Coming home was hard.
I spent half of my life outside my home country and the idea of coming home after such a long time was exciting. My excitement was short-lived; soon after my return, I started experiencing debilitating symptoms that I had never felt before.
Certain places, smells and circumstances triggered me, awakening some painful memories buried deep in my past. For the first time, I started experiencing physical symptoms. My body was in pain, I felt like I couldn’t breathe, and I lost my motivation to socialise, exercise, and even work. I didn’t understand what was happening and I couldn’t recognise myself.
Talk therapy didn’t help. Even though my therapist explained to me what was going on and rationally I fully understood it, my body was reacting to certain stressors and there was nothing I could do about it. I was determined to overcome my symptoms without using meds. I had never experienced this problem before, and I wanted to be fully free without temporarily numbing my pain with medication.
After lots of research and to my surprise, I discovered that the latest scientific evidence in overcoming trauma without using meds supports bio-psychosocial methods of using body psychotherapy, EMDR, and mind and body exercises such as Pilates.
I will always be grateful that I was introduced to Dragana. She is a wonderful and highly experienced psychotherapist and expert in the fields of body psychotherapy and EMDR.
Using EMDR and body psychotherapy, Dragana helped me to recognise, feel, accept, and release from my body and nervous system some of the hardest feelings and fears so that the memory of my past experiences was no longer upsetting to me. My nervous system became regulated, and I regained my peace and strength.
As a Clinical Pilates instructor, I was struck by the similarities between methods used by body psychotherapists and EMDR therapists to help their clients overcome emotional pain, and the methods I use in Clinical Pilates to help my clients overcome chronic pain.
In both cases, the only way forward is to recognise, work through, and release from your body and mind the physical and emotional aspects of pain. This regulates your nervous system, overcoming trauma and chronic pain.
Whether you are dealing with chronic pain, emotional pain, or both moving your body and healing your mind is a necessary part of your recovery. Our workshop was born out of this knowledge and the desire to help.
Do not be afraid of your pain! Feel it! It is going to hurt. But every moment you are hurting, you are healing. Remember, the only way out is through! Everything else is a temporary shortcut. You have to feel it to heal it!
We are here to help you.