker 3: Receive a boost from positive experiences. So highly sensitive people
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  Speaker 3: do grow up in a positive environment, or we get
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  Speaker 3: access to positive resources later in life, like getting to
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  Speaker 3: go to therapy or having a mentor, like, we can
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  Speaker 3: almost take in that positive experience more than someone who's
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  Speaker 3: not an HSP. So we also have this like a
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  Speaker 3: profound ability for healing and growth.
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  Speaker 1: So when when you say highly sensitive, you're just describing
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  Speaker 1: certain experiences. Is that what we're talking about here, sensitive
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  Speaker 1: to experiences, sensitive to the world, Yeah?
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  Speaker 3: Or what?
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  Speaker 2: Yes?
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  Speaker 3: So the acronym that they use the woman who wrote
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  Speaker 3: the book highly so Seat of Personal Lane Air and
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  Speaker 3: she uses the acronym des so ds for like depth
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  Speaker 3: of processing O is for overstimulation or overwhelm. So I
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  Speaker 3: mean we're taking in like if we're in crowded places,
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  Speaker 3: bright lights, loud noises, people's emotions, the mood in the room,
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  Speaker 3: even like sensitive to clothing, like I can only really
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  Speaker 3: wear soft clothing. I can't stand wearing like fake fabrics
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  Speaker 3: or scratchy clothing.
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  Speaker 2: And probably people have.
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  Speaker 3: Their the things that they're more sensitive to than others,
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  Speaker 3: but really sensitive.
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  Speaker 2: To the kind of like all stimulation.
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  Speaker 1: And how did you find out this is what you were.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, so it was kind of all coming together around
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  Speaker 3: the same time.
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  Speaker 2: I was like thirty two, thirty three or something and.
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  Speaker 3: I had an appointment with that same doctor where I
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  Speaker 3: went in and he was asking me about stress and
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  Speaker 3: I was.
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  Speaker 2: Like, I'm like, well, I'm living with.
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  Speaker 3: Roommates right now, and I just am overwhelmed all the time.
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  Speaker 3: And I said something to him like I'm just starting
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  Speaker 3: to realize I'm a really sensitive person because I could
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  Speaker 3: see my roommates were different than me, like the things
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  Speaker 3: that are overwhelming in me and they're fine. And my
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  Speaker 3: doctor looked at me, like straight in the eyes and
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  Speaker 3: was like, well, I could have told you that, and
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  Speaker 3: he basically explains to me, like, you're a highly empathic person.
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  Speaker 3: You know what people are feeling, like all your friends
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  Speaker 3: want to tell you their problems. And he's like, what
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  Speaker 3: you need is boundaries, Like you don't need to go
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  Speaker 3: to the grocery store and be like taking in how
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  Speaker 3: everyone around you's feeling. You need to learn like when
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  Speaker 3: can you have that on and when you turn that off?
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  Speaker 3: And I was like that sounds great, how.
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  Speaker 2: Do I do that?
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  Speaker 3: And again we uh, you know, talked more about embodiment
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  Speaker 3: and somatic experiencing. And then just around that time, I
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  Speaker 3: was actually like, Okay, I need to find a new
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  Speaker 3: place to live. So I started having meetings with some
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  Speaker 3: new roommates and one of the people I met with
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  Speaker 3: was a highly sensitive person. And when I was describing
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  Speaker 3: to her just like how I was feeling in my
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  Speaker 3: living situation, She's like, you sound like a highly sensitive person.
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  Speaker 2: Have you read this book? And that really like brought
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  Speaker 2: all the pieces together for me.
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  Speaker 1: It's amazing, isn't it When you know, you read a
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  Speaker 1: book like that, or you talk to someone like that
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  Speaker 1: and you do it's things click. Yes, You're like you
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  Speaker 1: see yourself in that You're like, and there's what there's
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  Speaker 1: I don't know. There can be comfort in that, there
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  Speaker 1: can be empowerment in that, there can be clarity in that,
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  Speaker 1: there can be hope in that, you know, you realize
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  Speaker 1: you're not.
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  Speaker 2: Nuts exactly exactly.
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  Speaker 1: So all right, let's talk about you and the work.
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  Speaker 1: First of all, do you speak Italian? How long were
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  Speaker 1: you know there?
