approach
Trauma Sensitive Yoga Therapy
Movement with choice, pace, and dignity
When you have lived through overwhelm, chronic stress, or experiences that made your body feel less safe to live in, “just do yoga” can land like a misunderstanding. You may want movement that helps, but you do not want to be pushed, adjusted, corrected, or watched like you are performing wellness.
Trauma-sensitive yoga therapy is a Vancouver-based offering provided online across Canada. It supports you in building a different relationship with your body through choice-led movement, steady pacing, and respect for your boundaries. This is therapy-informed care, not a fitness class, and not a space where you have to get it right in order to belong.
Understanding
When movement has felt complicated
Many adults arrive here with a complicated history of “body practices.” Maybe you have tried yoga classes that felt too fast, too exposed, too intense, or too focused on form. Maybe you have lived through trauma, chronic stress, illness, injury, or caregiving roles that changed how you inhabit your body. Or maybe you simply notice that when you slow down, your system does not soften—it escalates, collapses, goes numb, or goes away. That can make even well-intended mindfulness or movement practices feel out of reach.
Trauma-sensitive yoga therapy starts from a different assumption: the goal is not flexibility, performance, or pushing through discomfort. The goal is to restore choice, agency, and a sense of “I can stay with myself” in small, workable moments. That might look like noticing what happens when you turn your head, shift your weight, or choose not to do a movement at all. It might look like building tolerance for sensation one breath at a time, without asking your body to tell a story before it is ready.
This approach is especially supportive when you are tired of overriding your body. It makes room for protective responses without treating them as problems to fix. Instead, the work helps you relate differently to what shows up in your body, so movement becomes a place where steadiness can grow, not a place where you have to prove anything.
support
What this can shift
Trauma-sensitive yoga therapy can support a more grounded relationship with your body, built through agency, pacing, and respectful repetition over time.
in session
How we work
Sessions are slow, invitational, and choice-led. We begin by orienting to what you need today, including what would make movement feel more manageable. We move in a way that respects your boundaries and protects your dignity, with ongoing permission to pause, change your mind, or step back. The emphasis is on your internal experience, not on form, flexibility, or “progress.”
This work is offered by Laura Hoge, RSW, who is a certified trauma center trauma-sensitive yoga (TCTSY) facilitator. That matters because the method is designed to support agency and embodiment without hands-on adjustments, pressure, or performance language. We are both long-time yoga teachers, and we approach this as therapy-informed care: practical, relational, and grounded in what helps you stay present, not what looks good from the outside.
This work is not a performance-based yoga class, and it is not about being corrected, adjusted, or pushed past your edge. We prioritize choice, pacing, and respectful support so your system can stay with the process.
Online therapy
How we offer trauma-sensitive yoga therapy online
Trauma-sensitive yoga therapy adapts well to online sessions because the work is not about hands-on correction or external “doing it right.” It is about your relationship to choice, sensation, and agency, which can be practised in your own space with more privacy and control. Many people find it easier to stay present at home, where the nervous system does not have to manage travel, waiting rooms, unfamiliar settings, or the social pressure that can come with public movement spaces.
Online sessions also allow us to work with real-life context. The chair you use every day, the corner of the room where you feel safest, the option to turn your camera off for a moment, the ability to reach for a blanket or a steady surface—these are not distractions. They are part of how agency becomes practical and embodied. We keep pacing clear so the session ends with orientation, not disruption.
What supports this work online
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Finding the right fit
This approach is for adults who want body-based support that is steady, consent-led, and respectful of trauma history, chronic stress, or a complicated relationship with movement. You do not need yoga experience. You do not need flexibility. You only need willingness to explore choice and pacing with support.
This may resonate if:
It may not be the right fit if:
in context
Part of our broader practice
Trauma-sensitive yoga therapy is part of our broader commitment to relational, experiential, and body-aware care. We hold a non-pathologizing view of survival strategies, including bracing, collapse, numbness, and hypervigilance, and we aim to work in ways that restore agency rather than repeating dynamics of pressure or control. This approach also fits naturally alongside the rest of our work because it offers a practical way to build steadiness without requiring you to explain everything in words first.
When you want to explore the wider framework beneath our approach to therapy, we invite you to visit our trauma-informed therapist in Vancouver, BC, Canada page.
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begin
A calm first step
You do not need to be “good at yoga” to begin. You can arrive unsure, guarded, tired, or skeptical. The first step is simply getting oriented to what you need, what your body is currently carrying, and what kind of pacing would feel workable. We will stay grounded, practical, and respectful.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is trauma-sensitive yoga therapy, and how is it different from regular yoga?
Trauma-sensitive yoga therapy centres choice, agency, and internal experience rather than performance or form. There are no hands-on adjustments, and the focus is on what you notice and choose in your body, not what it looks like.
Do I need yoga experience or flexibility to start?
No. This work is designed to be accessible and paced. We can work seated, standing, or with minimal movement depending on capacity and comfort.
What if I dissociate, shut down, or feel overwhelmed during movement?
That is welcomed as information, not failure. We move slowly, track pacing, and prioritize orientation so you have options when your system shifts.
Is this offered as therapy or as a yoga class?
This is therapy-informed care provided within our practice. It is not a drop-in class and it is not about performance or physical achievement.
Can trauma-sensitive yoga therapy be meaningful online?
Yes. Because the work is choice-led and does not rely on hands-on adjustments, online sessions can support privacy, pacing, and continuity, especially when being in public movement spaces feels stressful.