Somatic Experiencing®, or SE, is a body-oriented modality that helps heal trauma and other stress disorders by tracking cycles of deactivation and activation within the individual’s nervous system. Developed by Peter Levine, Ph.D., it results from the multidisciplinary study of stress physiology, psychology, ethology, biology, neuroscience, indigenous healing practices, and medical biophysics, with more than 50 years of successful application. 

When your nervous system perceives a threat, it typically responds in a fight, flight, or freeze response. Whether a sudden event has occurred that you perceive to be life-threatening or there is exposure to long-term stress, your nervous system can sometimes get stuck in the threat response. The SE method provides a framework to assess where you might be “stuck” in the threat response and provides methods and clinical tools to resolve the accumulation of stress, shock, and trauma symptoms in the body.

Many people experience symptoms that present like trauma symptoms, but they don’t feel they have been through something that qualifies as “traumatic”. From Dr. Peter Levine’s website: 

“Trauma may begin as acute stress from a perceived life-threat or as the end product of cumulative stress. Both types of stress can seriously impair a person’s ability to function with resilience and ease, and live in the here-and-now. Trauma may result from a wide variety of stressors such as accidents, invasive medical procedures, sexual or physical assault, emotional abuse, neglect, war, racial discrimination, oppression, natural disasters, loss, birth trauma, or the corrosive stressors of ongoing fear, conflict, and chronic shaming.”

In addition to these, first responders, caregivers, therapists, individuals working in high-stress job fields, individuals with perinatal or postnatal trauma, chronic pain, chronic illness, and individuals who have left high-control religions may also be stuck in patterns of perceived threat in their nervous systems.