A renowned speaker, and bestselling author.

Gabor Maté

Gabor Maté (pronounced GAH-bor MAH-tay) is a retired physician who, after 20 years of family practice and palliative care experience, worked for over a decade in Vancouver’s Downtown East Side with patients challenged by drug addiction and mental illness. The bestselling author of five books published in nearly 40 languages, including the award-winning In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters With Addiction, Gabor is an internationally renowned speaker highly sought after for his expertise on addiction, trauma, childhood development, and the relationship of stress and illness. For his ground-breaking medical work and writing he has been awarded the Order of Canada, his country’s highest civilian distinction, and the Civic Merit Award from his hometown, Vancouver. His most recent book, The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness and Healing in a Toxic Culture is a New York Times and international bestseller.

Distinguished University Scientist/Professor, Polyvagal Theory Neuroscientist and Action Trauma Network Ambassador

Stephen Porges

Stephen W. Porges, Ph.D. is Distinguished University Scientist at Indiana University where he is the founding director of the Traumatic Stress Research Consortium. He is Professor of Psychiatry at the University of North Carolina, and Professor Emeritus at both the University of Illinois at Chicago and the University of Maryland. He served as president of the Society for Psychophysiological Research and the Federation of Associations in Behavioral & Brain Sciences and is a former recipient of a National Institute of Mental Health Research Scientist Development Award.

He has published approximately 400 peer‐reviewed scientific papers across several disciplines that have been cited in more than 45,000 peer-reviewed papers. He holds several patents involved in monitoring and regulating autonomic state. He is the originator of the Polyvagal Theory, a theory that emphasizes the importance of physiological state in the expression of behavioral, mental, and health problems related to traumatic experiences. He is the author of The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-regulation (Norton, 2011), The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory: The Transformative Power of Feeling Safe, (Norton, 2017), Polyvagal Safety: Attachment, Communication, Self-Regulation (Norton, 2021), and co-editor of Clinical Applications of the Polyvagal Theory: The Emergence of Polyvagal-Informed Therapies (Norton, 2018).

He is the creator of a music-based intervention, the Safe and Sound Protocol™, which currently is used by more than 2000 therapists to improve spontaneous social engagement, to reduce hearing sensitivities, and to improve language processing, state regulation, and spontaneous social engagement.

Psychiatry Professor, Harris-Woodman Chair at Western University of Canada, Director of the Clinical Research Program for PTSD

Ruth A. Lanius, M.D., Ph.D

Ruth A. Lanius, M.D., Ph.D. is a Psychiatry Professor and Harris-Woodman Chair at Western University of Canada, where she is the director of the Clinical Research Program for PTSD.
Ruth has over 25 years of clinical and research experience with trauma-related disorders. She established the Traumatic Stress Service at London Health Sciences Center, a program that specializes in the treatment of psychological trauma. Ruth has received numerous research and teaching awards, including the Banting Award for Military Health Research. She has published
over 150 research articles and book chapters focusing on brain adaptations to psychological trauma and novel adjunct treatments for PTSD. Ruth regularly lectures on the topic of psychological trauma both nationally and internationally. Ruth has co-authored two books: The Effects of Early Life Trauma on Health and Disease: The Hidden Epidemic and Healing the Traumatized Self: Consciousness, Neuroscience, Treatment. Ruth is a passionate clinician scientist who endeavours to understand the first-person experience of traumatized individuals throughout treatment and how it relates to brain functioning.

Founder and Executive Director of the Compassion Prison Project

Fritzi Horstman

Fritzi Horstman is the Founder and Executive Director of the Compassion Prison Project, an organization dedicated to creating trauma-informed prisons and communities. The first day Fritzi stepped inside a maximum security prison she realized it was actually a trauma center. She knew at that moment something needed to be done to change the system so she produced and directed the now viral video “Step Inside the Circle” with 235 incarcerated men addressing their Adverse Childhood Experiences. Currently, she is creating a 12-part video series about childhood trauma to be distributed to every prison across the U.S. and abroad. Fritzi has also produced HBO’s “The Defiant Ones” directed by Allen Hughes which has garnered several awards including a Grammy for Best Music Film. Her first feature, “Take A Number,” which she wrote, produced, and directed, debuted at the Slamdance festival and premiered on HBO. Fritzi studied at New York University’s summer film program and received a Bachelor of Arts in Film and English from Vassar College.

Creator of the Internal Family Systems Model (IFS)

Richard Schwartz

Richard Schwartz began his career as a family therapist and an academic at the University of
Illinois at Chicago. There he discovered that family therapy alone did not achieve full symptom
relief and in asking patients why, he learned that they were plagued by what they called
“parts.” These patients became his teachers as they described how their parts formed networks
of inner relationship that resembled the families he had been working with. He also found that
as they focused on and, thereby, separated from their parts, they would shift into a state
characterized by qualities like curiosity, calm, confidence and compassion. He called that inner
essence the Self and was amazed to find it even in severely diagnosed and traumatized
patients. From these explorations the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model was born in the early
1980s.

