Pregnant women and child touching their bellies, promoting somatic psychotherapy.

Spring 2019 Issue is Here

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Exploring the Relationship Between Prenatal and Perinatal Psychology and Family Violence: A Memoir

Submitted by: Sally Dear-Healey, Ph.D., PPNE, CBE, Doula “Therapists will have much more impact when they are able to conceptualize or discern more precisely what this...
Collage of parents interacting with babies, highlighting early childhood development.

Infant and Toddler Development: From Conception to Age 3. What Babies Ask of Us

Mary Jane Maguire-Fong and Marsha Peralta, recently published, Infant and Toddler Development: From Conception to Age 3. What Babies Ask of Us. In their “Preface”, they acknowledged my mom as a colleague and friend who has been “a source of wisdom, counsel, and inspiration in this work” (pg. x). Peralta noted, “We have so appreciated her contributions to our thinking and perspective”
Shadows of three people cast on a textured wall with dramatic lighting.

Prenatal and Birth Experience: Shadow and Potential

By Cherionna Menzam-Sills, PhD, ISMETA RSMT/E, RCST Adapted from a chapter in her forthcoming book, Fluid and Cosmos: Embodying Our Original Embryological Potential “Silence like a cancer grows.â€...
Diagram showing the brain's limbic system and its role in emotions and body control.

Primary Object Relationship: A New Reading

With Genovino Ferri and Mary Jane A. Paiva     When we talk about the primary object relationship, we first need to clarify that our perspective is one...
Silhouette of a person meditating at sunset over the ocean.

Listening to Your Body: How to Include the Body in a Therapeutic Conversation

In a world dominated by the intellectual and imaginal mind, the body can be shunted to the background as something that’s dumb, numb, inconvenient...
Smiling woman with long gray hair outdoors.

Letter from the Editor

Greetings SPT Community, It’s been quite a journey the past eight years for both Somatic Psychotherapy Today and me, as its Founding Editor-in-Chief. With our...
Close-up of an elderly woman smiling outdoors with flowers in the background.

Blossoming is Mandatory, Sparkling is Optional.

By Holly Holt   The Sacramento sky is scattered with fluff. The trees, covered in pink and white blooms reminiscent of the bedspread my mother chose...
Book cover showing a serene lake with mountains and a glowing light beacon at dusk.

It’s Never Too Late: Healing Prebirth and Birth At Any Age – Review

I was taken by Mia’s presentation of both information about what happens and what outcomes may result and also her specific processes, complete with dialogues and case studies, to work toward understanding and healing moments that can and do create imprints that influence our lives to come—who we are in this world, how we view ourselves within our family system as well as our communities at large, and how we believe the world accepts and values us.
Smiling woman with wavy hair in a casual top.

It’s Never Too Late: Healing Prebirth and Birth at Any Age – A Reflection...

Early in the writing of the first draft of It’s Never Too Late: Healing Prebirth and Birth At Any Age, I discovered there were steps, especially in the embryo’s story, that even after studying, I had difficulty envisioning. At the time I wondered, could I leave these hard to reach, yet essential steps out of my written examination? Would anyone besides experienced embryologists and biodynamic craniosacral therapy teachers notice? It didn’t take long to come clean with myself, that if I skipped intricate steps in my understanding, I would only further reinforce what was at the root of my amnesia, and that in order to be whole myself, I had to find out what was going on.