Jemma Schwartz

Healing Trauma

Healing Trauma

Living after trauma is so hard and full of paradoxes. It impacts how you connect to yourself, your beliefs, the relationships you pick, and how you parent. It colors what you choose as a career and how you show up in it. It distorts one’s perception of all aspects of the world, of what is safe and what is not.

You may feel stuck in anxiety – pain – overwhelm – shame – guilt. You may intellectually understand but not be able to move past it.

You want to keep yourself safe but doing so means your anxiety/ hypervigilance runs the show and says nothing is safe. You want to be seen, but vulnerability can lead to hurt or disappointment. You want connection but don’t know who to trust and give too much or too little of yourself. You are in your own head the whole time and that is exhausting.

Healing is possible, but research suggests a bottom up approach. This can mean understanding your nervous system, learning coping strategies, and practicing them so your body can (re)learn what safety and calm feel like. From there you can learn to tolerate living in a world where risk and disappointment are unavoidable. 

My Approach

I am an integrative therapist which means that I consider my approach to healing based on your symptoms, wishes and goals. I mix Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART), Internal Family Systems (IFS), Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT), Polyvagal Theory and my knowledge of trauma informed yogic practices for the mind and body into care.

I believe

You are not broken. Your system adapted to keep you safe in the past. Those safeguards are no longer working for you, and are impacting your ability to live. With you as the guide, our partnership will find the path towards a present you want to live in.

FAQ's

Is what I went through trauma?

There is no single definition of what will be traumatic to us and therefore completely unfair to compare traumas. Whether what impacted you was a one time big event or chronic and cumulative, it changes you. Trauma is something that alters your sense of safety and how you view the world, and it is in reaction to real or perceived threats. Words can have the same impact as fists, if you believe the threat. It is felt and remembered by the body to alert you and keep you safe.

It depends… If you have had a great life with a single trauma then we can target that trauma in 1-5 sessions. The more traumas there are and the more it is connected to early relationships the more complex the healing process will be. Once I know more about your history we can identify an initial timeline for our work.

Yes! Therapy can be in person or virtual. If you are virtual you must be located in NY at the time of our session. I use a HIPAA adherent telehealth program for our meetings.

Absolutely.  During times of stress it is easy for our healthy practices to go out the window. Much of wellness comes back to sleep, eating healthy food, drinking water,  exercise and connection. Breathe, move your body, get some sunlight, help someone else or snuggle with a 4 legged friend. I want you to shift away from your over consuming thoughts, even for a moment. Practice doing the things that fill you up, even if they are hard to begin.

It is very common to over perform as a way of building up one’s self concept and coping with trauma or uncertainties of childhood. However, when we only create meaning and definitions from our achievements and the external world, we miss a giant (sometimes scary) part of who we are. Our self, our soul. Therapy will help you heal and form a healthy relationship with yourself. You might find that this work also redefines how you want to show up for work in a way that is more sustainable.

When we are in the midst of a crisis our system responds to get us away from the threat. It isn’t until we have enough safety that our system can fully process the trauma. Sometimes symptoms emerge immediately, sometimes they are delayed. It is never too soon or too late to heal.

It can be. Loss can be traumatic, whether it is a physical death, an emotional loss, or a loss of dreams or opportunity. Healthy grieving doesn’t  mean forgetting. You will never be the same, but you can live after loss.