IFS is now evidence-based and has become a widely-used form of psychotherapy, particularly
with trauma. It provides a non-pathologizing, optimistic, and empowering perspective and a
practical and effective set of techniques for working with individuals, couples, families, and
more recently, corporations and and classrooms. In 2013 Schwartz left the Chicago area and now lives in Brookline, MA where is on the faculty of the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.

Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Author

Dan Siegel

Dan Siegel is the executive director of the Mindsight Institute and founding co-director of the Mindful Awareness Research Center at UCLA, where he was also co-principal investigator of the Center for Culture, Brain and Development and clinical professor at the School of Medicine.

An award-winning educator, Dan is the author of five New York Times bestsellers and other books which have been translated into over forty languages.  The founding editor of the Norton Professional Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology, he has overseen the publication of over eighty textbooks in this transdisciplinary framework focusing on the mind and mental health.

A graduate of Harvard Medical School, Dan completed his postgraduate training at UCLA specializing in pediatrics, adult, adolescent, and child psychiatry.  He was trained in attachment research and narrative analysis through a National Institute of Mental Health research training fellowship focusing on how relationships shape our autobiographical ways of making sense of our lives and influence our development across the lifespan.

Clinician, Consultant, Founding member of Polyvagal Institute

Deb Dana

Deb Dana, LCSW is a clinician, consultant, and author who lectures internationally on ways in which Polyvagal Theory informs work with trauma survivors. 

She is a founding member of the Polyvagal Institute, consultant to Khiron Clinics and advisor to Unyte – and developer of the signature Rhythm of Regulation Clinical Training Series. Deb is well known for translating Polyvagal Theory into a language and application that is both understandable and accessible – for clinicians and curious people alike.  Her publications include The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy: Engaging the Rhythm of Regulation (Norton, 2018); Polyvagal Exercises for Safety and Connection: 50 Client-Centered Practices (Norton, 2020); and Anchored: How to Befriend Your Nervous System Using Polyvagal Theory (Sounds True, 2021).

Deb can be contacted via her website. Click the link below.

Scientist, Professor, Author, Speaker

Sue Carter

C. Sue Carter, PhD is Distinguished University Scientist and Director Emerita of the Kinsey Institute and Rudy Professor Emerita of Biology at Indiana University Bloomington and Professor Emeritus at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she co-directed the Brain-Body Center in the Department of Psychiatry. Dr. Carter is past president of the International Behavioural Neuroscience Society and holds fellow status in that Society and in the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She is a former recipient of a National Institute of Mental Health Research Scientist Award. She has authored more than 400 peer-reviewed publications and edited 5 books Dr. Carter is the scientist, who discovered the relationship between social behaviour and oxytocin. Her work examines how oxytocin pathways are at the centre of physiological systems that enable human sociality.

Professor, Clinical Psychologist, Lecturer and Therapist

Janina Fisher

Janina Fisher, Ph.D. is a licensed clinical psychologist and a former instructor, Harvard Medical School.  An international expert on the treatment of trauma, she is an Executive Board member of the Trauma Research Foundation and a Patron of the John Bowlby Centre.  Dr. Fisher is the author of Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors: Overcoming Self-Alienation (2017), Transforming the Living Legacy of Trauma: a Workbook for Survivors and Therapists (2021), and The Living Legacy Instructional Flip Chart (2022).  She is best known for her work on integrating mindfulness-based and somatic interventions into trauma treatment.  More information can be found on her website: www.janinafisher.com

Licensed Psychologist, Consultant, and International Educator

Lisa Schwarz

Lisa Schwarz, M.Ed. is a licensed psychologist, consultant, and international educator working in private practice in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA.

She is the developer of The Comprehensive Resource Model™ (CRM™), a trauma therapy model that employs brain-body-spirit based physiological safety as the foundation for healing, and is the primary author of The Comprehensive Resource Model™: Effective therapeutic techniques for the healing of complex trauma. Lisa has, for the past 38 years, been dedicated to creating innovative methods for working with severe dissociative disorders (Complex PTSD, DID, DDNOS), attachment disorders, gestational and trans-generational trauma. She has also developed cutting edge conceptualizations and practice which support the maintenance of gains made through psychedelic work. 

The Comprehensive Resource Model Foundation is a 5013C which is dedicated to developing a new clinical branch of CRM (CRM EQUUS), which weaves together all aspects of CRM healing across timelines with Equine Assisted Healing.  The Foundation is also supporting the rescue and rehabilitation of traumatized race horses; some of whom are or will be part of the EQUUS partnership between humans and horses in healing trauma. Lisa’s work bridges neuroscience and multi-dimensional consciousness in trauma healing through a combination of traditional psychotherapy, somatic/attachment therapies and indigenous healing methods.  Horses are the newest addition to the CRM team.

Creator of Therapeutic Coaching and the founder and CEO of The Optimum Health Clinic (OHC)

Alex Howard

Alex Howard is Founder & Chairman of The Optimum Health Clinic(OHC), one of the world’s leading integrative medicine clinics.  With a team of 25 full time practitioners supporting thousands of patients in 50+ countries, the OHC team integrates a therapeutic coaching approach with functional nutrition.

