Somatic Tao

Somatic Tao Simple, effective relief for stress and trauma SOMATIC TAO is the home of BEN, Babyhood Emotional Neglect and how to heal the fall out of BEN.

SOMATIC TAO is an integrated neuro-somatic emotionally aware therapeutic approach that helps treat mental and physical symptoms of stress, trauma and early life neglect.
____________

SOMATIC TAO understands that most modern day mental and physical "ills" are due to a lack of ability to tolerate and process emotional energies:

• rage and protest energy mobilised in answer to unmet needs;
• toxic shame created by unmet very early developmental needs;
• grief due to loss, rejection and abandonment;
• fear and terror due to unmet need for safety and security.
____________

Working with:

• Dr Peter Levine's Somatic Experiencing (SE) to track felt sense of the body;
• Stephen Porges' Polyvagal Theory to identify the active part of the nervous system;
• knowledge of Traumatology;
• Parts of Self Theory; and
• the Taoist Philosophy understanding of how emotions affect health

SOMATIC TAO encourages suppressed emotions and trauma energy locked in your body to process, thereby increasing your mental and physical wellness.
____________

Combining the above with knowledge of Bowlby's Attachment Theory, SOMATIC TAO works with adults suffering the impact of:

• Babyhood Emotional Neglect, (BEN);
• Adverse Babyhood Experiences, (ABEs); and
• Adverse Childhood Experiences, (ACEs)

to recover emotional resilience and capacity to live an empowered and meaningful life for yourself and in relationship with others.
____________

With over 19 years experience of working with stress, emotional distress and trauma, plus familiarity of medical terms and drug mechanisms gained from previous careers in neuroscience and the pharmaceutical industry, I am able to share a unique and comprehensive approach to health to both clients and supervisees working in the mental health field. PLEASE NOTE: Somatic Tao does NOT use Messenger. Please contact using email at info@somatictao.co.uk
Many thanks.

DR LAURENCE HELLER - Fully experiencing ourselves"... the more we allow ourselves to fully experience who we are, the gr...
31/01/2026

DR LAURENCE HELLER - Fully experiencing ourselves

"... the more we allow ourselves to fully experience who we are, the greater the possibility of change."

Dr. Laurence Heller
Creator of NARM, NeuroAffective Relational Model for working with developmental trauma

MORE INFORMATION:

📌Information about Adverse Babyhood Experiences, ABEs: https://chronicillnesstraumastudies.com/abes-introduction/

📌 Introduction of BEN: https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=894198262721482&set=a.457198723088107

📌 Emoturity - Nervous System Emotional Maturity:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/16Hh4tXebz/

📌 Emotional Maturity & Resiliency:
https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1Kkndgmhjd/

📌 Emoturity Affects Life & Health:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19LN8uu4Pt/

📌EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE IS NOT EMOTURITY:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/15HmjdyGMc/

📌 EMOTURITY IS BUILT ON NEUROPLASTICITY
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1CFA4pMemf/










29/01/2026

GABOR MATÉ - SLEEP TRAINING BABIES

Gabor Maté explains how sleep training babies and ignoring their cries for help conveys to the baby that their needs don't matter.

Sleep training exposes babies to risk of BEN, Babyhood Emotional Neglect, and all associated negative impacts to long term health and happiness.

More information: https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1MaSfNkAfB/

Video credit - spark__growth














SHAME IS WIDELY MISUNDERSTOODShame is often described as an emotion, but it is more accurately understood as a neurophys...
28/01/2026

SHAME IS WIDELY MISUNDERSTOOD

Shame is often described as an emotion, but it is more accurately understood as a neurophysiological state.

Within Polyvagal Theory, shame aligns with dorsal vagal parasympathetic activation - a state of immobilisation and disconnection that arises when the nervous system perceives threat as overwhelming and inescapable.

The characteristics of shame offer powerful clues to its origins.

