Meet Liz Dampsey, PhD, SEP
Experiencing attunement from another to the subtleties of our movements, emotions and meaning-making, is at the heart of the healing journey. Being seen and held in this way is how I began my healing journey, and it is how I strive to meet each person with whom I have the privilege of working.
My work is an integration of my education, training, and experience in several body/mind approaches. I started as a bodyworker -- trained in Polarity therapy and Swedish massage -- which taught me how to attune to others through touch and non-verbal presence. After years of rewarding work, I returned to school to pursue a Master’s degree in psychology. Since creative expression through movement and dance had been, and continues to be, an integral part of my life since childhood, I focused my psychology training and education on movement-based expressive arts therapy. As part of my Master’s work, I completed an intensive training at Tamalpa Institute, and became certified in the Halprin Life/Art Process -- a movement-based expressive arts therapy model founded by dance pioneer and activist, Anna Halprin and her daughter Daria. It was through this deeply integrative work, that I experienced profound personal healing from trauma and significant losses in my past.
For the following 17 years, I worked at Sierra Tucson, a residential, behavioral health treatment center, providing psychotherapy to individuals facing addictions, trauma, mood and anxiety issues, eating disorders, and chronic pain. I worked as the coordinator of the grief and spirituality department, facilitating expressive grief work and helping clients explore their spiritual lives. During this time, I completed a certification in interfaith spiritual direction at the Tacheria School of Spiritual Direction, and became trained in equine-facilitated psychotherapy. Working with horses as my co-facilitators, expanded both my personal and professional experience and understanding of presence, connection, and the subtleties of attunement. Not only are horses emotionally attuned to their environment, but their innate, prey nature bestows them with implicit appreciation of social connection and attachment with members of their herd and, at times, with members of the human herd. My experience of becoming a member of an equine herd challenged me to find a deep inner sense of listening, presence, communication, partnering, co-regulation, and congruency with my truth in the moment.
In addition, working with horses and seeing how they physiologically regulate their nervous systems based on what is going on in their environment, led to my interest in becoming a Somatic Experiencing (SE) Practitioner. Through my SE training, I learned that humans sometimes struggle to physiologically regulate as easily as horses do, partly due to our rational brain overriding our natural impulses. SE is a trauma resolution model of healing that helps people increase awareness of the body experience, and learn how to regulate the natural functions of the autonomic nervous system, which include the fight, flight, and freeze responses.
During my tenure at Sierra Tucson, I returned to school to receive my Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Fielding Graduate University. My dissertation study examined the effects of equine-facilitated psychotherapy on emotion regulation using a physiological measure of autonomic nervous system functioning. I currently serve as Training Director and faculty member of the Southern Arizona Psychology Internship Center where I have begun to introduce the basics of Somatic Experiencing into the curriculum. I also have a small private practice working with individuals, couples, and families who are dealing with a variety of issues including substance use, mood issues, trauma, grief and loss, using equine-facilitated psychotherapy, SE and expressive arts therapy.
Experiencing attunement from another to the subtleties of our movements, emotions and meaning-making, is at the heart of the healing journey. Being seen and held in this way is how I began my healing journey, and it is how I strive to meet each person with whom I have the privilege of working.
My work is an integration of my education, training, and experience in several body/mind approaches. I started as a bodyworker -- trained in Polarity therapy and Swedish massage -- which taught me how to attune to others through touch and non-verbal presence. After years of rewarding work, I returned to school to pursue a Master’s degree in psychology. Since creative expression through movement and dance had been, and continues to be, an integral part of my life since childhood, I focused my psychology training and education on movement-based expressive arts therapy. As part of my Master’s work, I completed an intensive training at Tamalpa Institute, and became certified in the Halprin Life/Art Process -- a movement-based expressive arts therapy model founded by dance pioneer and activist, Anna Halprin and her daughter Daria. It was through this deeply integrative work, that I experienced profound personal healing from trauma and significant losses in my past.
For the following 17 years, I worked at Sierra Tucson, a residential, behavioral health treatment center, providing psychotherapy to individuals facing addictions, trauma, mood and anxiety issues, eating disorders, and chronic pain. I worked as the coordinator of the grief and spirituality department, facilitating expressive grief work and helping clients explore their spiritual lives. During this time, I completed a certification in interfaith spiritual direction at the Tacheria School of Spiritual Direction, and became trained in equine-facilitated psychotherapy. Working with horses as my co-facilitators, expanded both my personal and professional experience and understanding of presence, connection, and the subtleties of attunement. Not only are horses emotionally attuned to their environment, but their innate, prey nature bestows them with implicit appreciation of social connection and attachment with members of their herd and, at times, with members of the human herd. My experience of becoming a member of an equine herd challenged me to find a deep inner sense of listening, presence, communication, partnering, co-regulation, and congruency with my truth in the moment.
In addition, working with horses and seeing how they physiologically regulate their nervous systems based on what is going on in their environment, led to my interest in becoming a Somatic Experiencing (SE) Practitioner. Through my SE training, I learned that humans sometimes struggle to physiologically regulate as easily as horses do, partly due to our rational brain overriding our natural impulses. SE is a trauma resolution model of healing that helps people increase awareness of the body experience, and learn how to regulate the natural functions of the autonomic nervous system, which include the fight, flight, and freeze responses.
During my tenure at Sierra Tucson, I returned to school to receive my Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Fielding Graduate University. My dissertation study examined the effects of equine-facilitated psychotherapy on emotion regulation using a physiological measure of autonomic nervous system functioning. I currently serve as Training Director and faculty member of the Southern Arizona Psychology Internship Center where I have begun to introduce the basics of Somatic Experiencing into the curriculum. I also have a small private practice working with individuals, couples, and families who are dealing with a variety of issues including substance use, mood issues, trauma, grief and loss, using equine-facilitated psychotherapy, SE and expressive arts therapy.