Alex is creator of the Therapeutic Coaching methodology, and since March 2020, has been documenting his therapeutic work with real life patients via his In Therapy with Alex Howard YouTube series.  In the last few years, Alex has created some of the largest online conferences in the health and mind–body markets; including the world leading Trauma Super Conference. Alex’s online conferences have been attended by over a million people. 

Alex has published academic research in publications such as the British Medical Journal Open and Psychology and Health, and is the author of the books Why Me? and Decode Your Fatigue.  Alex’s latest book, It’s Not Your Fault – Why childhood trauma shapes you and how to break free is out now. 

Prof Derek Farrell MBE is a Professor in Trauma Psychology at the University of Northumbria (Newcastle)

Derek Farrell

Prof Derek Farrell MBE is a Professor in Trauma Psychology at the University of Northumbria (Newcastle), University of Worcester, and Queen’s University Belfast. Derek is President of Trauma Aid Europe and the Trauma Response Network Ireland. He is also Co-Editor of the Journal of EMDR Practice & Research.  He has been involved in several Humanitarian Trauma capacity-building programmes, including Pakistan, Turkey, India, Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, Indonesia, Lebanon, Poland, Philippines, Palestine, and Iraq. Derek has authored over 50 academic peer-reviewed publications and several book chapters and is the Co-Editor of the Oxford Handbook of EMDR.

A double Board-Certified Physician, boarded in both Preventive and Addiction Medicine with Double Master's degrees in Biochemistry and Public Health.

Dr. Aimie Apigian

Dr. Aimie Apigian is a double Board-Certified Physician, boarded in both Preventive and Addiction Medicine with Double Master’s degrees in Biochemistry and Public Health. She graduated from Loma Linda University in 2010 with her medical degree where she then went on to 3.5 years of general surgery residency.     

Having been a foster mom and then adoptive mom, she had personal experience with trauma in her home and then non-profit working with other adoptive families and their children until trauma became her own personal story with her body giving in during her surgery residency training.  Through all of these life experiences, she has discovered that life experiences become one’s biology and that trauma is more than our psychology.  It requires a specific process and a holistic integrative approach for addressing stored trauma in the body.  She left her thriving conventional addiction medicine practice, is a certified functional medicine physician, and has numerous trainings and certifications in functional medicine, mental health, addiction, and trauma therapy modalities.  Seeing the huge gap in both medicine and mental health for addressing stored trauma and its effects on the body, her mission is now to help 1 million people accelerate their trauma healing journey by addressing the Biology of Trauma, and bringing the model of the Biology of Trauma to every medical and mental health educational system by the year 2041. 

She does this through her business, Trauma Healing Accelerated, her podcast, The Biology of Trauma with 130,000 downloads, an active YouTube channel, free Masterclasses, her annual Biology of Trauma Summits with almost 200,000 registrations, but ultimately inviting people to her educational and experiential courses for individuals and her professional certificate training program.

Somatic Educator, Restorative Justice Advocate & Speaker

Marlee Liss

Marlee Liss (she/her) is a somatic educator, award-winning speaker, author, social worker and lesbian Jewish feminist. She made history in the justice system when her sexual assault case became the 1st in North America to conclude with restorative justice through the courts. Since then, she has coached thousands of women and non-binary folk in healing shame and transforming trauma. Marlee’s work has been featured in Forbes, Huff Post, Buzzfeed, the Mel Robbins Show and more. As an award-winning speaker, she’s delivered talks for: The US Military SAPRO, Vanderbilt University, University of Toronto, Trauma & Recovery Conference, Women’s Mental Health Conference at Yale and more. Marlee was 1 of 25 survivors on an elite panel for the National Action Plan to End Gender Based Violence informing federal policy and her story is currently being made into a documentary directed by Kelsey Darragh. 

CEO & Co-Founder of the Mindsight Institute

Caroline Welch

Caroline Welch is the CEO and Co-founder, with Dr. Dan Siegel, of the Mindsight Institute in Santa Monica, California. Welch has served as a Los Angeles County court-appointed mediator, as well as in- house counsel at MGM Studios and Spelling Entertainment Group. She began her mindfulness practice forty years ago while working in Japan as an English teacher. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin Law School with a master’s degree from the University of Southern California, she started her career in law as a corporate litigator.Welch provides lectures and workshops on anti-sexism, antiracism, and well-being in our personal and professional lives.

Internationally recognized breathing/movement specialist and best-selling author

Betsy Polatin

Internationally recognized breathing/movement specialist and best-selling author, Betsy Polatin, MFA, SEP, has been teaching for more than forty-five years and is currently a master lecturer at Boston University’s College of Fine Arts. Her background includes many years of movement education and performance, as well as training in the Alexander Technique, music, dance, yoga, meditation, trauma resolution, and the broader healing arts. Her work is greatly influenced by the teachings of Spiritual and Meditation Masters.

