New offerings! Yippee! 🎉
Check them out here
First off, let me say how pleased I was to see folks at the Open House a couple weekends ago. Nothing delights my heart more than PEOPLE. There were lots of good conversations happening about the body, how prolonged stress and trauma show up in the body via postures, movements, and tension, and how we can work to resolve these effects and give the body (and person) new options. So. Much. Fun.!!
New Offerings for Everyone
There were several new offerings announced at the Open House, that I want to mention here for those that could not make it.
Release & Refresh Class
Like a massage for the nervous system, this body-centric class facilitates dropping out of fight/flight and freeze responses and landing in a more grounded, calm state. We do this with strategic body positioning and stretching, guided exercises that foster body awareness, and safe explorations into areas where we can let go. Takes place on yoga mats (provided), and is offered as a monthly drop-in class on the 2nd Wednesday of the month. Registration is required, and can be done on the Release & Refresh page of the website.
For this class, I invited Michelle Ester-Bode, a phenomenal yoga teacher here in Brownsburg that has completed coursework in being trauma-informed, to co-teach with me. Her expertise is proving to be a perfect fit for what I wanted this class to be: super simple ways of moving, stretching, and engaging the body while being guided into the nervous system’s “safety zone” (out of fight/flight or freeze). No yoga experience necessary, as we’ve made this incredibly accessible to everyone.
Within 12 hours of announcing this new class on Facebook last week, the October 11 class was sold out, and then in a short time later the November class was also sold out. We hear you! We’re looking to see if we can add more times. Stay tuned.
Release & Refresh Class for Parents & Caregivers
As you’ll see on the website, there is also a version of this class designed specifically for those whom parenting or caretaking is one of their major stressors life right now. So for those who stay home with little ones, caretake for an aging parent, tend to a special-needs child, or for anyone who deals with the ongoing stress of raising kids, this version of the class is for you! I personally know that stage of life (I’m in it currently and have been for 11 years) and hold a special place in my heart for moms, dads, and other caregivers. We need more support! This is my answer to that, my attempt to provide a respite that speaks directly to that experience. This special version takes place on the last Friday of the month and is longer (2 hours), to give more time for the frazzled feeling of parents to dissipate while we find some calm. This class offers childcare — yay! — for those single parents or folks who don’t have family around or easy babysitter options, for a small fee of $6/child. I have Safe-Sitter Certified babysitters lined up and ready to serve you. 🙂 These parent-version classes are NOT filled up yet, so grab your spot today for the next one, and share it with your friends, here.
Feel to Heal Program
This program is not new (this is the 5th round), but it IS coming up! We start in 20 days! 😯 There are so many people who have expressed interest in joining this 8-week class this fall, that I can’t keep track of them all. You better sign up here before it’s too late!! It runs on Monday nights, October 30 - December 18, 6:45 - 8:45pm.
What is Feel to Heal? Studio A’s flagship program, it’s an educational deep-dive into the connection between emotions and tension/pain in the body. Drawing from multiple approaches and grounded in neuroscience, we safely and gently explore our emotions and our nervous system patterns, and discover new ways to handle stress and emotions, thus introducing more ease into the physical structures of the body. It is a fantastic primer for one-on-one work, since the connection between emotions and the body inevitably comes up when seeking to heal from trauma. Some folks use this program as an adjunct to their work with a mental health therapist, and others as a stand-alone experience or as they wait to become a one-on-one client at Studio A. It is deeply trauma-informed and is influenced by some of the best therapies that exist for chronic pain (emotional and/or physical). Read more about it here. Come learn with us!
New Offerings for Professionals
We also have several new offerings for therapeutic professionals to check out…
Somatically-Oriented Practitioners’ Association (S.O.P.A.)
This is a newly-formed group open to professionals that have been trained in and are actively employing somatic interventions with their clients, or are current students of somatic modalities. This group aims to foster connection between somatically-oriented practitioners and help expand the reach of somatic work here in Indiana. We meet quarterly, alternating between in-person and Zoom, to accommodate those outside central Indiana who wish to join. Next one is at the end of this month! Read more and register for meetings here.
Help for the Helper
Part book club and part experiential session, this 8-week class is for therapists and other helping professionals that experience “vicarious trauma“ from chronic exposure to others‘ trauma. We will be working our way through “Help for the Helper“ by Babette Rothschild and also practicing the principles together, of developing greater body awareness as a means of self-care amidst being with clients. This will be held on Thursdays via Zoom so that professionals can join us on their lunch break. Starts in February, sign-ups coming soon! If you run a practice with multiple therapists/practitioners, consider if you want to go through it together as a team, as a way to grow professionally together.
Becoming Trauma-Informed
If you work with bodies, then you work with trauma. So it is crucial that massage therapists and other bodyworkers develop skills to spot fight/flight and freeze responses when they happen in our clients and know how to safely and effectively navigate a session when this occurs. This program aims to teach you that and more. This new offering is being born out of the immense need for more programming, courses, and support overall for bodyworkers as they encounter the effects of trauma in their clients. It is an understatement to say that massage school does not prepare us adequately for what we encounter in the folks that land on our table, as far as the trauma responses, boundary violations, and embedded fight/flight and freeze patterns that their body holds and expresses. And the current programs that exist are lengthy, expensive, and really go into more detail than what would be considered necessary basics for bodyworkers. I’m aiming to have this ready by Fall 2024 and intend to have it provide CEUs. Stay tuned for more info.
All of these new offerings for professionals can be seen in more detail on the “For Professionals” page of the website.
That’s all for now friends! Enjoy this amazing fall weather while it lasts!
~Allie