Trauma Therapy Culver City, CA | Simeon Simov, LMFT

Trauma Therapy in Sawtelle, West Los Angeles California

Your past doesn’t define you. Let’s find new way forward.

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The weight of what you’ve been through is real. The good news is, it’s possible to find your way back to yourself.

Maybe you know you’ve experienced trauma. Or maybe you’re not quite sure. What you’ve experienced feels “normal” or like other people “have been through worse”, but something feels off regardless.

Daily life feels harder than it should. You feel tired- not just physically, but emotionally, mentally, even spiritually.

You might be struggling with:

A persistent sense of loneliness or disconnection- even when you’re surrounded by people you love

Fear of being judged by others, or constantly putting others’ needs ahead of your own at the expense of your well being

Feeling broken, unlovable, like a failure or that you don’t belong

Low motivation or a sense of being exhausted all the time, even after rest

Difficulty in your relationships- in conflict, you either shut down and withdraw to overanalyze everything, or lash out and then feel guilty.

Physical symptoms such as chronic tension, pain, headaches, dizziness or digestive issues that even your doctor can’t give you an answer for

You may wonder whether trauma therapy is really for you.

Sure, you’ve been through hard hard times, but calling it “trauma” can feel like overreacting, being dramatic, or invalidating others who’ve had it worse. Especially when your experiences weren’t out of the ordinary in your family, culture, or community.

This makes present day life confusing. Because even if it shouldn’t have left a mark, even if it all seems explainable or “not that bad”, you can still feel it.

I’m here to tell you that your perception is real and you deserve to heal from your past.

In psychology, trauma used to be classified as big events such as war, violence, sexual assault etc. However, our understanding of trauma has vastly expanded; it can also include many normal experiences such as:

A home that felt unstable, critical, or just emotionally cold

Overly harsh or strict parents

Moving multiple times throughout childhood (and always being “the new kid”)

Chronic bullying or rejection by peers

Needing to “earn” love from parents or caregivers

Divorce, mental illness or substance use in the family

Being an immigrant and feeling pressure to conform to American culture whilst simultaneously feeling like you’re not seen for who you are.

None of this means that you had a bad or unhappy childhood and it doesn’t take away all the positive experiences you had either. It just means that there are some wounds from the past that need tending to.

What Trauma Work With Me Looks Like.

While I would never wish trauma upon anyone, I’m also a firm believer that the pain of trauma can be processed and transformed into unimaginable growth.

It’s not unusual for successful trauma work to include more than relief of symptoms. It also includes reconnecting to who we really are. It’ s about reclaiming or cultivating that part of us that so often feels “missing” or “broken” when we are in the thick of it.

The natural outcome of trauma therapy is for you to grow into a version of yourself that is globally more capable, successful, resilient, happy, connected and authentic in all areas of your life.

When we go through something traumatic, our brain often can’t make sense of it in the moment. That means the brain doesn’t fully process the emotions that come along with the experience, and we end up feeling stuck in the past even as life continues on.

That’s why you might feel like part of you knows something logically (like “no one is judging me”), but another part still feels anxious or afraid that you are being judged—or will be.

In the work we will do together, we will start to make sense of those experiences that are leaving you feeling stuck so that you can digest the emotions that you weren’t able to in the past, and begin to experience life more in the present.

We will begin by preparing you for the reprocessing of trauma.. This preparation can look different for everyone, but often includes addressing things like:

present day relationships, boundaries, healthy communication.
addictions
more pressing or urgent present day challenges
shame and self-criticism
emotional Regulation skills
exploration of triggers, patterns and unhelpful coping skills related to trauma
coping with physical symptoms related to trauma
developing mindfulness skills and other practical tools for dealing with overwhelm
creating a “safe enough” external environment to support trauma work
expanding your “window of tolerance”- the ability to tolerate traumatic material without becoming overwhelmed by it

Contemporary Research is Finally Validating What Healers Have Known for Thousands of Years: Trauma Doesn’t Just Live in the Mind, it Also Lives in the Body

Trauma reshapes our physiology, not just our psychology. This is why we can’t simply “think” our way out of trauma. It’s also why most modern approaches to trauma therapy emphasize working with both the body and the mind.

Once our preparation phase is complete, we can begin the deeper work of reprocessing and letting go of trauma. I will gently guide you in a structured exploration of what happened in your past. In particular, I will help you access thoughts, emotions, behaviors, body sensations and mental imagery related to the trauma while ensuring that you are safely anchored in the present. By keeping “one foot in the past and one foot in the present”, the mind organically learns to repair, reorganize and release trauma.

Some of the most effective ways to engage in this process are through mind & body based therapies such as EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing←-add link to EMDR Page), Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT)<---Add link to EFT Page., Somatic Therapy, and parts work.

While each of these modalities works in a different way, they all share a common goal: to move beyond conscious “thinking level” insight and into the deeper layers of trauma where real healing can begin.

Therapy for Trauma Can Help You…

Finally experience your day to day life from a present perspective instead of being clouded by emotions from the past

Clarify confusing, often contradictory feelings and find alignment between your values and your actions.