Betsy leads international trainings where she presents her unique and revolutionary fusion of ideas: scientific knowledge combined with ancient wisdom and intuitive human creativity. Since 2016, she has been co-teaching  “Trauma and the Performing Artist” with Peter A. Levine, PhD. She also teaches “the Wisdom of Trauma,” with Dr. Gabor Maté. Betsy is the author of the best-seller, HUMANUAL, an Epic Journey to your Expanded Self, and The Actor’s Secret. As a well-known educator, she has published numerous articles in the Huffington Post. She maintains a private practice online internationally. Please visit: HUMANUAL.com

Consultant Psychiatrist and founder of the Mirabilis Health Institute

Paul Miller

Prof Paul W. Miller, MD MB BCh BAO DMH MRCPsych FRSA, is an author, Consultant Psychiatrist and founder of the Mirabilis Health Institute; an EMDR Europe Accredited Trainer and Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Life and Health Sciences at Ulster University. His humanitarian work has supported projects on the Island of Ireland, as well as in Myanmar, Northern Iraq and he is currently focused upon trauma capacity building for Ukraine.

Project Lead – Lighthouse Charity 

Gary Symington

Project Lead – Lighthouse Charity 

Gary Symington grew up in West Belfast where he worked as a youth worker for 18 years.  He joined Lighthouse in 2011, a community based charity providing support for those bereaved by suicide as well as services for those in emotional crisis.   

He has worked with thousands of young people throughout Belfast and beyond, which has been a privilege.  As Projects Lead for the Ask Twice Project Gary provides group work in Belfast secondary schools, working with young people presenting with emotional health concerns.  This work is delivered in partnership with his colleague Sinead McIlvenna, where they integrate the skills of youth work and counselling.  Outside work Gary has a keen interest in classic cars and spends most weekends with his wife, son and daughter who both play football.   

Survivor, Coach, Mentor, Speaker, Author

Ronia Fraser

Ronia Fraser is an internationally renowned and multi-award-winning Trauma Recovery Coach & Clinical Hypnotherapist and one of the leading experts in the field of Narcissistic Abuse Recovery. Since 2017 she’s been helping abuse survivors from all over the world get back on their feet, regain their mental health and recover who they were always meant to be. 

Website: Ronia Fraser | Award-Winning Narcissistic Abuse Recovery Coaching 

Dr. Mariel Buqué is an Afro-Dominican, Columbia University-trained Psychologist, intergenerational trauma expert, and the author of the book Break the Cycle

Dr. Mariel Buqué

Dr. Mariel Buqué is an Afro-Dominican, Columbia University-trained Psychologist, intergenerational trauma expert, and the author of the book Break the Cycle: A Guide to Healing Intergenerational Trauma. Her clinical framework is holistic and infuses ancient and indigenous healing practices into a modern, comprehensive therapeutic approach. During her clinical training, she co-developed and completed a 3-year immersive holistic mental health care fellowship in collaboration with the United States Health Administration and Columbia University Irving Medical Center, where she offered holistic psychotherapy, in the Spanish language, across multidisciplinary clinics in the Columbia hospital system, including cardiology, neurology, obstetrics and gynecology, and primary care.

She has utilized her training in holistic care to integrate holistic practices, like sound bath meditation and breathwork, into therapy, which has helped to deepen trauma healing for her clients. She additionally provides healing workshops to Fortune 100 companies including Google, Twitter, Capital One, and Meta and lectures within the psychology department of Columbia University. Dr. Buqué is widely sought out for her clinical expertise and trauma approach and has been featured on major media outlets including The Today Show, Good Morning America, and ABC News. During her doctoral training and then within her clinical position as a psychologist at Columbia University’s Irving Medical Center, Dr. Buqué was able to see the profound impact of intergenerational trauma, which led to her adopting a more holistic lens to healing layered trauma. This is now the underlying methodology behind her proprietary intergenerational healing approach. Dr. Buqué now makes her healing practices accessible through her book Break the Cycle, her newsletter, and a growing community on social media. As such, she has been named as a School of Greatness 100 Greatest People Doing Good in 2022 and an inaugural Verywell Mind 25 Mental Health Champion.

Her book can be found at https://sites.prh.com/breakthecyclebook.

Clinical Lead - CAMHS and Adult Eating Disorder Humber and North Yorkshire Provider Collaborative

Dr Nicola Green

Dr. Nicola Green is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist with over 25 years of experience working in CAMHS community and inpatient services and is passionate about trauma informed care. Nicola has been working to bring trauma informed practice into CAMHS services using the ARC framework since 2019. Nicola worked to develop the clinical model for the Inspire CAMHS adolescent inpatient service in Hull (opened Jan 2020), incorporating ARC to inform the philosophy of care and ethos on the unit and to support a move away from the more traditional diagnostic medical model. The ARC framework is now being used across the wider CAMHS system in Hull and East Yorkshire and as part of regional work to develop and embed a consistent trauma informed approach across Humber and North Yorkshire partners working with vulnerable children and young people at risk of offending.  

