trauma/ptsd
For What Your Body Is Still Carrying
Trauma isn't what happened to you. It's what happened inside you in response to it. And it lives there still, in the places your body braces without warning, in the reactions that feel out of proportion, in the exhaustion of managing a nervous system that never fully settled after something it couldn't process at the time.
I work with trauma not by asking you to retell the story until it loses its charge, but by working with your nervous system directly. Helping it complete what the original experience interrupted. That's a different kind of work, and it's the kind I do.
start with a free 15 minute consultation
Discover your path forward...your next chapter starts here
Trauma Isn't in the Memory. It's in the Response.
Most people who carry trauma have already told the story. Many times. In previous therapy, to trusted people, inside their own heads at 3am. And telling it helps, sometimes. But for many people, the retelling becomes its own kind of reactivation without resolution. The story gets clearer while the body stays stuck.
That's because trauma isn't stored the way ordinary memories are. It's stored as sensation, as activation, as a nervous system response that fires before the thinking mind has time to catch up. The body doesn't distinguish between the memory of a threat and a current one. It responds to both the same way.
Working with trauma means working at that level. Not talking about the experience from a distance, but helping your system complete what the original experience interrupted. When that happens, the memory doesn't disappear. It just loses its grip.
EMDR and the Body: Why I Use Both
Most trauma therapists specialize in one approach. I hold certifications in both EMDR and Somatic Psychotherapy, and in practice these two approaches work together in ways that neither does alone. EMDR uses bilateral stimulation to help your brain reprocess experiences that got lodged rather than integrated. Somatic work tracks what's happening in your body throughout, the tightening, the breath, the activation, and works with those signals directly.
The combination matters because trauma is rarely just a cognitive event or just a body event. It's both. Some of what's stored responds to EMDR's reprocessing. Some of it needs to be met in the body, slowly, with enough safety to let the system move through what it couldn't at the time.
I also draw from Sensorimotor Psychotherapy for Trauma, a body-centred approach specifically developed for trauma themes, which gives me additional tools for working with the physical expressions of activation, collapse, and freeze that talk-based approaches often miss entirely.
When the Wound Isn't a Single Event
Not all trauma comes from one clear moment. For many people, it accumulated over time, in a family system that wasn't safe, in relationships where their needs were consistently unmet, in an environment that required them to be someone other than who they were to survive it.
Complex trauma of this kind tends to be more pervasive and more difficult to locate than single-incident trauma. It shows up not just in specific triggers but in how you relate to yourself, in your patterns with other people, in the sense that something foundational feels off even when you can't point to a particular cause.
I work with complex trauma rooted in family and relational experiences regularly. It's some of the most meaningful work I do. The Enneagram often becomes a useful lens here too, helping to illuminate the specific strategies that formed around the wound and what it would take to move beyond them.
trauma therapy
This might be right for you if...
You react to things in ways that feel out of proportion and can't talk yourself out of it
Your body braces, freezes, or shuts down in situations that should feel safe
You've told the story but the charge hasn't left
You're exhausted by the effort of managing your own nervous system
Your trauma is complex, relational, or rooted in a long history rather than a single event
Previous therapy helped you understand what happened but didn't change how your body responds
You're scared that talking about it will make it worse
You're ready to work with trauma at the level where it actually lives
Trauma-Specific Training
My trauma training is rigorous, body-centred, and built for the level where trauma actually lives. I completed my EMDR certification through the Maiberger Institute in Boulder, one of the most respected EMDR training bodies in the state, and my certification in Sensorimotor Psychotherapy for Trauma through the Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute, a body-based approach developed specifically for trauma themes.
My Master's from Naropa University in Clinical and Mental Health Counseling with a concentration in Mindfulness-Based Transpersonal Counseling gave me a whole-person, contemplative foundation that means trauma work here never happens in isolation. My additional certifications in Somatic Psychotherapy, Gestalt Therapy, and Existential Psychotherapy mean I can follow trauma wherever it leads, into the body, the relational patterns it created, and the questions of identity and meaning it leaves behind.
Sessions and Pricing
I'm private pay only, which means our work is never shaped by insurance timelines or approval requirements. Sessions are $140 for 50 to 55 minutes. A free 15-minute consultation is available before any commitment. You can reach me at (720) 663-0334.
start with a free 15 minute consultation
Discover your path forward...your next chapter starts here
-
That fear is common and makes complete sense, especially if previous therapy involved retelling the story without feeling better afterward. In my practice, we don't begin with the traumatic material. We build safety first, develop internal resources, and move at a pace your system can actually tolerate. EMDR and somatic work don't require you to narrate the experience in detail. They work at the level of the nervous system, which means we can process what happened without retraumatizing you in the process.
-
Yes, when it's done carefully and with adequate preparation. Complex trauma requires a slower, more relational approach than single-incident trauma. I don't move into active EMDR processing until there's enough safety, trust, and internal resource to support it. The stabilization phase isn't a delay before the real work. It is the real work, and it matters enormously for complex trauma specifically.
-
PTSD is a clinical diagnosis with specific criteria around intrusion, avoidance, negative cognition, and hyperarousal following a traumatic event. Trauma is a broader term for the nervous system's response to overwhelming experience, which doesn't always meet the full criteria for PTSD but is still very real and very present in the body. I work with both, and the approach is similar: working at the level of the nervous system rather than just the narrative.
-
It depends significantly on the nature and complexity of the trauma. Single-incident trauma often responds more quickly than complex relational trauma built up over years. I don't operate on a fixed timeline. We move at the pace your system actually needs, not the pace a program dictates.
-
You can reach me by calling (720) 663-0334, emailing jacqui@pathofpurpose.org, or booking a free 15-minute consultation through the website. Path of Purpose is located at 1895 Bluff Street, Boulder, CO 80304. Telehealth sessions are available for Colorado residents throughout the state.