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  Speaker 3: I was there for like two years and eight months. Okay,
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  Speaker 3: I can get buying Italian, but I always felt like
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  Speaker 3: a little bit, like they would say an Italian in
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  Speaker 3: a stupidella, like I felt like a little.
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  Speaker 2: Bit of a dish.
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  Speaker 3: And you know, now that I know more about poly
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  Speaker 3: bagel theory, I wonder about how my social engagement is
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  Speaker 3: this system was affected over there, because even though I
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  Speaker 3: could speak the language, I don't think I could feel
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  Speaker 3: deeply connected like I can in English.
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  Speaker 2: You know.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's funny. I was in Bologna. I was traveling
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  Speaker 1: through there, and I stopped and uh, I was with
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  Speaker 1: some friends and I got a I wanted a sandwich,
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  Speaker 1: and we knocked on. I knocked on this market and
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  Speaker 1: was closed. It was like during that time and during
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  Speaker 1: the day. But this elderly woman came around and I
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  Speaker 1: didn't know any Italian, but she was so nice and
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  Speaker 1: lovely and she welcomed me in and they gave me
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  Speaker 1: this sandwich that was like amazing. It's like the simplest sandwich,
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  Speaker 1: but it was like freaking unbelievable. And then I left
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  Speaker 1: and then I was walking down the road and she
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  Speaker 1: comes out and she starts like screaming at me, and
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  Speaker 1: she starts going like this, why is this lady telling
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  Speaker 1: me to leave? But of course she met coming back here. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: it was so funny.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, they do it like this.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I went back and she gave me
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  Speaker 1: something else. It was it was it was I'll never
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  Speaker 1: forget that anyway. All right, So how tak walk us
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  Speaker 1: through how you came to need or want to like
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  Speaker 1: work in this area and start working with touch, which
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  Speaker 1: is a topic in and of itself.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: So the first therapist I landed with in Asheville was
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  Speaker 3: actually not a somatic experiencing practitioner.
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  Speaker 2: She was Hakmie and.
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  Speaker 3: We worked together for a couple of years and it
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  Speaker 3: was okay, but it was clear to me like something
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  Speaker 3: was missing. And I finally went her after the couple
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  Speaker 3: of years and I was like, I need to work
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  Speaker 3: with someone who like specializes in trauma, and that was
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  Speaker 3: when I finally landed in the office of a sematic
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  Speaker 3: experiencing practitioner named Sherry Azar and she was also a
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  Speaker 3: transforming touch practitioner, and I think in our very first
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  Speaker 3: session we did some touch work, and after our first session,
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  Speaker 3: my body just felt this huge wave of relief of like, oh,
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  Speaker 3: this is what I like my body needed, and I think, like,
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  Speaker 3: this is what maybe I thought sematic therapy.
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  Speaker 2: Was going to be, but like, this is what I need,
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  Speaker 2: exactly what I need.
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  Speaker 3: So I was really inspired by the work I did
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  Speaker 3: with Sherry, and then she ended up passing away in
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  Speaker 3: twenty twenty three from lung cancer, and so I have
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  Speaker 3: this like extra inspiration that I want to like carry
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  Speaker 3: the torch forward, you know, of course in my own way,
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  Speaker 3: but I was just so inspired with how she helped
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  Speaker 3: me that I want to be able to do that
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  Speaker 3: for other sensitive people.
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  Speaker 1: So you walked in there with her, What did she do?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah?
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  Speaker 1: So really what did she do to?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah?
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  Speaker 3: I would have to like I probably wasn't so present
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  Speaker 3: in our very first session. Like now that I'm a practitioner,
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  Speaker 3: I'm always like tracking what people are doing. But she
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  Speaker 3: was trained with Steven Terrell, which now I've done that
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  Speaker 3: training as well. The training itself is called transforming the
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  Speaker 3: experienced based Brain, and then the modality is called transforming Touch.
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  Speaker 3: And in the main protocol of that work, what we're
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  Speaker 3: doing is bringing our touch if we're in person or
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: if we're virtual, where we're just bringing our awareness and
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  Speaker 3: we're bringing it to seven points of the person's body.
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  Speaker 3: This includes like their adrenal glands, their brain stem, and
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  Speaker 3: their ankles. And the main goal of this is like coregulation.
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  Speaker 3: This was developed to help people have developmental trauma, and
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  Speaker 3: so often those people had an early rupture where their
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  Speaker 3: nervous system didn't really get the foundation that needed for resiliency.
