Relational Touch-Based Therapy
There is trauma in the body that words and thoughts can’t reach. Unlike traditional talk therapy, which primarily engages the mind, Embodied Liberation Sessions (ELS) bring us into deep relationship with ourselves and with each other by accessing the wisdom and intelligence of the body for a more integrated approach to healing.
The core tenets of this work are: embodiment practice, relational practice, and liberation practice. We use a de-colonial lens of attachment and de-pathologize non-verbal expressions of trauma in the body.
In these sessions, we co-create a safe container for experimentation, practice, and honest relating. I use somatic practices and therapeutic touch to support nervous system regulation, process emotions, explore how trauma lives in the body, cultivate awareness, and facilitate reparative relational experiences.
This is a liberatory practice—you are not a passive receiver of touch or a disembodied head in a therapy room, but a fully engaged, creative, collaborative, and responsive participant in our work and in your life.
Embodied Liberation Sessions
What are the benefits of touch-based therapy?
Explore Intimacy & Non-Sexual Touch
Touch therapy offers a structured, supportive environment to explore intimacy, closeness, and sensuality without judgement or expectation. You will learn to notice your body’s signals, understand your boundaries, practice voicing needs, and discover what kinds of touch feel nourishing and safe.
Nervous System & Emotional Regulation
One of the most healing aspects of this work is co-regulation—the way our nervous systems naturally settle in the presence of another regulated, attuned person.
Remedy for Touch Deprivation
In modern society, meaningful touch is increasingly rare, leaving many people physically and emotionally deprived. Touch therapy provides a safe, non-sexual space to experience nurturing contact and rebuild your capacity to give and receive intimacy.
Ease Chronic Tensions & Stress
Many of us carry stress and tension in our muscles, posture, and connective tissue without even realizing it. Through therapeutic touch, your body can soften areas that have been chronically tight or held, often resulting in mental and emotional relief.
Release Holding Patterns in the Body
Our bodies carry memories, trauma, and habitual tension that can affect your physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health. Touch therapy helps you notice and release these holding patterns in a gentle, guided way so you may experience emotional clarity and a renewed sense of energy.
Effective Alternative to Talk Therapy
In a society where touch is often restricted to sexual partners, investing in safe and healing touch can be more effective than talk therapy to yield a sense of presence, freedom, and connection. We will engage the mind insofar as you’re attuned to your somatic experience.
What should I expect in a touch-based therapy session?
We will start each session by helping you tune into the state of your body and calm your nervous system. I will guide you into an embodied meditation or invite gentle movement. You will practice reorienting to your inner and outer landscapes and bringing awareness to the needs and desires of your body.
1 | Somatic Grounding
From this more embodied state, I will invite discussion around a particular challenge, ongoing theme of exploration, or an experience that feels alive for you that day.
I will help you identify how your present experience—cognitive, emotional, physical, and/or spiritual—is being expressed in the body. We’ll discuss what kind of touch feels safe and supportive for you.
Together, we’ll create goals or a direction of exploration for our session. The flow of our sessions is highly collaborative and will be guided by ongoing themes, arising needs, intuition, and deep listening. The ratio of verbal to non-verbal engagement will be adapted to your needs, capacities, curiosities, and desires that day.
2 | Verbal Check-In
After about 20 minutes of engaged verbal processing and reflection, I will use the material we’ve gathering and alchemize it through your other centers of intelligence.
I will use intuitive, intentional touch—such as holding, gentle contact, or weighted pressure—to help you connect your thoughts to your body and shift your nervous system to a more regulated state. This might look like sounding, movement, breath, manual bodywork, play, gestures, experimentation, relational exercises, or nature interactions. You will remain fully clothed.
Over time, I may challenge you to cultivate your somatic awareness by exploring boundaries, distinguishing different qualities of touch, navigating relational dynamics, processing emotions, and shifting internal blockages.
3 | Touch Exploration
The last 15-20 minutes of our session will return us to our cognitive state to digest, integrate, make meaning, and transition to close.
This is not about “fixing” but about being present to your experience and developing embodied awareness—an inner knowing that is more whole and coherent than cognitive knowledge—which ultimately yields more joy, clarity, and agency in your life.
Future sessions will build upon past work or focus on goals that feel most present that day.
4 | Integration
FAQs
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This approach draws from the deepest learnings on my own life path. It integrates wisdom from various disciplines, including somatic therapy, dance, bodywork, fascial and structural work, Contact Improvisation, Authentic Movement, liberation-oriented activism, Buddhist philosophy, Daoism, Qi Gong, and meditation. I am trained in the Hakomi Method and am a certified Somassage® practitioner.
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Embodied Liberation Sessions are open to anyone interested in non-traditional healing practices that center body wisdom and relational touch. Since this work involves relational, participants are encouraged to have cultivated some level of body awareness practice in the past or present (ex. somatic therapy, meditation, yoga, dance, massage, etc.) We will be co-creating a container for embodied exploration, continually checking in about consent, boundaries, and relational edges.
Those who identify as queer, trans, neurodivergent/neurowild, sex positive, or who are highly receptive to touch as a healing modality may particularly benefit from this work.
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Touch is our first language—it’s a biological necessity. In a society where touch deprivation, overwhelm, and technological disembodiment are the norm, safe therapeutic touch helps restore our most primal pathways for parasympathetic healing, emotional regulation, and presence.
Touch-based therapy can be a powerful alternative healing modality for many physical, psychological, and spiritual challenges, including:
Anxiety
Depression
Isolation/loneliness
Life transitions
Sexuality & intimacy
Self-Esteem/self-worth
Trauma/(C)PTSD
Relationship & attachment issues
High-performers, achievers, leaders, creative blocks
Disembodiment in lifestyle or work environment
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Sessions are in-person in the East Bay. Each 75-minute session is $220. I have limited sliding scale slots reserved for queer, trans, and/or BIPOC clients. Email me with questions or to schedule a consultation call: teresatrinhcounseling@gmail.com
Testimonials
The testimonials below were given freely and reflect genuine experiences of those who have engaged with my touch offerings.
“I always feel so seen and cared—my entire being slows down and I feel more connected to my body and the world around me... It often feels like Teresa is also receiving as she gives bodywork and this reciprocity is such a sweet and sacred experience.”
“Whenever I receive Teresa’s touch... it’s like a huge hug to my nervous system. She is so aligned with her truth and spirit which I can feel in her touch. She moves so gracefully and intentionally. ”
“Teresa’s touch is nuanced; her presence soft and gentle, the conversation nourishing and heartening, the grip and precision of Teresa’s touch powerful...”
“Teresa’s touch was so soothing to all my tensions. And I’m not a person who prefers touch! I appreciate the sense of trust I get from Teresa—she is so open and loving, and one can’t help but be in reciprocal flow with her!”
Your body bends towards healing.
Your body is a portal—
a direct path to the present moment and to a more whole existence.