Nicola continues to promote trauma informed practice in her current role as Clinical Lead for the Humber and North Yorkshire provider collaborative for CAMHS and Adult Eating Disorders (AED) inpatient care. Nicola provides clinical leadership for the CAMHS and AED inpatient providers within the collaborative, working closely with clinicians and teams to promote a consistent and coordinated approach to clinical work across the whole CAMHS and AED pathway in the Humber and North Yorkshire region. Nicola also works clinically one day a week in the community CAMHS ED service in North East Lincolnshire provided by NAViGO CIC.

Amber Benziger, MS, LPC (She/her/hers)

Amber Benziger

Amber Benziger, MS, LPC (She/her/hers)  is a licensed psychotherapist, anxiety coach, and speaker in southern New Jersey. She owns Vitality Behavioral Health, specializing in anxiety disorders, burnout prevention, and trauma therapy. Amber is also the creator of The Anxiety Lab card deck, a deck of 40+ journal prompts to help alleviate your anxiety. To learn more about Amber visit www.ambervsanxiety.com and follow her on Instagram @amber_vs_anxiety.

Kati Taunt

Kati Taunt is a Clinical Social Worker, Cognitive Behavioural Therapist, Systemic Practitioner, EMDR and Trauma Therapist, consultant and trainer. She has  25 years of experience working in specialist CAMHS, a children’s trauma charity, multi-agency provision for children and families with complex trauma, private practice, youth work and local authority residential child and adolescent provision.

As the only Europe based licenced ARC trainer  (Attachment, Regulation and Competency, see www.arcframework.org) she has been working to introduce trauma-informed practice into; schools, residential care, foster care, youth justice services, adolescent psychiatric in patient services, charities, secure units, police liaison teams, CAMHS, youth drug and alcohol teams (in patient and community) disability services, early help teams and specialist adolescent teams within social care in locations throughout the UK and Europe for the past 12 years.

www.trauma-informedpractice.com

Head of Service at SWERRL (Strengthening Wellbeing, Emotional Health, Relationships and Readiness for Learning) in Enfield

Mark Maidens

Mark is Head of Service at SWERRL (Strengthening Wellbeing, Emotional Health, Relationships and Readiness for Learning) in Enfield. For the last three years, he has been working to bring trauma informed practice into primary schools in Enfield using the ARC framework. He has developed his trauma informed practice and understanding by working in various roles in both primary and secondary settings and schools for over 20 years in Enfield. He has worked directly with pupils, parents and school staff. Prior to this, he worked as a classroom teacher in Soweto and central Johannesburg for 10 years in South Africa.  He has two adopted children so has a “lived and breathed” experience of the impact of early trauma.

Clinical lead of the Health Team at Clare Lodge

Sophie Mulvana

Sophie is the clinical lead of the Health Team at Clare Lodge, a secure welfare home for girls between the age of 11-18. She is also a member of the Managed Clinical Advisory Group for Children and Young People in Secure Care and the Professional Collaboration Network for the Integrated Framework for Secure Care. She has been working to bring trauma informed practice to Clare Lodge and their outreach service using the Attachment Regulation Competencies Model. She is a clinical psychologist by background and has spent much of her career thinking about how systems in inpatient settings, including hospitals and prisons, can more effectively understand and support those who come into contact with them.

Psychotherapist, Author, Founder, Televagal, Khiron Clinics and Get Stable

Benjamin Fry

Benjamin is the Founder of Televagal, Khiron House and Get Stable. He is an accredited psychotherapist, author and entrepreneur. He has had a rich and varied career, combining his interests in psychology, the media and business. In his twenties he went to film school and made a feature length film which was distributed by HBO and Paramount, then founded and ran nightclubs and restaurants, before starting a family, training as a psychotherapist and writing his first book which led to presenting a television series for the BBC, as the psychotherapist in Spendaholics.

More recently he has combined his business experience, clinical training and media skills to set up Khiron Clinics, one of the only residential trauma-treatment centres in the world; to lobby for more effective treatment in the public sector through his non-profit Get Stable; and to develop Televagal which delivers nervous-system informed technology for a variety of behavioural health problems. Benjamin is also a practicing couples’ therapist, using trauma and nervous-system informed therapies to help his clients optimise and heal their relationships.

Georgie Oldfield MCSP is a leading physiotherapist and UK Specialist in a pioneering approach to chronic pain relief

Georgie Oldfield

Georgie Oldfield MCSP is a leading physiotherapist and UK Specialist in a pioneering approach to chronic pain relief that is evidence-based, educational and focuses on self-empowerment. As a clinician Georgie came across the pioneering work of John E Sarno MD while trying to find an answer to the many anomalies her patients with pain presented with.

After visiting Dr Sarno in 2007, Georgie completely changed the way she worked with chronic pain. Like Dr Sarno, she began to see exceptional recoveries once she began helping patients address the underlying causes of their pain, rather than just treating the symptom itself. With the evolution of pain science over the past 15 years, as well as a clearer understanding of how trauma, including ACEs, are linked to chronic pain, Georgie and the global community she is involved with, are working hard to change the out-dated belief that chronic pain can only be managed.