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  Speaker 3: So we're giving the body that experience of coregulation that
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  Speaker 3: was maybe missed, and giving the body that experience of having.
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  Speaker 2: A caregiver who was regulated.
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  Speaker 3: Safe, consistent, attuned, like doing what they said they were
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  Speaker 3: going to do, like no surprises, and it helps to
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  Speaker 3: widen the window of tolerance so that you're not as
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  Speaker 3: impacted by the stress you experience in your everyday life.
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  Speaker 1: So at what point did you decide to get into
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  Speaker 1: this work.
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  Speaker 3: It was pretty immediate because like right around that time,
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  Speaker 3: I was teaching yoga and was like pretty clear that
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  Speaker 3: I didn't want to make a living as a yoga teacher,
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: like jumping through all the hoops that yoga teachers have
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  Speaker 3: to jump through just to make a living for themselves.
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  Speaker 3: And I was trying to decide between whether I was
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  Speaker 3: going to go to school for counseling or whether I
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  Speaker 3: was going to go to.
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  Speaker 2: School for massage.
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  Speaker 3: And Sherry, she was a massage therapist, so she wasn't
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  Speaker 3: a licensed counselor, and you know, I talked with her
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  Speaker 3: about her experience being a practitioner. I also talked to
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  Speaker 3: some people who had gone to counseling school, and I
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  Speaker 3: just decided I wanted to go to the body based route.
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  Speaker 2: I think part of that was because.
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  Speaker 3: I was kind of hyper intellectual that I knew if
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  Speaker 3: I went to a counseling school, I'd probably be great
• 18:26
  Speaker 3: at it, Like I'm great at studying, I'm great at
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: taking tests.
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: But I was like, no, I want to take more
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: of like.
• 18:30
  Speaker 3: The body based approach because that's kind of what's more
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: missing from my system. And I think body workers too,
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: have more flexibility of what they can do with clients,
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: Like in some states it's really hard to touch your
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: clients as a counselor, Like you might have to go
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: to the counseling board and get like specific permission to
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: use touch, and you have to explain why it's needed.
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: You might have to explain to insurance companies, like why.
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: You're doing this.
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: Where as a massage therapist, like that's your license. You
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: have a license to touch, and so I think you
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: have more flexibility to to work with clients through the
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: body that way.
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: Well, let's talk about that. The the idea of touch
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: is I think fraud in the field of therapy. You know,
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: it's I mean, it's just a loaded topic. Yeah right,
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: it is. But but it's it's so amazing, right when
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: you when when someone is just all those that crazy
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: those descriptors you just said, you know, consistent and grounded
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: and themselves. When someone is like that, when they're fulfilling
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: all that criteria and they're have they're healing hands on you,
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: it's it's amazing. It's amazing. But why is it so
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: fraught in our society? I mean, what's your take?
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: I mean, I have a lot of thoughts on this topic.
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: I feel like even as an American culture where we
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: don't touch a lot, like I was refting reflecting recently
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: on my childhood and.
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: I had one cousin who was Brazilian.
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: She like moved to Brazil at ten, but we still
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: spend time with each other every year, and we would
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: like massage each other as children. And then I think
• 20:26
  Speaker 3: of me and my American friends, like we might play
• 20:28
  Speaker 3: with each other's hair, but we.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: Didn't massage each other's faces or like. So I think
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: part of it is just our culture.
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: And you know, of course, in the therapy industry, you
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: just have to be really careful. You have to protect
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: your license. And if you touch a client when you
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: know there's not explicit consent or there's some kind of
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: confusion of whether it's consensual or not, then your your
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: license could be at risk.
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: I interviewed a long time ago, I interviewed a gentleman
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: by the name of Jerry vest who has since passed on.
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: But he was a therapist and he worked with a
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: lot of military dudes, and he said touch was so
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: important to the work that he did with these guys
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: who were suffering from PTSD, and I'll never forget that
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: and he said, how can you heal without touch? You know,
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: how can you do it? How do you do it?
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: What do you do? I mean you talked about you know,
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: where you touched in that one modality, one experience, But
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: what else are you bringing to the table when you
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: do this work?
