Somatic Therapy and Perinatal/Postpartum Mental Health
Somatic Therapy
Somatic therapy is a therapeutic approach that focuses on the connection of the mind and body and promotes the utilization of a body-centered approach to mental healing and growth. While there are a number of different modalities to practicing somatic therapy, these modalities tend to include exploration of physical sensations, emotions, and body-focused exercises. The benefits for most somatic practices are increased awareness of the body’s experience(s) and development of tools for alleviating tension or releasing stored experiences held within the body.
Why is a mind-body approach important to treating perinatal and postpartum mental health concerns?
Conceiving, pregnancy, birth, and infant/child nurturing during the postpartum period are ALL embodied experiences. The human body goes through so much during each of these experiences! As so aptly stated by Helena Vissing in her book, “Somatic Maternal Healing”, pregnancy and parenthood is the “expansion of the nervous system” due primarily to the innate neurobiological changes that occur throughout these periods. This expansion, along with the rapid physical and hormonal changes experienced throughout pregnancy, can sometimes result in new or worsening anxiety, depression, anger, and trauma-related symptoms. Moreover, perinatal and postpartum individuals can also struggle with changes to their body, their relationships, and their sense of self (even the world, as a whole). Because of this, it can be incredibly important to include the body when helping someone to heal or grow throughout their perinatal and postpartum experiences.
How can somatic therapy help throughout the perinatal and postpartum periods?
Somatic therapy has been shown to help with a number of mental health conditions. Primarily, it has been found to be helpful with the management of depression, anxiety, trauma, stress, grief, and chronic pain. Conceiving, pregnancy, birth, and parenthood are major changes in an individual’s life that alone can cause challenges. On top of these life changes, perinatal and postpartum individuals are also simultaneously experiencing neurobiological and hormonal changes, sleep deprivation, and physical changes/pains. Here are some of the ways somatic therapy can help:
Emotional Regulation
Emotions are experienced within the body. For some individuals, the disconnection from one’s body can make it difficult to understand their emotions and challenging to regulate their emotions. For others, they feel their emotions intensely and often feel overwhelmed by them. Regardless of the relationship with emotions, individuals commonly report notable or intense emotional changes throughout perinatal and postpartum periods. Somatic therapy can teach someone how to be in touch with their emotions and teach tools for regulating them.
Strategies for emotional regulation are body scans, somatic release (progressive muscle relaxation, wall pushes), breathwork, and pendulation exercises (shifting between focusing on discomfort and neutral/positive sensations).
Embodied Healing
One benefit to somatic therapy is the increased awareness and attunement to one's body-based experiences, which can promote a sense of agency and empowerment. This can be especially helpful for individuals who have experienced pregnancy-related loss, birth trauma, or medically-based trauma throughout their perinatal and postpartum periods.
Strategies that help with embodied healing are breathwork, gentle body movement (bi-lateral stimulation or rocking), mindfulness (safety visualization), and sensory grounding (focusing on a visual, tactile, auditory, taste or olfactory sensation)
Promotion of Child-Parent Attachment
An important job for parents throughout parenthood is to allow their child to “borrow” their nervous system in moments of distress so that their child can return to a state of calm, experience safety, and receive love. When a parent can successfully offer a warm, nurturing, and calm nervous system, they are promoting the development of a strong bond and secure attachment within their child. Somatic therapy can help someone identify when they are dysregulated and develop skills for shifting back into a calmer state.
Strategies that help with soothing the body in order to promote attachment are breathwork, gentle body movement (swaying, bouncing, yoga), and palming exercise (placing warm hands gently over both eyes to create darkness for 1-2 minutes)