Forum Master of Ceremonies & Panelists:
Master of Ceremonies: Kate White
Panelists: Mary Jackson, Anna Chitty, Frank Carbone, Veronique Mead
This course will not include CEs. Our upcoming recorded live events will be available here, free for members and non-members who register for them, as is the case here. Members and event registrants can use their discount code to watch this event free.
Description
There is a lot of interest in understanding the impact of the earliest trauma. While many professions are now beginning to include trauma from the prenatal and perinatal period, there is a group of somatic professionals that has deep expertise from decades of experience. Please come to this outstanding forum, The State of the Art of Prenatal and Perinatal Somatics, to hear presentations and discussion with four experts in the field: Mary Jackson, Anna Chitty, Veronique Mead, and Frank Carbone. Midwife Mary Jackson has decades of experience training practitioners with Ray Castellino, one of the pioneers in prenatal and perinatal somatics. Anna Chitty taught for years with Ray Castellino and has developed her own methods for integrating the impacts of earliest wounds. Medical Doctor and Somatic Experiencing Practitioner Veronique Mead developed the Adverse Babyhood Experiences and has researched the roots of chronic illness as coming from our earliest stress responses as prenates and babies. Continuum Teacher and Prenatal and Perinatal Somatics Practitioner and Teacher Frank Carbone has developed a fusion of the therapies he has trained in for years called Womb Continuum, and he will talk about and demonstrate that during our forum. Discussion with these four experts will be moderated by Kate White, Founder and Director of the Prenatal and Perinatal Somatics Institute. She will bring her nearly 30 years of study and training to shine the light on this field of practice, supporting exploration in the history, practice, and future of Prenatal and Perinatal Somatics. You won't want to miss this if you are interested in the field of preverbal trauma healing!
Discussion Points
- We will explore how our early experience of conception and birth can impact our perception of the world as being safe or unsafe, of us being wanted or unwanted, and why we may have a pattern of getting stuck at certain places in projects and journeys.
- Parents often have the need to tell the story of giving birth to their children and have close family and friends hear it. We will explore how babies and older children have the same need to show or tell their birth story experience, and how the way they do it changes as they grow.
- The evolution of the paradigm that began as birth psychology and is now a somatic practice.
- Identification of professional practices for Prenatal and Perinatal Somatics.
- Developmental origins of adult health and disease (DOHaD) and early contributions to risk for chronic disease.
- Maternal-infant bonding, separation, and chronic illness.
- An interactive Womb Continuum experience of two creative embryonic pieces: One Cell Meditation in a somatic constellation.
- Sensing into the womb space, connecting to pleasurable umbilical cord gestures.
Meet the Panelists
Kate White
Kate is a board member of the United States Association for Body Psychotherapy (USABP) and is the International Body Psychotherapy Journal (IBPJ) Fall-Winter Guest Editor covering the topic of prenatal and perinatal somatic care. She is an advanced bodyworker and somatic trauma resolution therapist who has been involved with pre- and perinatal health for over 30 years, starting with maternal and child health, family planning, and health education as an international professional, to a practitioner of the healing arts as a bodyworker working with pregnant mothers, families and babies. Her qualifications include: BA and MA in communications, Certifications in prenatal massage, infant massage, Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy, Somatic Experiencing® Practitioner Training, and over 25 years of study and training in Prenatal and Perinatal Somatic Psychology with many leading pioneering practitioners. She is the founder and former Director of Education for the Prenatal and Perinatal Educator Certificate course for the Association for Prenatal and Perinatal Psychology and Health, 2013-2019. Founder and Executive Director of the Center for Prenatal and Perinatal Programs and the Prenatal and Perinatal Somatics Institute, Co-Creator of Integrated Prenatal and Perinatal Dynamics and Prenatal and Perinatal Healing Online, Creator of Baby Dynamics Clinical training, Leading Edge Somatic Skills Seminars, and the Whole Family Clinic.
Mary Jackson
Mary is a Registered Nurse, Licensed Midwife, and home birth Midwife with over five decades of experience, having attended around 3000 births in Santa Barbara, Ventura, and Ojai, California. Now working with a second generation of babies, she integrates Cranio-Sacral, Somatic Experience, Circle of Security, and Castellino Prenatal and Birth Training into her practice. In one year, she attended 63 consecutive home births with no transfers to the hospital, most labors under 14 hours, and all babies breastfeeding. Mary is committed to helping families integrate birth imprints and heal from early life challenges. She has spoken internationally, co-teaches the Castellino Foundation Training, and is the President of the BEBA Clinic in Ojai, CA.
Anna Chitty
Anna has spent 45 years exploring and teaching the interdependence of body, mind, emotions, and essence. She co-created a training school in Boulder Colorado and is the director of the Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy 700-hour training program, as well as the Somatic Blueprint Training. She combines experiential and cognitive teaching approaches informed by her understanding of the Polyvagal System, Pre and Perinatal Somatics, Embryology, and Biodynamic Principles. She collaborated with Ray Castellino for many years, teaching a training called Body into Being. Anna was a founding member of the Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy Association of North America and co founder of the International Association of Biodynamic Trainings. She has been a keynote speaker at numerous conferences, has collaborated with holistic health leaders, is a teacher of the Diamond Approach, and has spent many years in the Rinzai Zen tradition.
Frank Carbone
Frank is a seasoned professional with expertise in somatic health, music, and movement. A retired NYC Sanitation Worker from Queens, New York, he has been active in the music scene since age 15, performing as a singer and songwriter with projects like WOOFWOOF and NY Groove. Frank is an authorized Continuum teacher, trained under Emilie Conrad, and also trained in prenatal and perinatal psychology under Dr. Ray Castellino. He developed the Womb Continuum, blending these practices to facilitate deep somatic healing. Frank is a certified Gyrotonic instructor and offers Womb Continuum Process Workshops worldwide while maintaining private practices in Ojai, CA, and New York.
Veronique Mead
Veronique is a former Board Certified family physician and Dartmouth-affiliated assistant professor of family medicine. She retrained with a Master’s degree in somatic psychotherapy from Naropa University and specialty training in pre and perinatal trauma and somatic experiencing (SE). For the past 25 years Veronique has explored the scientific literature on how effects of trauma from the prenatal and other periods in a person’s life influence risk for autoimmune and other chronic illnesses. She shares the research on her blog Chronic Illness Trauma Studies.com. Veronique offers consultations on chronic illness and trauma to health professionals and people living with chronic illness.
Coming Soon!
Tracing Life’s First Imprints:
Read this Forum’s IBPJ Companion Issue on Prenatal & Perinatal Somatics
The next issue of the International Body Psychotherapy Journal is a companion to the upcoming forum event, diving deep into Prenatal & Perinatal Somatics with transformative insights from leading experts. Featuring articles on the impact of earliest trauma, attachment imprints, transgenerational healing, and somatic therapeutic approaches, this special edition explores cutting-edge perspectives that significantly reshapes our understanding of early life experiences and how they influence lifelong patterns. Don't miss this essential collection of research, interviews, and clinical perspectives—subscribe now to stay at the forefront of somatic psychology!
Our guest editor for this issue is Kate White, the Founding Director of Education at the Association for Prenatal and Perinatal Psychology and Health (APPPAH), and the Founder and Director of the Center for Prenatal and Perinatal Programs.
Kate White’s editorial guidance offers a vision—one in which the prenatal and perinatal field is no longer sidelined, but fully integrated into somatic psychotherapy. The IBPJ Editorial team suggests this area of somatics is not merely a niche within body psychotherapy; it serves as the foundation upon which all somatic inquiry is built.