Feel confident in who you are and capable of moving forward in life in a way which feels meaningful to you

Learn to manage uncomfortable feelings without reacting in ways that don’t align with the person you want to be

Create better boundaries

Improve communication skills

Let go of people-pleasing; learn to say “no” without guilt.

It’s time to transform the weight of the past into freedom in the present and resilience in the future

FAQs

A: The intensity of trauma is on a spectrum. It can be as subtle and culturally accepted as a well meaning but emotionally unattuned or overly strict parents, to as intense as chronic abuse or violation of human rights.

Moreover, “trauma” as an umbrella term certainly includes but is not limited to PTSD as a diagnosis.

Whether your experience fits under the label of “trauma” is a bigger conversation. And if you’re wondering about that, we can explore it together. Labels can be useful at times, but they aren’t required for healing.

What matters most is that something in your past still feels unresolved — something that may be shaping how you think, feel, or relate today. We can work through that together, whether or not it fits any specific definition.

A: This is a very common dilemma! Trauma survivors often feel uncertain if they want to heal for fear of losing their “superpowers”.

Trauma work does not have to include losing anything. . Those are hard-earned skills which serve a tangible role in your life. The goal of trauma work is not to “undo” that learning. Rather, it’s to find ways to engage in life in a way such that the drawbacks of your trauma aren’t as loud. Ultimately the goal is for you to have your feelings rather than for them to have you; to bring awareness and flexibility of how you respond to situations, rather than feeling like you are controlled by the ebbs and flows of your feelings and of life.

A: Trauma work is not about finding someone to blame.. It’s about taking an honest inventory of how past experiences impact your present, and moving on from them. This might include acknowledging things you needed and did not receive from childhood. But it can also include acknowledging that your parents did the best they could with what they had, and all of the positive impacts of the love and care they did give you.

A: I’m sorry to hear that your previous experience was not what you were hoping for. I cannot guarantee this will have a different outcome as I don’t know how your therapist approached trauma work, nor did I witness the therapy to determine potential barriers to successful treatment.

Having said that, anecdotally, I can share that I’ve had many clients who had unhelpful previous therapies and found that their experience with me is different. This is not because I am better than their previous therapist, but because I simply have training and skills that many therapists with only the base level of graduate training do not.

The training for trauma therapy in grad school is only one class which does not include any training on the “bottom up” approaches necessary for most trauma work. I have extensive training in trauma-based therapies and certification in EMDR.←hyperlink to EMDR page- the current gold standard for such bottom up approaches.

If this is of concern to you, feel free to reach out for an intro call and I would be happy to chat with you to determine if I am the right person to help.

Trauma Therapy in Sawtelle, West Los Angeles California

Your past doesn’t define you. Let’s find new way forward.

The weight of what you’ve been through is real. The good news is, it’s possible to find your way back to yourself.

You might be struggling with:

You may wonder whether trauma therapy is really for you.

What Trauma Work With Me Looks Like.

The Therapeutic Relationship and Trauma

The Building Blocks of Trauma

The Mind-Body Connection in Trauma

Therapy for Trauma Can Help You…

It’s time to transform the weight of the past into freedom in the present and resilience in the future

FAQs

Q: How long will our work together take

Q: I know that my past negatively impacts me but I don’t have PTSD- I don’t know if it’s really “trauma”.

Q: I know that the past has affected me, but I want to move on. I feel like blaming it on trauma is just an excuse or will make it worse.

Q: What if despite all the negatives, my trauma has also benefited me in some ways. I don’t want to lose all those benefits (e.g. I learned how to be very successful, well-liked by others, solve problems in a pinch etc.).

Q: I know that my childhood impacts me but I don’t want to blame my parents. They are good people and they did their best.

Q: I’ve done trauma therapy before and it was helpful but I still felt stuck or It wasn’t helpful at all. Is this going to be different?

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Trauma Therapy in Sawtelle, West Los Angeles California

Your past doesn’t define you. Let’s find new way forward.

The weight of what you’ve been through is real. The good news is, it’s possible to find your way back to yourself.

You might be struggling with: ​

You may wonder whether trauma therapy is really for you.

What Trauma Work With Me Looks Like.

The Therapeutic Relationship and Trauma

The Building Blocks of Trauma

The Mind-Body Connection in Trauma

Therapy for Trauma Can Help You…

It’s time to transform the weight of the past into freedom in the present and resilience in the future

FAQs

Q: How long will our work together take

Q: I know that my past negatively impacts me but I don’t have PTSD- I don’t know if it’s really “trauma”.

Q: I know that the past has affected me, but I want to move on. I feel like blaming it on trauma is just an excuse or will make it worse.

Q: What if despite all the negatives, my trauma has also benefited me in some ways. I don’t want to lose all those benefits (e.g. I learned how to be very successful, well-liked by others, solve problems in a pinch etc.).

Q: I know that my childhood impacts me but I don’t want to blame my parents. They are good people and they did their best.

Q: I’ve done trauma therapy before and it was helpful but I still felt stuck or It wasn’t helpful at all. Is this going to be different?

You might be struggling with: