Jessica Van der Merwe

Trauma isn't limited to acute events — it includes the subtler abandonments, betrayals, and systemic harms that shape how you function. Your history doesn't define you, and it doesn't have to be a life sentence. I integrate parts work (IFS/TIST), Brainspotting therapy, and somatic therapies to get to the root of your experience. I believe in the wisdom of the body to heal through compassionate attunement, set to your individual pace, to restore self-trust in your nervous system. 

My training is specialized in complex trauma and dissociation. The core framework is Trauma Informed Stabilization Treatment (TIST), developed by Janina Fisher, PhD, which treats your protective patterns (the parts of you that learned to numb, please, fight, or disappear) as intelligent adaptations rather than pathology. TIST integrates Internal Family Systems/parts work and Sensorimotor psychotherapy. I integrate parts work/TIST with Brainspotting therapy for trauma processing. 

The combination matters. Talk therapy alone often can't reach what's stored beneath language; body-based work alone can leave you without a frame for what's surfacing. Working across all three lets us meet what's actually happening — cognitive, emotional, and physiological — at the same time.