Sex and intimacy coaching is an exploratory practice of getting to know and accepting yourself both sexually and emotionally, locating and moving through barriers to intimacy, and learning skills to be vulnerable and get more of what you need.

As a Certified Somatica® practitioner, my approach combines talk-based coaching with experiential, body-based (somatic) practices (see “What does a sex and intimacy coaching session look like?” below for examples). Learn more about the Somatica® Method of coaching here.

The somatic or body-focused aspect of this approach will help you to map and develop awareness around your embodied (physical) and emotional responses to triggers like stress, unmet needs, boundary crossing, as well as safety, connection and pleasure. In session we may explore different bodily positions, movements, touch, and sensations to help free stored emotions, shift patterns that aren’t serving you, develop self-awareness, and heal.

This is a clothing on method with no kissing of the mouth or touching of the genitals. Aside from that, we will be working within each of our boundaries. Personally, I need to feel a lot of safety with someone, which comes with authentic connection, before progressing to more intimate physical touch. Part of our work together will be identifying your unique boundaries, and supporting you to express those during our session so that you can get better at expressing them in your life.

During our sessions, we’ll start by checking in. As we’re connecting and getting to know each other, I’m always scanning for and bringing to your attention the things you do really well when it comes to intimacy, and anything that may be a barrier for you.

Based on where you’re at on the day of our session and what you’re working on overall, I may introduce experiential practices – that I’ll guide you through or we’ll do together (or I’ll facilitate between you and your partner) – to help you heal, grow and overcome your unique barriers to intimacy.

Examples of experiential practices include:

• Core desires exploration to unveil the feelings that turn you on the most

• Relaxing into receiving to get more comfortable with receiving love, touch, desire and presence from others (and feel you are worthy of it).

• Trigger and boundary mapping to develop a felt sense of your triggers and boundaries in real time.

• Practicing the steps of relationship repair so that you have a process that you know works for you (and your partner) to develop understanding and come back into connection after inevitable ruptures/conflicts

• Sharing present moment feelings to develop your emotional literacy and ability to connect emotionally with yourself and others

• Inner child healing to deepen self-connection and self-love

• Pleasure mapping and exploring self and partner touch to develop a map of where you feel the most pleasure and the types of touch you like best

• Erotic embodiment breathwork to feel more present in your body and connected to your sexual self

• And so much more!

At the end of each session, we’ll take a few minutes to debrief so that you have a sense of if and how you want to take what we worked on forward to improve your life and relationships. I may also give you some optional home practices to continue integrating our work between sessions.

As part of my coaching programs, you have the option to contact me between sessions for support navigating challenging conversations/situations, share insights for deeper integration, ad stay accountable.

I’m a Certified Somatica® Sex and Relationship Coach, not a licensed therapist, so this is not therapy. The primary differences are the somatic and experiential component (see above list of experiential practices) of this work (versus therapy which tends to be more talk-based), the boundaries of the method (see above question), and the focus of our work together.

The focus of sex coaching is on sexual empowerment and creating a more pleasure-focused life through communication and skill-building, and can include touch and even spirituality if that’s your thing.

Additionally, the relationship you have with me is different from the relationship you may have with a therapist or counselor in that our relationship is based on mutual vulnerability (meaning that I will never expect you to be vulnerable without also bringing my vulnerability) and the real time connection between us is the primary substrate for our work. You can think of working with me as entering a “Relationship Lab” (see Somatica® Philosophy) – rather than talking about what you need to work on to have more intimacy, we will work on it together during the session.

A note about trauma:

Working with me to understand and express yourself sexually and emotionally is deeply healing. However, I am not your first stop for processing trauma, sexual or otherwise. If you are in active, acute trauma, please seek the support of a licensed therapist or counselor. And if you have experienced trauma in the past, I ask that you are either working with or have worked with a licensed practitioner around that trauma as a precursor to working with me.

Think of this somatic sex and intimacy work as another puzzle piece to your trauma healing journey. My goal is to support you in feeling empowered by helping you confidently express your needs and boundaries so that your trauma gets triggered less often, and you can still thrive despite it.