Georgie is a clinician, an educator and author, having published her book, ‘Chronic Pain: Your Key to Recovery’ in 2014. Through her training organisation, SIRPA^TM, Georgie also developed the first training programme in this field in 2010, enabling health professionals and coaches to learn how to integrate this approach and the concept on which it is based within their own work. In 2011 she also developed an online recovery programme for people in pain which is educational and self-empowering, supporting them towards regaining their lives. This has recently been replaced with a new, up to date, programme with resources presented by a number of experienced SIRPA-trained practitioners. Georgie speaks widely about this approach, was invited to give a TEDx talk in 2019 and a few years ago she was also an invited Specialist on the Tonight programme on ITV about chronic pain.  Since 2015, SIRPA has also organised and hosted international conferences, which are held at 1 Wimpole Street, the home of the Royal Society of Medicine in London.

Founder & Editor, MindHealth360, Executive Director, IMMH Integrative Medicine for Mental Health

Kirkland Newman

Kirkland Newman is an Anglo-American journalist and entrepreneur. She is the Founder and Editor of MindHealth360, a free, global resource for integrative mental health and functional medicine psychiatry, the Host of The MindHealth360 Show, and the Executive Director of IMMH, Integrative Medicine for Mental Health.  

She created MindHealth360 after her own postpartum depression to address the epidemic of mental health issues and the lack of sustainable, root-cause based solutions for mental health in mainstream medicine. She launched the MindHealth360 Show in 2020 to give a voice to the top practitioners of integrative mental health from around the world. In 2023, she took over the leading integrative mental health conference in the US, IMMH, to educate mental health practitioners about the latest scientific research and best clinical practice in integrative mental health and functional medicine psychiatry.

She has worked for Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Ogilvy & Mather in New York, and for Musiclegal and The Prince’s Trust in London. She is a Co-Founder and Trustee of The Horizon Foundation which provides support for young refugees from the Middle East and Asia.

Kirkland has a first class/summa cum laude BA/MA from Oxford University in Modern Languages and Literature (French and Spanish); an MSc from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) in European Studies; and an MA from The School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in Near and Middle Eastern Studies. Her dissertation “The Battle for Victimhood, Roles and Narratives of Suffering in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict” was published in “Narrating Conflict in the Middle East: Discourse, Image and Communications Practices in Lebanon and Palestine”. 

Business Events Account Manager, Visit Belfast

Jackie Geddis

Jackie is a Business Events Account Manager at Visit Belfast, boasting an impressive track record of over 28 years sales and marketing experience working within the dynamic Travel & Tourism sectors. In her current role, she is part of an award-winning team who are responsible for attracting strategic business events to Belfast and Northern Ireland.

Jackie is committed to leveraging events as a force for good advocating for their integration with broader objectives spanning natural, financial, political, human, social, and cultural dimensions. She sees events not merely as gatherings, but as catalysts for positive change, capable of leaving a lasting legacy that extends far beyond their immediate impact.

Jackie is a passionate advocate for the local economy, recognizing the pivotal role that events play in driving job creation, fostering prosperity, and nurturing a sustainable environment for growth. Through her efforts, she envisions Belfast evolving into a vibrant and sustainable destination, one that not only attracts visitors and business but also serves as a welcoming and thriving community for its residents. With her dedication and vision, Jackie continues to support shaping Belfast into a place where people can not only visit and meet but truly live and thrive.

Dr Stephen W. Porges & Anthony Gorry

Bio – Dr Stephen W. Porges:

Dr Stephen W. Porges, PhD is a Distinguished University Scientist at Indiana University, professor of psychiatry at the University of North Carolina and professor emeritus at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the University of Maryland. He has published more than 400 peer‐reviewed scientific papers that have been cited in more than 50,000 peer-reviewed papers and holds several patents involved in monitoring and regulating autonomic state. He created the Polyvagal Theory and a
music-based intervention (Safe and Sound Protocol). He is author of several books including The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation (Norton, 2011), The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory: The Transformative Power of Feeling Safe (Norton, 2017), and Polyvagal Safety (Norton, 2021), as well as co-author with Seth Porges of Our Polyvagal World: How Safety and Trauma Change Us (Norton, 2023), and co-editor with Deb Dana of Clinical Applications of the Polyvagal Theory: The Emergence of Polyvagal-Informed Therapies (Norton, 2018). Dr. Porges is co-creator with Anthony Gorry of Polyvagal Music, and a founder of the Polyvagal Institute.

Bio – Anthony Gorry:

Anthony Gorry is the CEO of Polyvagal MusicLLC and AjoiA Ltd; he has invented a new technology and clinical protocol with American behavioural neuroscientist, Dr Stephen W. Porges. Anthony Gorry is a music producer, audio designer and composer; he has a Bachelor of Arts in Music and Performing Arts and a diverse portfolio which includes co-producing music for nature documentaries, collaborating with BAFTA awardwinning production teams, and working with renowned artists and Grammy award winning producers, including Gwen Stefani, No Doubt, Richard Ashcroft and Moby, having had success at the top of the U.S and International charts. Anthony has worked with many international brands, including L’Oréal and Adidas producing content for worldwide campaigns and has had his work featured in movies and television. Recently he served as an audio consultant for LG’s emerging technology team in Silicon Valley.