• 21:48
  Speaker 3: Well, yeah, and the amazing thing is we can also
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: do this virtually, so you can do it where your
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: hands aren't physically touching someone and it's you know, of course,
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: it is nice to have a physical hand there because
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: you can feel a contact, you can feel their warmth.
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: But really what we're bringing is our intention to that point.
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: And when I'm bringing my intention to a point on
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: soone's body, I'm usually I'm connecting because I work with
• 22:12
  Speaker 3: developmental trauma, connecting more with like their infant parts. So
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: like I'm imagining being like a coregulated caregiver just being
• 22:20
  Speaker 3: with this the infant parts. I also hold, you know,
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: I'm not trying to make anything happen, but I hold
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: an intention of just the possibility of healing.
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: I hold the body with gratitude, especially.
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: When we're at like the adrenal glands or the brainstems.
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: These parts of our body are really active when we
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: don't feel safe, and a lot of us feel ashamed
• 22:41
  Speaker 3: about those responses, but it's actually like I'm holding them
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: with gratitude because like you've been working so hard to
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: keep us safe and like and right now in this moment,
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: like you have some support. You can relax if it
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: feels safe enough to relax, but like also no pressure,
• 22:56
  Speaker 3: you can be right where you are.
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: I mean, that idea, that word intention is so crucial,
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: you know, I mean, just from what you were saying,
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: I was kind of feeling a certain settledness and relaxed
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: in myself because we don't oftentimes we don't get that right,
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: We don't get someone who is bringing their kind of
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: equanimity and regulation and intention into our soul like that.
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's amazing. And when're talking about people who've
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: been impacted by trauma, that's exactly what not only didn't
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: they have, but oftentimes it was like ripped away from
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: them intense.
• 23:51
  Speaker 3: And especially because like with really early developmental trauma, which
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: typically happens before the age of three, you don't have
• 23:57
  Speaker 3: memories of that time. Your brain is not yet for
• 24:00
  Speaker 3: those kinds of memories. And you know, touch is our
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: first language. That's how you first start relating with the
• 24:06
  Speaker 3: world is through touch with your caregiver.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: So what do you do? How do you work?
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so.
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: You know, of course there has to be consent for
• 24:21
  Speaker 3: the person for touch, because I started out as a
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: transforming touch practitioner and that's what I was advertising myself
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: as a lot of people were coming to me because like,
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: that's what they want. Often they were people who had
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: even already tried somatic therapy, but their sematic therapists didn't
• 24:36
  Speaker 3: use touch, so they were specifically seeking out someone who
• 24:39
  Speaker 3: uses touch.
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: But I have had clients who.
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: Come to me and are like, actually, I don't like
• 24:43
  Speaker 3: to be touched, Like I guess you're going to touch
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: me because that's what you do.
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: And I'm like, no, I don't have to touch you.
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: Like there's other stuff we can do.
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: And with that, some of it's exploring their resistance to
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: being touched or just like honoring their boundary that they
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: don't want to be touched and working through that.
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: If people do get on the table, I'll typically.
• 25:02
  Speaker 3: Do the seven point protocol, which is the main protocol.
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: We'll just do that for like six to eight weeks,
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: and again that's to give their nervous system that feeling
• 25:11
  Speaker 3: of consistency and safety, and like just our nervous systems
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: developing a relationship with one another so that we, you know,
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: we both feel safe around each other. And then over
• 25:22
  Speaker 3: time we might add in additional enhancements we call them.
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: Some of that could be bringing in some more of
• 25:28
  Speaker 3: the somatic experiencing work. We might be you know, tracking
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: more sensations and talking about what they're feeling in their body.
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: We might be doing some like couple uncoupling work where
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: we notice areas in their body where there's tension, areas
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: in their body where there might be more ease, and
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: we can shift their awareness between those different points and
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: just get curious about what happens. And then some of
• 25:50
  Speaker 3: Stephen Treill's work is also around primitive reflexes that might
• 25:54
  Speaker 3: be retained, So that could be things like the moral reflexes,
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: a well known reflex and these are reflexes that babies
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: have that are supposed to get integrated at certain you know,
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: at six months or a year and a half. But
• 26:07
  Speaker 3: if you have disruptions early in your life, those reflexes
• 26:10
  Speaker 3: can get retained and affect your nervous systems. So I
• 26:14
  Speaker 3: might be leading people through like doing some movements that
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: kind of resemble those reflexes, just to add some activation
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: to the system. See what happens, and we can try
• 26:26
  Speaker 3: to integrate some of those reflexes if they're if they're still.
