A woman rests her forearms on a sunny garden wall overlooking the city.

When your body won't stand down

For adults in New York who feel braced and wired, even when nothing is wrong.

A woman takes a phone call beside a bright open window.

Who This Is For

Often it is because your body learned, somewhere along the way, that it wasn't safe to relax. Maybe it was a hard childhood, a high pressure job, years of holding things together, or one frightening stretch you never had time to recover from. The alarm kept ringing after the danger passed, and now it rings on quiet Sundays too.

Being on edge isn't a character flaw, and you aren't imagining it. It is a pattern your nervous system settled into, and patterns can shift. Many of the people I see look calm from the outside and feel wired underneath.

A woman opens a garden gate onto a sunny path with a blue water view.

What Being on Edge Looks Like

Startling easily
A door closing or a phone buzzing sends a jolt through you.
Never off duty
Scanning the room, the inbox, or a partner's mood for signs of trouble.
Tired but wired
Exhausted by evening, and still unable to settle into sleep.
Short fuse
Snapping at small things, then feeling bad about it afterward.

A man repots a young plant in a blue ceramic pot on a sunny porch.

How I Work With a Body That Won't Settle

Telling yourself to relax often doesn't work, because the alarm isn't coming from your thinking mind. So we work with the body directly. With Hakomi and somatic work, we notice, slowly and kindly, what happens in your shoulders, belly, or breath when you feel on guard. Noticing it with someone steady beside you can begin to change the signal.

Psychodynamic work helps us understand when you first learned you had to stay alert, and what that alertness is still trying to protect. Over time, the aim is a body that can tell the difference between real danger and an ordinary Tuesday.

More about my approach

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What Sessions Look Like

A calm first step
A free 20 minute phone consultation. No pressure, just a conversation.
A steady rhythm
55 minute sessions, often weekly to start and then every other week, in Rhinebeck, Hudson, or by telehealth in New York State.
Practice in the room
Part of each session goes to noticing what helps your body settle, so you can find it again on your own.

What Can Shift

What I hope for is that you get to come down from high alert. Not into numbness, but into presence: able to sit on the porch, enjoy the people you love, and feel at home in yourself.

If you are tired of living braced, a free 20 minute phone consultation is an easy place to begin.