Rachel Yehuda

Rachel Yehuda, PhD, is an Endowed Professor of Psychiatry and Neuroscience of Trauma.  She is also Director of Mental Health at the James J. Peters Veterans Affairs Medical Center. Dr. Yehuda is a recognized leader in the field of traumatic stress studies, PTSD, and intergenerational trauma.  In 2019, Dr. Yehuda was elected to the National Academy of Medicine for her seminal contributions to understanding the psychological and biological impact of traumatic stress.  In 2020, Dr. Yehuda established and now directs the Center for Psychedelic Psychotherapy and Trauma Research.

Thomas Hübl, PhD

Thomas Hübl, PhD, is a renowned teacher, author, and international facilitator whose lifelong work integrates the core insights of the great wisdom traditions and mysticism with the discoveries of science. Since the early 2000s, he has been leading large-scale events and courses that focus on the healing and integration of trauma. He has been teaching workshops and presenting training for Harvard Medical School since 2019 and is currently a visiting scholar at Harvard’s Wyss Institute. In 2022, he received a PhD in Wisdom Studies from Ubiquity University. 

His non-profit organisation, The Pocket Project, works to support the healing of collective trauma throughout the world. He is the author of Healing Collective Trauma: A Process for Integrating Our Intergenerational and Cultural Wounds and the forthcoming book Attuned: Practicing Interdependence to Heal Our Trauma—and Our World.

Kate McAlpine

Kate is a trauma and addiction informed yoga instructor, breathwork teacher and sound therapist. She has enjoyed helping her local community achieve a higher level of mental and physical well-being in the last 4 years by sharing her personal practice of somatic movement, transformational breathwork and a wide range of guided meditations.

Creator of the Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Method

Pat Ogden, PhD

Pat Ogden, PhD, (she/her), is a pioneer in somatic psychology, the creator of the Sensorimotor Psychotherapy method, and founder of the Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute (sensorimotor.org). Dr. Ogden is a clinician, consultant, international lecturer and the first author of two groundbreaking books in somatic psychology: Trauma and the Body: A Sensorimotor Approach to Psychotherapy and Sensorimotor Psychotherapy: Interventions for Trauma and Attachment (2015). Her third book, The Pocket Guide to Sensorimotor Psychotherapy in Context, advocates for an anti-racist perspective in psychotherapy practice.  Her current interests include couple therapy, child and family therapy, social justice, diversity, inclusion, consciousness, and the philosophical/spiritual principles that underlie her work. 

BACP Registered therapist

Tony Buckley

Tony Buckley, BA, is a BACP registered therapist who holds a BA Hons degree in Counselling, a Diploma in Supervision and Certificate of Education and Further Education. Tony has studied Cranio-Sacral Focused Anatomy and is currently studying towards a Masters in Neuroscience at Kings College London. Tony has accrued over 30 years’ experience in the therapeutic field including activities such as teaching, supervision, private practice, and managing teams of counsellor’s in both a university setting and an adolescent counselling service within the voluntary sector.  Former professional roles included seven years spent as manager of the Counselling and Trauma Service for Transport for London (London Underground), which offers a time-limited trauma treatment service, psychoeducation, stress reduction groups and response support following critical incidents. Tony has been teaching Sensorimotor Psychotherapy internationally for over 12 years, delivering all 3 levels of the method in Ireland, Norway, UK, Netherlands, Finland and Australia. In addition to teaching therapists Tony likes to find some time to write and has contributed several articles in the somatic psychology field and co-written a chapter titled “Healing the Traumatized Organization” in the 2012 Wiley-Blackwell  book called International Handbook of Workplace Trauma Support.

ACTIVIST CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST AND CO-FOUNDER OF UNYOKE FOUNDATION

Nomfundo Walaza

Nomfundo Walaza is a clinical psychologist who has worked as an activist in the human rights field for more than three decades. She served as the CEO of the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre (DTPC) for 7 years. She also served for 11 years as the Executive Director of the Trauma Centre for Survivors of Violence and Torture in Cape Town. In this capacity, Nomfundo focused primarily on the empowerment and the healing of victims of torture, trauma and violence, many of whom suffered severely at the hands of the Apartheid regime in South Africa. She also served the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa in multiple roles.

Since leaving the DTPC, Nomfundo Walaza has been deeply involved in mediation, conflict transformation, dialogue facilitation, peacebuilding and assisting academic institutions with engaging in difficult conversation around issues of transformation and decolonization.  Nomfundo co-founded the Unyoke Foundation with Chris Spies in 2017. She currently accompanies a group of aspirant young leaders in South Sudan and in the refugee camps in Uganda.

Nomfundo Walaza co-facilitates unyoke reflective retreats for international peace practitioners. She is dedicated to finding innovative ways to accompany young and upcoming peacebuilders within the African continent. Nomfundo has a keen interest in exploring African Indigenous Knowledge systems as they pertain to peacebuilding, mediation, and conflict transformation. She firmly believes that intergenerational accompaniment and support are the keys to addressing Africa’s intractable conflicts.

