Kathleen Dunbar Psychotherapy

Deep Brain Reorienting

DBR—Deep Brain Reorienting—is a newer approach to trauma therapy, developed by Dr. Frank Corrigan, a Scottish psychiatrist. It works differently from most talk therapy.

The short version

• Before you have a feeling about something, your body has already responded. A split second of tension around the eyes or at the base of the skull. A shiver, a gasp, a sudden hollowness.
• That response happens in the brainstem—below thought, below emotion, and faster than either.
• When something overwhelming happens, especially early in life, that first response can stay unfinished in the body.
• DBR works directly with that layer, rather than with the story or the emotions built on top of it.

Why the order matters

• Most therapy starts with what you think or feel about what happened.
• DBR starts earlier—with the body's shock, which comes before emotion.
• Beginning with the shock and clearing it is what allows deep material to be approached without being flooded by it.

What a session is like

• We find a specific moment—not the worst moment, but the one that first caught your attention.
• Then I help you get a clear sense of where you are: in the room, in your body, in space.
• We’ll locate a subtle tension, usually around the eyes, the forehead, or the base of the skull. That becomes the anchor.
• From there we stay with what unfolds—fleeting body sensations—as we clear the body’s shock.
• I stay alongside you. I don't interpret, analyze, or ask you to explain. 
• Later on we make room for any deeper emotional pain to arise, while still clearing the shock. Clearing the shock makes this much easier to do. 
• At the end of the session we invite your new perspective—a shift in how you see yourself, or simply a clearer sense of things, that arises on its own from the work. 
• Sessions are slow and quiet. You are not required to tell me what happened.

What people often notice after a session

• Less of the braced, on-edge feeling that never seemed to have a cause.
• Old material becoming possible to be near without being overwhelmed.
• A shift in how they see themselves that arrives on its own rather than being talked into.
• Sometimes tiredness afterward, as things continue to settle.

What it may be a good fit for

• Trauma that hasn't responded to talking about it.
• A sense of aloneness, or that something is wrong with you, without a clear origin.
• Feeling shut down, numb, or far away.
• Having done a lot of therapy and understanding yourself well, without that understanding changing much.
• Early wounds that came before words—infancy, birth, the first years.