Havening Session

What is Havening?

This is where you can describe what clients can expect from this service. You might want to include details about who this session is for, how it can help them, and any general information they should know beforehand.

Havening works by gently changing the way your brain stores and reacts to distressing memories. When something traumatic happens—like a difficult birth—the brain can “lock” the experience together with strong emotional reactions such as fear, shame, or helplessness. That’s why even years later, a reminder of the event can trigger those same feelings in an instant.

During Havening, gentle, repetitive touch on the arms, hands and/or face, sends calming signals through your nervous system. This helps your brain produce soothing brainwaves and chemicals like serotonin that tell your body you’re safe now. In this relaxed state, your brain can reprocess the memory, keeping the facts of what happened, but removing the overwhelming emotional charge.

In short, Havening helps your brain update the memory from traumatic and unsafe to something in the past that no longer controls how you feel in the present.

Sometimes one session is all that is required to achieve the outcomes you are seeking, and sometimes additional sessions will be needed. This won't likely be apparent until we discuss what you're hoping to achieve, and explore how you respond to the therapy.

What to expect

1. Our session will be held via Zoom and will take around 1 hour
2. We will talk about what you want to get from the session and discuss what's achievable
3. Once we have practiced the different Havening touches and check there are no further questions, I will need you to briefly ‘activate’ yourself, meaning, you will need to recall the traumatic event (either out loud or in your head) to momentarily stimulate the ‘fight or flight’ response.
4. I’ll then ask you to gauge your level of activation on a scale of 0 - 10 and we’ll commence Havening touch (each of us applying self-Havening touch across the screen).
5. For the next few minutes I will ask you some weird and whacky questions (called ‘distractions’) which will completely take your mind off the trauma, enabling the calming Havening touch to work its therapeutic magic.
6. I will ask you to recheck how you feel when you recall the trauma in your mind and give me your new 1 - 10 level of distress. On numerous occasions people I have worked with have gone from 10 to 0 after just one round of distractions, but sometimes it takes one or two more rounds to substantially lower the level of distress.
7. We usually end the session with one or two other types of Havening (what I described above is called Event Havening), all aimed at helping you to feel more calm and empowered when memories of your birth come to mind, or when you are thinking about what a future birth could be like for you.
8. We talk about how you can utilise self-Havening outside of the session, and what follow-up support might be required for you.