Somatic therapist and educator

Jane Shaw

Jane Shaw marries biodynamic craniosacral therapy, neurobiology, and Jungian psychology to support individuals to recover from and become resilient to adverse life experiences. Having spent many years in the world of business and finance, she been immersed in the field of holistic health for 20 years, seamlessly blending neuroscience and new medicine with profound teachings from ancient healing arts. As a therapist, writer, and educator, Jane delivers training programmes and retreat experiences both online and in person, in Ireland and internationally. Jane holds an M.A. in Economics from the University of Edinburgh and an M.A. in Jungian and Archetypal Psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute, always continuing to learn from both her academic research and lived experience.

Consultant Clinical and Forensic Psychologist

Dawn Harris

Dr Dawn Harris is a Consultant Clinical and Forensic Psychologist and an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society. She has worked in both the public and private sectors for over 29 years where she gained extensive experience of working with people who have experienced psychological trauma. She previously co-founded, co-owned and worked as a psychological lead in a private psychiatric hospital.  Within the Criminal Justice field, she has significant experience of working within the prison setting and has designed trauma informed rehabilitative interventions for forensic settings.  She has been a Parole Commissioner in Northern Ireland and has co-developed a trauma informed programme that is neurobiologically and physiologically based, for men who are involved in the Justice system.

Dawn developed and has delivered BPS (British Psychological Society) accredited training to thousands of staff within both private and public organisations with the aim of creating trauma informed and responsive cultures.  She also used her expertise in trauma when working with senior leaders to create organisational cultural transformation using the principles of trauma informed practice.  This includes changing policies, procedures, practice, relational interactions and communication.

Dawn currently provides a highly specialist clinical, forensic psychological service, and opened Kedras Clinics in Perth in 2022 which uses cutting-edge, evidence based neurotechnology and psychotherapy to address a variety of symptomatology in children, young people, and adults including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism, PTSD/CPTSD, insomnia, concussion, TBI, peak performance in sports and business, anxiety, depression, concentration, epilepsy, fibromyalgia, brain fog and other forms of chronic pain amongst others.

Kedras Clinics is operating at the cutting edge of mental health and wellbeing treatments, centred around the latest neuroscience offering people the most effective, innovative interventions to achieve optimum brain functioning.  As neurofeedback is about fine tuning the brain, it can help improve performance and concentration, sharpen daily functioning, increase clarity, and improve sleep: the bedrock of physical and mental wellbeing. Kedras Clinics bases all interactions on the relational aspect of healing, with a focus on working within a blended framework of neuroscience, somatic-cognitive connection, respect, trust, collaboration, and intuition.

Senior Strategic Advisor, International Conflict Resolution and Community Trauma Expert

Peter McBride

Peter is The Director of The Cohen Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies located at Keene State College, New Hampshire.  Having worked in Northern Ireland for most of his career, he is a post conflict/atrocity mental health specialist with a wide range of skills and experience in the development of mental health and wellbeing services after community experiences of ethnically motivated violence, atrocities and genocide.  He has worked on the influence of trauma on the capacity of individuals, groups and communities to engage in peace-making  and reconciliation processes, concluding that the characteristics of the experience of trauma – specifically large group experience – mitigates against successful reconciliation processes. 

He has most recently worked with USAID in South Sudan training frontline staff on the role of trauma in atrocity prevention, and works regularly with the Auschwitz Institute for The Prevention of Genocide and Mass Atrocity in their international training programmes.  He was the founder, 20 years ago of Carecall, now called Inspire Workplaces, which is the largest provider of workplace wellbeing services in Ireland.  Peter was Group CEO of Inspire for the past 10 years until 2019. 

Peter has held multiple public chairmanships including two government roles, one dealing with openness and transparency across the health service following the hyponatremia inquiry, the other dealing with the legacy issues of the Magdalene laundries and Mother and Baby Homes.  He was the chair of NICVA, and Million & Me – a BBC Children in Need initiative to improve the mental health of young people across the UK.  Peter is a well-known conference and public speaker on these issues both locally and internationally.

Psychotherapist, trainer, author

Ros Townsend

Ros Townsend is an experienced psychotherapist who combines private therapy work with referrals from Occupational Health and the NHS. She has a special interest in working with those affected by psychological trauma and has worked extensively with survivors of domestic abuse, members of the blue-light services, and with military veterans through the veterans charity, PTSD Resolution, of which she is also a Trustee. She is author of the highly regarded self-help book, ‘PTSD: Understanding and Recovery’ and the recently published ‘Why Three Fs?’, which sets trauma within a wider contextual understanding of what we need to thrive and lead emotionally healthy lives. 

Ros is also a tutor for the Human Givens College and regularly provides bespoke training days for organisations looking to improve the wellbeing of their staff.

She developed the current Trauma Awareness Training programme for PTSD Resolution, which is delivered across the UK, and has been engaged as a speaker at events designed to raise awareness in the field of mental health. 

She lives near the coast in the South West of England with her two children, and, when not reading a book, can be found climbing mountains or wild swimming.