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: There, I would imagine that, Uh, this can bring up
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: a lot of stuff for people. I mean, just you
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: doing over that, going over that seven point thing. I mean,
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: because being touched is is it's a heavy duty day,
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: right when you're going into a healing process like that,
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: and someone's an experienced practitioners is doing that. Can you
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: talk about what I'm sure you've had stuff come up.
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean a common response I see, especially one
• 27:07
  Speaker 3: of the first moves is a little bit of like
• 27:08
  Speaker 3: a heart opening where I have one hand on one
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: shoulder and the other hand on the opposite hip, so
• 27:13
  Speaker 3: it like kind of opens up the chest area. And
• 27:16
  Speaker 3: typically with that a lot of people will just have
• 27:19
  Speaker 3: some feelings. It's almost this bitter sweet like it feels
• 27:22
  Speaker 3: so good to have someone being present with me. And
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: also it brings up grief for all the times that
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: they didn't have that.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: Presence, So definitely some grief comes up.
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: They'll also be some resistance to relaxing, Like if their
• 27:38
  Speaker 3: parasympathetic system starts coming on a little bit more, there's
• 27:41
  Speaker 3: a little bit more relaxing. Well, then there can often
• 27:43
  Speaker 3: be this anxiety that comes right after and the meaning
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: making of like, well, it's actually not safe to relax.
• 27:51
  Speaker 3: And so we can kind of go back and forth,
• 27:54
  Speaker 3: like watch those waves of we call it like trauma
• 27:56
  Speaker 3: bortex counter bortics as they come and just normalize that
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: that's normal part of the process.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: You know. Now you don't have to answer this question
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: or feel free to do so to the doree, you
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: feel comfortable, But did you experience trauma as a kid?
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: Oh?
• 28:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so, well the early developmental stuff, and then it's
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: a little bit of a question mark. I've had some
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: memories come up of sexual trauma as a child's but
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: I don't have any conscious memories of it. It's all
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: come up as like somatic memories, you know. I've checked
• 28:38
  Speaker 3: in with family members about some of it, and it
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: seems likely something did happen, but we don't quite know,
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: you know, whether the sematics memories I've had are based
• 28:48
  Speaker 3: on exactly what happened or just my physiology's way of
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: processing things. But it seems likely something happened when I
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: was pretty small.
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: Yea, Audi, what do you? I mean, your story is
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: so inspiring and I think it in a sense answers
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: what I'm going to ask you. But what do you
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: what do you think allows you to do this work?
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: Because this is a specialty. Not everyone can do this work, right.
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: We don't want anyone just touching us.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: Right, Oh, that's a good question.
• 29:27
  Speaker 3: You know, when I was in massage school, the feedback
• 29:30
  Speaker 3: I kept getting from my my colleagues, so they were
• 29:34
  Speaker 3: all just like, I feel so safe around you. Well,
• 29:37
  Speaker 3: and I don't know what I I don't know what
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: I was.
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: In massagechool. Anyone I massage just like, I feel so
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: safe around you.
• 29:46
  Speaker 3: And even when I started working as a massage therapist,
• 29:50
  Speaker 3: people will be like this massage was different, like and
• 29:54
  Speaker 3: just the pace I move at I move at a
• 29:55
  Speaker 3: really slow pace, and so I think part of it
• 29:58
  Speaker 3: is an and I've been this way since I was little.
• 30:01
  Speaker 3: People just feel comfortable around me, So I think that's helpful.
• 30:07
  Speaker 3: But I think for me too, what drives me is
• 30:11
  Speaker 3: that experience I had with Sherry, where I was when
• 30:15
  Speaker 3: I was in so much distress and really a lot
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: of people don't know how to help someone who are
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: in that position. I was like looking for answers from
• 30:25
  Speaker 3: doctors for like five years with no answers, and so
• 30:29
  Speaker 3: to have Sherry, who finally was like the first person
• 30:31
  Speaker 3: who really got it, really changed the course of my life.