SOMATIC characteristics of shame:

📌 Absence or blunting of sensation
📌 Numbness or confusion
📌 Loss of energy or muscle tone
📌 Connection feeling difficult or even excruciating

➡️ SOMATIC DISCONNECTION

BEHAVIOURAL characteristics of shame:

📌 Heightened self-consciousness
📌 Difficulty making or sustaining eye contact
📌 Flat or restricted emotional expression
📌 Behaviours that appear illogical or contradictory to one’s values or lived experience
📌 People-pleasing or appeasement
📌 Little or no self-compassion

➡️ BEHAVIOURAL DISCONNECTION

BELIEF PATTERNS associated with shame:

📌 “I can’t”
📌 “Nothing works”
📌 “It’s impossible”
📌 “It doesn’t happen for me”
📌 “I’m a failure”

➡️ PSYCHOLOGICAL / EXISTENTIAL DISCONNECTION

Across all domains, shame involves disconnection and immobilisation - from the body, from emotion, from meaning, and from a coherent sense of self.

According to Polyvagal Theory, this disconnection and immobilisation are mediated by the dorsal vagal parasympathetic system. From this perspective, shame is best understood as a shutdown or freeze-like nervous system state.

The dorsal vagal system is non-cognitive and operates outside conscious awareness. Shame therefore does not require consciousness or understanding and can develop prior to cognitive development. This challenges the belief that shame begins around age two; rather, this is when its characteristics become visible.

Shame is an unconscious autonomic nervous system response to inescapable threat. This threat is internal - it's the intense emotion arising due to emotional neglect or misattunement in utero and during babyhood. BEN, Babyhood Emotional Neglect, wires shame into the nervous system.
👉 Save this if you’re learning to understand shame through the nervous system.
👉 Share this with someone who thinks shame is ‘just an emotion'.

MORE INFORMATION:

📌 INTRODUCTION OF BEN, BABYHOOD EMOTIONAL NEGLECT: https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=894198262721482&set=a.457198723088107

📌 THE THREAT IN BEN
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1BHBRhLTpY/

📌 BEN CHANGES WIRING OF THE BRAIN:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1A2TFYgTt6/

📌 EMOTURITY IS BUILT ON NEUROPLASTICITY
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1CFA4pMemf/















EMOTIONAL DISSOCIATIONAn adult's disconnection from their own emotional self, (emotional dissociation), will mean they l...
27/01/2026

EMOTIONAL DISSOCIATION

An adult's disconnection from their own emotional self, (emotional dissociation), will mean they lack awareness of and tolerance for their child's emotions, (whether that child be their inner child self or the biological child they are parenting in the here and now). And so...

➡️... emotionally dissociated parents bring up emotionally dissociated children ...
➡️... who grow up into emotionally dissociated adults ...
➡️... who then likely become emotionally dissociated parents ...
➡️... who then bring up emotionally dissociated children ...
➡️... and ...
➡️... and ...
➡️... and ...
.. the emotional dissociation is passed forward to future generation 😕 after future generation 😟.

And why is the above important? Because emotional dissociation perpetuates the nervous system's intolerance of stress, thereby leading to mental 😵‍💫 and physical unwellness 🤒.

Please help stop the perpetuation of emotional dissociation.

Please help your young toddler/child recognize their emotions in their bodily experience. When your child is emotional:

👉 Please name your child's emotion for them
👉 Please use your facial expressions to demonstrate your child's emotion to them, i.e., use mirroring
👉 Please help your child locate the feeling of their emotion in the felt sense of their body, e.g. use the drawing of a Gingerbread person.

🎯 Conscious awareness is the antidote to dissociation.

🎯 Prevention of dissociation promotes energetic flow of emotions in the body.

🎯 Energetic flow of emotions is the foundation of physical and mental wellness.

A great resource to help parents help their children develop emotional awareness is the book:

"Trauma Proofing Your Kids" written by Peter A. Levine and Maggie Kline:
https://www.amazon.com/Trauma-Proofing-Your-Kids-Instilling-Confidence/dp/1556436998

MORE INFORMATION:

📌 EMOTOLOGY:
https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=1034305068710800&set=a.457198723088107

📌 TRAUMA IS THWARTED EMOTOLOGY:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1MKWcnKZLA/

📌 EMOTOLOGY RELIES ON INTEROCEPTION:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CnetSUCjo/

📌 Emoturity - Nervous System Emotional Maturity:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/16Hh4tXebz/

📌 EMOTURITY IS BUILT ON NEUROPLASTICITY
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1CFA4pMemf/

📌 EMOTION WIRES THE NERVOUS SYSTEM
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1BbHRZub7o/

📌 Emoturity Affects Life & Health:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19LN8uu4Pt/

📌 Emotional Intelligence Is Not Emoturity:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/15HmjdyGMc/



















25/01/2026

SOOTHING SUNDAY – Walking in the Snow ...

