You deserve joy and ease.
We are not built for the extraction of our body’s resources, the quiet depletion of our energy for endless demands. We are meant to share freely from the reservoir of our abundant energy, creativity and wholeness.
Hi, I’m Andrea Sorum, a Life Coach supporting clients who bravely listen to the inner wisdom that is looking for a different way.
While there are many ways to approach ME/CFS recovery, I have seen for myself and my clients that
1) Baseline/capacity stabilization and growth (body wisdom)
2) Nervous system regulation (soothing responses)
3) Self-expression and self-compassion (resilience)
4) Whole-self integration through somatic techniques (acceptance)
lead to lasting recovery and transformation.
Every part of this process - body wisdom, soothing responses, resilience and acceptance - creates more and more self-trust within yourself. With each new layer of trust, the body learns more and more safety. As the body learns safety, symptoms ease and more becomes possible.
This process repeats in every stage of recovery. There is always more to discover as new challenges arise. This is why, while there are many programs, protocols and practitioners out there that can help you, there is nothing that can support you as well as a private somatic coach and healing community.
I am available to my clients to help them navigate every step of the way as they learn these tools for themselves and create lasting change in their bodies, nervous systems and lives. My clients have private calls with me twice a month and unlimited email access to me between calls. They also enjoy being a part of an intimate group once a month where they can share and learn together in master coaching sessions. It’s true that we are the ones who ultimately have to show up and do this work for ourselves, but I can tell you it is a whole lot easier and more enjoyable when you’re showing up and doing this work with a lot of personalized support and community.
As a coach working with you 1:1 I offer co-regulation, constant support and masterful guidance while we go deep with somatic healing of your nervous system. As someone who has been through some of the worst symptoms of ME/CFS for over 6 years, followed by a healing journey of over 2 years, I will normalize and help you stay grounded through all of the inevitable ups and downs.
I will support you trying various other modalities as well. Freeing our bodies of toxins, especially those that collect in our cerebral spinal fluid when our lymphatic systems are slow, is important as well. I was able to benefit from seeing an osteopathic doctor who specialized and trained others in the Perrin technique. I also tried a lot of various supplements and met with a nutritionist and physical therapist. I want you to continue doing what works for you. I am a coach, not a cult, and I will support all the pathways you explore.
What you will find about working together is that, while there are so many modalities that serve, there are few practitioners that can spend the time to help you through a complete healing process. That’s what is unique and special about the coaching relationship.
Body Wisdom - Soothe - Heal - Integrate
To stabilize, we find your baseline or current capacity and create an individualized plan for your days. With stronger boundaries and a clear sense of what is and isn’t right for you, body wisdom begins to grow and your symptoms begin to ease.
We soothe the nervous system through daily rituals, vagus nerve toning, somatic inner work and mind-body practices.
To heal, we visit the internalized survival stories and strategies that no longer serve you. We look at shadow parts that have been hiding under layers of shame. We explore emotions and express them. And we show compassion for all of it - the shame, the fear, the anger, the guilt, the selfishness and pride. We befriend and hold space for all those pieces that were hiding, that were hurting, and integrate them through somatic healing techniques.
When those parts of ourselves that were hiding are out in the open and seen and heard they naturally have less hold on our unconscious reactive patterns that have made our nervous system decide it is not safe. We can love all those parts of ourselves and learn they are not threats but powerful aspects of our inner world. We become less sensitive to triggers, to stress alarms, when we see them as allies who only want the best for us.
With that new relationship with ourselves, we choose the energetics we want to embody. We choose new beliefs and behaviors that are aligned with our truest deeper wisdom.
To build resilience, you learn to trust your capacity to stretch. When you have maintained a stable baseline for a couple of weeks, you try something new - something that brings you joy. A hermetic stress, a new activity, a sensory experience. You stretch in small ways at first, then bigger ways as your capacity grows. You learn to stay calm and show yourself compassion through set-backs and dips.
Then, when we have stretched in small ways over and over, we reintegrate into life with bigger steps. All the work you’ve done healing your whole self will arrive back into the world a transformed person - a person your nervous system feels safe to be.
Reclaim your..
Body Wisdom
Our body’s communication systems - the sensitivity, symptoms, intuition, tension, and activation we experience - carry vital information.
Your experience says you cannot push through, optimize, protocol or positive think your way through this. It’s time to try something different. In the midst of the demands of your life, learning to listen to your body’s wisdom is the first act of liberation.
Creativity
Your authentic voice, your creative expression, is vital not just for your own healing, but the time and place you belong to.
As we break free from the knots of “should” and relationship patterns that drain us, we have more energy for imagination - for drawing connections, for leadership, for inspiring others.
What is possible for our world needs each of us - our unique spark - to come alive with creativity.
Agency
When we feel stuck, hemmed in by life circumstances, or burned out, it is hard to imagine or hope for something to change. But there are always choices available to us, even in the most difficult situations. In fact, losing all ability to control life is a part of the initiation into the strength of your own fire.
Your nervous system was built to keep you alive - to survive - and will gravitate towards those familiar survival patterns. But you can learn new patterns, claim your sovereignty, maintain compassionate boundaries and find freedom and choice.
Art: ©Yelyzaveta Mahda
Coaching can support you to..
Befriend and transform the fear and survival patterns that keep getting in your way.
Trust your intuition implicitly.
Cultivate boundaries that both create space for the life you desire and are loving and empowering for others.
Wire your brain to be on your side and creatively work through challenges.
Nourish and stabilize your body, mind and spirit. Reset your nervous system.
Design a life that prioritizes your values, what brings you joy and meaning.
Choose what’s right for you.
My promise to you
Integrity
I value honesty, equality and collaboration. I am a co-creator with you and will honor your values, intuition and needs as a coach should. I am not a licensed mental health professional and will let you know if anything is outside the scope of my training.
I celebrate the diversity of gender expressions, sexual orientations, abilities, brains, cultures, ethnicities, heritages, skin pigments, religions, spiritual practices and all forms of expression that inform our humanity.
I honor and pay my respect to the Indigenous elders past and present and their wisdom that has cared for and preserved the land I live and work on (non-ceded treaty Dakota land).
Compassion
The investment of your time, your resources, your intention and your willingness to be seen, heard and loved is something I feel honored to hold and nurture. My training is trauma-informed and sensitive to all the ways human beings suffer. I am committed to creating safe containers that are healing and nurturing.
Instead of staying in shame, we can cultivate a willingness to acknowledge our growth areas and forgive ourselves. We can begin to recognize how others’ expectations for us keep us second-guessing ourselves and buried in doubt. We can move through shame with abundant grace.
Instead of staying paralyzed by fear, we can love those patterns that have worked so hard to keep us safe, while ultimately deciding when it feels right to move forwards.
Instead of feeling like a victim, we can cultivate and receive self-compassion for ourselves.
The only way forward, truly, is through compassion and love.
Value
It takes a lot of courage to do this work, and it takes a commitment. My promise to you is to offer individualized, high-quality coaching that integrates all levels of knowing - somatic, cognitive, spiritual and emotional - so you not only have the information and tools you need, you also can embody and default to the new patterns and energetics you choose for yourself.
When you invest in yourself this way you change your life in a way that goes beyond yourself or your lifetime.
When you answer the call of liberation for yourself you answer the call of liberation for others as well. You become an inspiration and leader
It is time to listen.
It is time
to set stone on stone -
one cairn at a time -
to mark the path.
It is time to honor
what you need
to be;
Who the world
needs you to be.
It is time to come home
to yourself.
Read more in the journal.