• 30:35
  Speaker 3: And so I think that's where my fire comes from,
• 30:39
  Speaker 3: of like, I don't want this to be so hard
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: for other people to find the support they need. I
• 30:45
  Speaker 3: would really love for touch work to be like come
• 30:49
  Speaker 3: a little bit sooner, Like even if someone sees a
• 30:52
  Speaker 3: child struggling, like, oh, what if heavy they tried some
• 30:55
  Speaker 3: kind of body work.
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 30:56
  Speaker 3: I wish this intervention was used more readily because right now,
• 31:00
  Speaker 3: it's usually, as one of my se teachers says, like
• 31:03
  Speaker 3: the last stuff on the block. People have tried everything else.
• 31:06
  Speaker 3: They've tried talk therapy, maybe they've even tried somatic experiencing,
• 31:09
  Speaker 3: and there's like something still missing, and then like years
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: later they find to touch therapist.
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: Is often how it happens.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: Go back to Sherry. What did she do? What does
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: she do that was so life altering?
• 31:24
  Speaker 3: Oh?
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: Man, were just her.
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: Way she had a way about her.
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: I'm assuming, Yeah, there's a few moments that really stick out.
• 31:31
  Speaker 3: She was definitely very attuned. One of the first moments
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: I remember was I used to have a habit of
• 31:41
  Speaker 3: kind of disappearing in conversations, Like people would talk at
• 31:44
  Speaker 3: me and I could kind of leave and you be
• 31:47
  Speaker 3: off of my own little thoughts, and.
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: They would still talk at me.
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: No one ever realized I was gone, and I could
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: come back and nod and smile, and I was just like,
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: I can't believe people don't realize I'm not here because
• 31:57
  Speaker 3: they've been talking at me for like thirty minutes.
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: And Sharry was the first one. I did that in
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: front of her.
• 32:03
  Speaker 3: She was saying something to me and I kind of
• 32:04
  Speaker 3: went off somewhere and she looked straight at me and said,
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: where'd you go?
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: And I was like, oh, my gosh, she sees me.
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: She can see me, you know. She was the first
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: one who realized I wasn't there. Yeah, So she was
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: just so attuned. And then I think there was a period.
• 32:23
  Speaker 3: It was after I had been exposed to some molds,
• 32:26
  Speaker 3: which is like a whole nother story, but I was
• 32:27
  Speaker 3: pretty dysregulated after that experience and was just really struggling
• 32:32
  Speaker 3: with regulation. And I remember her saying to me like, Hey,
• 32:39
  Speaker 3: you're in the tunnel right now, and I know you
• 32:41
  Speaker 3: can't see the light at the end of the tunnel,
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: but I know it's there.
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: Because I've been in the tunnel before.
• 32:47
  Speaker 3: And She's like, I promise you it's there, and I'm
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: standing here at the end of the tunnel.
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: I'm calling your name and like I'm holding a torch
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: for you.
• 32:54
  Speaker 3: And that really got me through those days where like
• 32:57
  Speaker 3: I was feeling hopeless of just like well, Sherry said,
• 32:59
  Speaker 3: it's so, I'm just going to keep showing up every week.
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: And you know, now I do feel like.
• 33:05
  Speaker 3: I am outside the tunnel, thank goodness, and you know,
• 33:11
  Speaker 3: I just I feel inspired about being able to be
• 33:13
  Speaker 3: that person for someone else who's still in the tunnel
• 33:15
  Speaker 3: and feels like there's no way out.
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: That's awesome. That's awesome. Damn, Audrey, you're amazing. I'd love
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: to have you back. Oh yeah, really, how do people
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: reach you? How where can they learn more about you?
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 33:31
  Speaker 3: So my website is Restorative Presence dot com. I'm also
• 33:36
  Speaker 3: on Instagram at sematics with Audrey, and I have a
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: YouTube channel which I haven't posted anything in a while,
• 33:42
  Speaker 3: but my YouTube is at Sematics with Audrey, so that's
• 33:45
  Speaker 3: where people.
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: Can find me.
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: Okay, we'll have all those up here at the show
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: notes page at the Trauma therespodcast dot com. Audrey, thank
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: you so much, really inspiring, really inspire. I'm so glad
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: there are people like you out there who are doing
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: this work really well.
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much.
• 34:02
  Speaker 3: It was a pleasure to be here and appreciate the
• 34:04
  Speaker 3: opportunity to be able to share a little bit of
• 34:06
  Speaker 3: my story.
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: All right, we'll be in touch, all right.
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: Take care.