Healing Trauma: Finding the Right Therapist in Vancouver BC

Starting therapy can feel both hopeful and overwhelming. There are so many approaches, acronyms, and philosophies out there that it’s hard to know where to begin. At the end of the day, the most important thing is finding a therapist and a style that feels right for you, someone you feel safe with, and methods that resonate with how you naturally process and heal. At Unplug Hour, that’s what we focus on: creating a grounded, compassionate space where real healing can unfold.

Our resident counsellor Natalie integrates three main pillars in her work with clients: somatic therapy, parts work, and self-compassion. This combination creates a safe and effective container for processing difficult emotions and experiences without overwhelm.

1. Creating Safety and Building Resources

Trauma healing doesn’t begin by diving into painful memories. It starts by helping the body feel safe again. In somatic therapy, this is often called resourcing. Clients are gently guided to connect with sensations, memories, or images that bring a sense of stability or comfort.

This might involve noticing the feeling of support in the chair, remembering a safe person or place, or simply tuning in to the breath. Over time, these practices give the nervous system reference points for safety.

Natalie explains, “When we create safety first, the body learns that it’s possible to stay grounded while exploring what once felt overwhelming. This builds trust between mind, body, and therapist.”

2. Feeling vs. Flooding: Expanding Your Capacity

Many people associate difficult emotions like shame, grief, or despair with being consumed or overwhelmed. Somatic therapy helps separate feelings from flooding. Instead of reliving trauma, the process involves gently titrating emotional experiences. Clients touch into them in manageable doses, then return to safety.

As this capacity grows, clients discover that they can be with challenging sensations without losing their footing. Natalie often likens this to developing a superpower:

“When we build our ability to stay with discomfort, whether emotional or physical, we become more resilient. Life can still bring challenges, but we know how to stay calm and grounded no matter what comes.”

This capacity-building is a core reason somatic therapy is so effective for trauma. It strengthens the nervous system’s flexibility and allows healing to happen gradually and safely.

3. Meeting Inner Parts with Compassion

In addition to somatic work, Natalie incorporates parts work, a therapeutic approach that recognizes that many of our strong emotions and reactions come from younger parts of ourselves. These parts often carry pain, fear, or unmet needs from earlier in life.

Rather than trying to push them away, parts work invites us to meet these inner experiences with curiosity and warmth. Clients learn to step into the role of the wise, unconditionally loving adult, offering the support those parts never received.

This process is often intertwined with somatic awareness. A part might show up as a tightness in the chest, a lump in the throat, or a sinking feeling in the stomach. By combining body-based awareness with compassionate inner dialogue, these parts can begin to feel safe, integrate, and no longer need to hide, lash out, or create internal conflict.

4. Self-Compassion as the Foundation

Underpinning all this work is self-compassion. Trauma often leaves people with layers of self-blame, shame, or harsh inner criticism. Learning to meet yourself with kindness is not a soft extra; it is essential.

Self-compassion provides the emotional safety net that allows somatic and parts work to unfold. As Natalie puts it, “When we treat ourselves with the same care we’d offer someone we love, healing accelerates. The nervous system relaxes, the inner parts trust more easily, and real change becomes possible.”

A Holistic Approach to Trauma Healing

Acupuncture and somatic therapy work beautifully together. Acupuncture can calm the nervous system and regulate energy flow, creating physiological conditions that support deeper emotional processing. Somatic therapy and parts work then offer tools to understand, feel, and integrate experiences in a way that honors the body’s natural rhythm.

Healing trauma is not about erasing the past. It is about building enough safety, capacity, and self-trust in the present that old wounds can finally be felt and released.

In summary

Finding the right therapist is about more than credentials. It is about safety, resonance, and approaches that support your unique healing. At Unplug Hour, our resident therapist integrates somatic therapy, parts work, and self-compassion, alongside acupuncture, to support trauma healing in a grounded and holistic way.

~ Unplug Hour, Natalie Talson

Kelso Mill