Perinatal and Birth Trauma Therapy
Something happened. And your body hasn’t forgotten.
You just had a baby. But in your body, something feels off. Something didn’t go according to plan, and everyone around you keeps reminding you that at least you have a healthy baby. It doesn’t help. Those hard days keep getting harder.
You’re constantly afraid something bad is going to happen, to you, or to your baby.
You’re right. Something is off. And you don’t have to face it alone.
You might be here because:
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You feel like you don’t know yourself anymore.
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You find yourself replaying what happened, over and over and over.
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You tense up at seemingly random smells, sounds, or sensations in your body, a body that feels like it betrayed you.
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You can’t sleep even when the baby is sleeping, and everything feels out of control.
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Your heart races out of nowhere.
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Nobody seems to understand what you went through. They focus on everyone being healthy, rather than the fact that what was supposed to be special and meaningful left you feeling lost in one of the scariest moments of your life.
You aren’t crazy.
No matter how long it’s been since you gave birth — you will be postpartum for the rest of your life. If your birth is still affecting you, you still deserve support.
Even if on paper your birth went the way it was supposed to, it can still be traumatic. Birth settings and providers can be disempowering. One moment where your choice was taken from you can be all it takes to change the way you carry your birth story. Maybe you had a near miss, or there were complications for you or your baby.
No matter what happened, your body remembers, and it’s having a hard time processing and letting go.
The perinatal period asks you to become an entirely new person, physiologically, emotionally, in every way. Some things that feel like they should be “normal,” not sleeping, constant worry, are actually symptoms of something deeper.
Constant worry is common. It is not normal. Birth trauma, postpartum anxiety, and postpartum depression are deeply misunderstood and frequently misdiagnosed.
What does healing actually look like?
Healing after a traumatic birth or pregnancy looks different for everyone. But here is what I see:
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You find yourself more present with your family, less braced for the next thing to go wrong.
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You stop waiting for the other shoe to drop.
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You can think about your birth without feeling your heart race, without being pulled back “in it.”
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You feel like yourself again. You sleep for more than an hour at a stretch.
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You’re interested in things you loved before. You laugh without it feeling strange.
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You understand that your birth experience doesn’t define you, or the mother you are.
Your birth trauma doesn’t have to keep you trapped. It can become a story of your strength, your resilience, and the fact that you brought a new life into the world.
My Approach:
I work from a feminist, multicultural framework — which means your identity, your culture, your history, and your context are always part of how we work together. The tools I use are built on that foundation.
I work from a feminist, multicultural framework — which means your identity, your culture, your history, and your context are always part of how we work together. The tools I use are built on that foundation.
Internal Family Systems (IFS)
IFS is both a way of seeing and a set of tools. I’ve found it to be a remarkable fit for perinatal work, because pregnancy and birth have a way of activating parts of us we didn’t know were there, old wounds, old fears, old ways of coping. IFS helps you get curious about those parts rather than fighting them, and to lead from the calm, grounded self underneath the chaos.
It also helps with the identity shift of becoming a parent, which is enormous and often gets tangled up with how we were parented. IFS can bring clarity and intention to that, so you can be the parent you want to be while also tending to the younger parts of yourself that maybe didn’t get what they needed.
EMDR & Brainspotting
Sometimes talking about what happened isn’t enough. EMDR and Brainspotting are both powerful approaches that help your brain and body process and release the trauma they’re holding, in a way that honors what happened while giving you new access to it. It will always be part of your story. But the same experience can feel like a source of pain, or a source of resilience. These approaches help make that shift.
A note on judgment:
Clients are often afraid they’ll be judged for how they feel. Let’s be real: motherhood, parenting, and birth are really f*cking hard. I will not judge you, and in many cases I probably know exactly how you feel, as a mother myself. You deserve a warm, real space to show up in the beautiful mess that is parenting.
How we can work together:
Individual Therapy
Individual therapy offers a private, focused container to go at your own pace. We’ll work with what’s showing up for you — your body, your story, your relationships — using IFS, EMDR, and Brainspotting as it fits. If you’re not sure whether you’re ready for group, individual therapy is often a good place to start.
Womb Wounds to Wholeness- Group therapy
Womb Wounds to Wholeness is a closed 12-week group for people healing from a traumatic birth or perinatal experience. Sessions are 90 minutes and incorporate the same tools I use in individual work — but with something individual therapy can’t offer: the experience of healing in community with people who innately understand what you’ve been through.
There is something irreplaceable about being witnessed by others who have carried something similar. The group provides that.
The group meets Tuesdays from 10-11:30am. The fee is $75 per session, with a limited number of accessible spots available on a sliding scale. [link to interest form]
Not sure which is right for you? I’d love to help you think it through.
About Alyssa Castaño-Mann, LCSW
From the beginning of my career I specialized in trauma treatment, and became a certified EMDR therapist so I would have a powerful tool to help people move through it. Over time I found myself drawn more and more to perinatal mental health — which in some ways was a return to an early calling.
I was the kid who watched birthing shows on TLC and wanted to be an OB-GYN even in middle school. After becoming a social worker, that draw never left. I trained as a lactation counselor and a doula. I’ve done PSI trainings and trainings with the Touchstone Institute, which specializes in the mental health during perinatal period. I helped co-found a doula nonprofit in St. Louis in 2019 and have been active in the birthworker community here since.
I did all of that before becoming a mother myself. That experience has shaped who I am as a parent and as a therapist in ways I couldn’t have anticipated.
The therapy I do is not just talk therapy — though some sessions, there is a lot of talking. It’s focused on helping you reach your goals. I want you to one day not need to work with me. This is a season of your life. I would be honored to spend it with you.
Ready to take the next step?
It starts with a conversation. Fill out the short form below and we’ll schedule 15–20 minutes to talk about what’s going on for you and answer any questions you have. You decide if we’re a good fit. There’s no pressure and no commitment. I want you working with the therapist who is right for you, and if that’s not me, I’ll help you find who is.
Three Circles of Healing,LLC
Location
1015 S Compton Ave,
St. Louis MO, 63104
Make an Appointment
Email: alyssa.michelle@threecirclesof healing.com
Open Hours
Tuesday – Friday: 10am – 7pm