Walking
In the snow
Past silent majesty
Trough gates
Walking back
Into sunshine.











SUE GERHARDT - Talking about feelings."... if caregivers don't talk about feelings, or if they represent them inaccurate...
24/01/2026

SUE GERHARDT - Talking about feelings.

"... if caregivers don't talk about feelings, or if they represent them inaccurately, it all be much more difficult for the child to express feelings and to negotiate around feelings with others."

Sue Gerhardt
Psychoanalytical Psychotherapist














BEN LEADS TO LASTING EMOTIONAL & PHYSICAL PAIN From the final months in the womb through the first two years of life, th...
22/01/2026

BEN LEADS TO LASTING EMOTIONAL & PHYSICAL PAIN

From the final months in the womb through the first two years of life, the brain grows and develops at an extraordinary rate. During this time, neuroplasticity is especially high, meaning the brain is highly sensitive to its environment. This sensitivity helps form new neural connections [1], but it also makes the brain vulnerable to neglect and stress.

More than twenty years ago, researchers proposed that experiences during the perinatal period and early childhood permanently shape how brain circuits are built. Since then, studies have shown that Babyhood Emotional Neglect (BEN) can alter brain development by speeding up the maturation of corticolimbic circuits. These changes help a child survive in adverse environments, but they can come at a long-term cost [2, 3].

More recent research has examined how childhood trauma affects brain activity. A large study using brain SPECT imaging and clinical data from over 7,000 participants found a clear link between Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) scores and an increased risk of psychiatric conditions, including PTSD, anxiety, depression, and substance use disorders [4].

Importantly, the study also found abnormal activity in brain regions involved in emotional pain and decision-making, such as the anterior cingulate and thalamus. These areas, which process both physical and emotional suffering, were overactive in individuals with high ACE scores. This helps explain why early trauma is often linked to chronic conditions such as fibromyalgia and migraines.

Taken together, this evidence shows that early life adversity, including BEN, can contribute to lasting emotional and physical pain. BEN is often invisible, yet it lies at the root of much long-term suffering and disease.

Breaking the cycle of BEN begins with awareness. Healing begins when we nurture emotional maturity in ourselves and support it in the next generation. 💫

🧐 PLEASE INCREASE AWARENESS OF BEN
🤲 PLEASE SHARE ABOUT BEN
🗣 PLEASE SPEAK ABOUT BEN
👉 PLEASE POINT PEOPLE TO SOMATIC TAO - THE HOME OF BEN

MORE INFORMATION:

📌 Introduction of BEN: https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=894198262721482&set=a.457198723088107

📌 BEN & Caregiver History of BEN
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1GLpM8h9sn

📌 THE THREAT IN BEN
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1BHBRhLTpY/

📌 Emoturity - Nervous System Emotional Maturity:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/16Hh4tXebz/

📌 Emoturity Affects Life & Health:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19LN8uu4Pt/

📌 Emotional Intelligence Is Not Emoturity:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/15HmjdyGMc/

📌 EMOTURITY IS BUILT ON NEUROPLASTICITY
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1CFA4pMemf/

📌 BEN CHANGES WIRING OF THE BRAIN:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1A2TFYgTt6/

📌 BEN's VIOLENT RAGE IN ADOLESCENCE
https://www.facebook.com/somatictao/videos/525087156991101

📌 BEN's DISRESPECT, MISOGYNY & IMMORALITY:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CKBSTrNpE/

📌 BEN’s RELATIONSHIP WITH THE DARK TRIAD:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1AQqmsutyw/

📌 BEN's NEUROINFLAMMATION:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1Foy23rEjq/

📌 DSM LABELS of BEN:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/17NRmtgiyo/

📌 BEN’s RISK OF ADHD
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1EAaz3vLjR/

RESEARCH

[1] Knudsen E.I. Sensitive Periods in the Development of the Brain and Behavior. J. Cogn. Neurosci. 2004;16:1412–1425. https://doi.org/10.1162/0898929042304796

[2] Tyborowska, A., Volman, I., Niermann, H.C.M. et al. Early-life and pubertal stress differentially modulate grey matter development in human adolescents. Sci Rep 8, 9201 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-27439-5

[3] Sheth C, McGlade E, Yurgelun-Todd D. Chronic Stress in Adolescents and Its Neurobiological and Psychopathological Consequences: An RDoC Perspective. Chronic Stress (Thousand Oaks). 2017 Jan-Dec; 1:2470547017715645.

