Somatic Trauma Release
Breathwork
Emotions are physiological. When experience cannot be fully processed, the nervous system organizes around protection, and the body braces.
This practice combines conscious connected breath with somatic nervous system work to support the completion of unfinished survival responses, soften fight-flight-freeze patterns, and restore regulation from the inside out.
The focus is not catharsis or temporary release, but genuine reorganization.
Unlike most breathwork, this approach is grounded in trauma science, somatic experiencing, and relational attunement, paced carefully and held within a safe, attuned field. This is not just overaction, but an embodied and integrative means of inner transformation.
Through rhythmic breath, the intellectual mind can rest, and the nervous system can access preverbal and implicit or unconscious layers of experience, completing what was once interrupted and creating space for presence, clarity, and deeper connection with yourself.
This work is for you if:
You feel stuck in patterns of stress, tension, or overwhelm
Old emotions resurface but don't resolve
You want to soften fight-flight-freeze responses at the nervous system level
You're navigating grief, trauma, or significant life transitions
Other approaches have helped but something deeper remains untouched
Breathwork or altered-state experiences were profound but not integrated or lasting
FAQs
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Most breathwork either overstimulates the nervous system or produces profound transpersonal experiences without the support for genuine integration. The result is often temporary cathartic in the moment but not lasting healing or transformation.
My approach is grounded in trauma science, somatic experiencing, and careful relational attunement. Sessions are paced deliberately, with attention to containment, nervous system capacity, and what is actually ready to move. The aim is not just release but reorganization, completion of what was interrupted, held within a safe and integrative field.
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Breathwork refers to intentional breathing techniques used to support regulation, presence, and healing.
The breath mirrors the nervous system: it is one of the few voluntary functions that also operates unconsciously, making it a precise entry point into implicit and preverbal layers of experience.This offering uses conscious connected breath, an intentionally activated rhythmic breathing style. When paired with somatic nervous system work, trauma science, and relational attunement, it supports not just temporary catharsis but genuine nervous system reorganization, often accessing preverbal and developmental layers of experience that other approaches cannot reach.
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Somatic nervous system work engages how experience lives in the body at its most implicit levels, in the patterns of activation, protection, and organization that form beneath conscious awareness. When experiences overwhelm our capacity to process them, the system organizes around protection rather than presence. Through bottom-up, felt experience, the nervous system can complete what was interrupted and reorganize from the inside out, restoring safety, coherence, and choice.
In my practice and full integrative approach, bottom-up nervous system work and top-down developmental and identity work operate together, because meeting experience fully requires both a regulated nervous system and a coherent sense of self to meet it with. -
Trauma is not a pathology but an adaptive survival response. When experiences overwhelm our capacity to process them, the nervous system organizes around protection rather than presence.
Not all may resonate with acute shock trauma, which is the initial interpretation of trauma science, but many carry developmental trauma: patterns shaped not by a single event but by the chronic relational environment of life, particularly in our earliest years. This distinction matters for how healing works. Developmental patterns require a developmental approach: slowly, relationally, and through the gradual building of nervous system capacity, refined perception, and a more coherent sense of self.
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Sessions are either online from anywhere in the world via live Zoom, or in-person in NYC.
In-person sessions are in Midtown Manhattan on select days and carry a small additional fee.
Private groups as well as couples’ sessions are also available for breathwork.
Meet your breathwork practitioner
About Me
Susan Reis is an integrative somatic practitioner based in New York City, specializing in nervous system work, developmental growth, and somatic trauma resolution. She is a Certified Biodynamic Breathwork & Trauma Release System (BBTRS) Practitioner, Somatic Experiencing, Certified DARe Practitioner, Certified Brainspotting Practitioner, Certified Buteyko Breathing Instructor (functional breathing), and Nejang Healing Yoga Teacher, while also currently completing a MS in Applied Neuroscience. Her breathwork sessions weave conscious connected breath with somatics, trauma science, subtle body dynamics, and relational attunement, paced carefully to support genuine healing rather than temporary catharsis. She works with individuals online and in-person in NYC.
Learn more about me and my approach.