[4] Keator DB, Salgado F, Madigan C, Murray S, Norris S and Amen D (2024) Adverse childhood experiences, brain function, and psychiatric diagnoses in a large adult clinical cohort. Front. Psychiatry 15:1401745. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2024.1401745















TREATMENT OF TRAUMA – SINGLE EVENT vs DEVELOPMENTALTreatment of shock/single event trauma requires completion of thwarte...
21/01/2026

TREATMENT OF TRAUMA – SINGLE EVENT vs DEVELOPMENTAL

Treatment of shock/single event trauma requires completion of thwarted/incompleted defense responses in the musculoskeletal system.

Treatment of babyhood/developmental trauma requires regulation and completion of thwarted/incomplete emotion responses in the body and face.

But… since all behaviour is driven by emotion, any sense of trauma is due to incomplete emotology.

Hence… healing any form of trauma must include working emotologically.





















ACID REFLUX & GASTRITIS – PHYSICAL OR EMOTIONAL?A recent study using an ingestible pill sensor reveals a strong link bet...
20/01/2026

ACID REFLUX & GASTRITIS – PHYSICAL OR EMOTIONAL?

A recent study using an ingestible pill sensor reveals a strong link between stomach physiology and emotional experience [1].

Participants swallowed a pill that measured gastrointestinal pressure and temperature while viewing video clips designed to evoke disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, or a neutral state. Those who felt the most disgusted or fearful showed significantly lower stomach pH, indicating increased acidity, with acidity rising alongside emotional intensity. Electrical activity in the gut also mirrored feelings of revulsion, and breathing rates increased during fearful and sad scenes. In contrast, happier emotions were associated with less acidic stomach pH. These findings suggest gastric signals contribute to emotional states - but do they tell the whole story?

Stomach acid is essential not only for digestion but also for protection, killing harmful microbes [2] and responding to internal threat, including over-ingestion [3]. When the stomach is overwhelmed, vomiting may be triggered to expel the perceived danger.

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) extends digestion beyond food to include emotional energies. In Taoist Five Element Theory, excessive Wood energy (anger) can overwhelm Earth, the Stomach, reversing its normal downward movement and causing nausea, reflux, or vomiting. From this perspective, gastric distress may arise from emotional excess.

Although stress-based explanations of gastric distress were widely accepted by the mid-twentieth century, discoveries such as acid-reducing H2 antagonists [4] and Helicobacter pylori–related ulcers [5] shifted treatment toward pharmaceuticals. As a result, psychosomatic explanations fell out of favour, since not everyone under stress develops ulcers [6]. Yet, while pharmacology and physiology describe the physical mechanisms of gastric distress, emotological models help explain why it emerges in certain people at particular times.

RESEARCH:

[1] Porciello G, Monti A, Panasiti MS, Aglioti SM. Ingestible pills reveal gastric correlates of emotions. Elife. 2024 Jun 4;13:e85567. https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.85567

[2] SRM Global Hospitals. What is the Role of Acid in Our Stomach? Unveiling the Secrets of Gastric Acid. https://srmglobalhospitals.com/blog/what-is-the-role-of-acid-in-our-stomach-unveiling-the-secrets-of-gastric-acid [2026 01 19]

[3] Singh P, Yoon SS, Kuo B. Nausea: a review of pathophysiology and therapeutics. Therap Adv Gastroenterol. 2016 Jan;9(1):98-112. https://doi.org/10.1177/1756283X15618131

[4] Black J. Reflections on the analytical pharmacology of histamine H2-receptor antagonists. Gastrol. 1993;105(4):963–968. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0016508593909378

[5] Marshall BJ, Warren RM. Unidentified curved bacilli in the stomach of patients with gastritis and peptic ulceration. Lancet. 1984;16(8390):1311–1315. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(84)91816-6

[6] Bardhan KD. Perspectives in duodenal ulcer. 2nd ed. Welwyn Garden City: Smith, Kline and French; 1981 [1977]. https://search.worldcat.org/en/title/9150527













18/01/2026

SOOTHING SUNDAY – When Winter ...

When winter
Dusts everything
With crystals
Of frozen
Water.












LINDSAY GIBSON - EMOTIONAL NEEDS"... we all need other people to meet out emotional needs for comfort and closeness. Th...
15/01/2026

LINDSAY GIBSON - EMOTIONAL NEEDS

"... we all need other people to meet out emotional needs for comfort and closeness. That's what relationships are all about."

Lindsay Gibson,
Psychologist and Author














EMOTION WIRES THE NERVOUS SYSTEMEmotion is the primary driver of all human behaviour. It shapes us at every level, from ...
14/01/2026

EMOTION WIRES THE NERVOUS SYSTEM

Emotion is the primary driver of all human behaviour. It shapes us at every level, from musculoskeletal movement to microscopic nervous system activity, including the release of neurotransmitters and hormones.

The system that expresses emotion in the body is the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS). Each branch corresponds to a distinct emotional state:

👉 The sympathetic nervous system mobilises fight and anger.
👉 The ventral parasympathetic system supports safety, connection, pleasure, and love.
👉 The dorsal parasympathetic system activates immobilisation responses such as freeze and terror.

At the centre of the ANS is the vagus nerve, the body’s most influential nerve. It connects the brain with major organs in the chest and abdomen. Through this pathway, emotional states directly influence organ function, immunity, and brain activity.

We are born with an active ANS, meaning we are born capable of emotion. However, our brain is emotionally immature. This gap explains why co-regulation is essential in early life. Infants must “borrow” the regulation of a more emotionally mature - emoture - nervous system to develop their own emoturity.

Effective co-regulation provides a competent external container that protects biological integrity while intense emotional energy is processed. When the nervous system feels safe enough, emotional resilience and brain capacity develop.

When early emotional experiences are overwhelming and co-regulation is absent or insufficient - as in Babyhood Emotional Neglect (BEN) - the nervous system becomes flooded. Emotion becomes an internal threat with no escape. The ANS is forced into survival strategies:

🫥 Energetic flight → dissociation, anxiety, ADHD
🔥 Fight → neuroinflammation
🥶 Freeze → toxic shame, syndromes

Over time, BEN:

➡️ alters neurochemistry
➡️ reshapes autonomic responses
➡️ rewires the brain

ultimately affecting behaviour, personality, and organ function. These early adaptations predispose individuals to emotional distress, mental imbalance, and physical illness rooted in early emotional neglect.

MORE INFORMATION:

📌 EMOTOLOGY:
https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=1034305068710800&set=a.457198723088107

📌 TRAUMA IS THWARTED EMOTOLOGY:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1MKWcnKZLA/

📌 EMOTOLOGY RELIES ON INTEROCEPTION:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CnetSUCjo/

📌 Emoturity - Nervous System Emotional Maturity:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/16Hh4tXebz/

📌 EMOTURITY IS BUILT ON NEUROPLASTICITY
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1CFA4pMemf/

📌 Emoturity Affects Life & Health:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19LN8uu4Pt/

📌 Emotional Intelligence Is Not Emoturity:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/15HmjdyGMc/

📌 THE THREAT IN BEN
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1BHBRhLTpY/

📌 BEN CHANGES WIRING OF THE BRAIN:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1A2TFYgTt6/

📌 BEN's NEUROINFLAMMATION:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1Foy23rEjq/

📌 BEN's PROPENSITY FOR SYNDROMES
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19fbXzymQs/

📌 BEN’s RELATIONSHIP WITH THE DARK TRIAD:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1AQqmsutyw/

📌 EVIDENCE BEN IS INTERGENERATIONAL:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19qoVjjsmq/











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Our Story

Somatic Tao is an integrated, holistic approach to treat all manner of physical and emotional symptoms ranging from: panic and anxiety; to rage and depression due to abuse; to pain from physical injury or surgery. It is a neural-somatically aware therapeutic approach that tracks and teaches how to attune to the nervous system speaking in the body. Working with:


  • the body awareness of Somatic Experiencing (SE) to track the nervous system;

  • the biological and emotional aspects of trauma; and

  • the Taoist philosophy of Chinese Medicine,