Womb Surround Process Workshop
Please find upcoming dates below, along with the application/history form, near the bottom of the page.
My favourite way to work with prenatal and birth issues, small womb surround process workshops usually consist of 4 participants and and assistant, facilitated by me, Cherionna.
Over the course of 3 - 4 days, each participant has a turn where the entire group supports them in their intention.
Based on principles developed by pre- and perinatal therapy pioneer Ray Castellino, these workshops occur within a beautiful, safe, relational field.
I support you in slowing down and being present with what is important for you to explore from your very early history. I guide you in embodied exploration and resolution of early traumas.
I see a major aspect of the profound healing experienced in these workshops as being the cellular learning that happens in a gentle, sensitive context, which is often very different from what you experienced in the womb and when you were born.
The principles behind these workshops are based on what every little one needs and so many of us didn't get back then. It is possible to experience immense change when these needs are met.
If this appeals to you, please read on for more details.
What is a 'Womb Surround' Process Workshop?
(adapted from Ray Castellino’s description at http://www.castellinotraining.com/process/)
A 'Womb Surround' Process Workshop is a small group format developed and refined by Raymond Castellino since 1992. It creates a safe, welcoming environment in which to explore early imprinting from preverbal life that is affecting your present life. Typically in Cherionna's workshops there are 3- 4 participants in a workshop, along with Cherionna Menzam-Sills as facilitator, and usually 1-2 assistants.
Dr. Castellino created this format because he found that complete and lasting transformations most often happen in a small group setting like this. This 3-4 day format allows for spaciously establishing a safe relational field, exploration of the early material presenting, and time to integrate. Cherionna has added to this format additional somatic and heart-centered, mindfulness-based resourcing activities as part of the workshop.
Each workshop begins by reviewing basic interactive, empathy and contact skills so that participants are actively able to support each other during the workshop with the intention of creating a safe and nurturing "womb surround." Each participant receives an approximately 1.5 - 2.5 hour session with Cherionna with group support during which they explore physical and emotional patterns of prenatal, birth or other early origin. Each session is followed by individual and group debriefing, integrative processing and discussion. Tools used include group interactive processes, energy awareness, Craniosacral work and/or other touch, movement, mindfulness and empathy skills. The exploration is done with an orientation to present-time resource and the layers of support provided by the group.
The purpose is to enhance awareness and resolve early trauma, creating more options for current behavior and ways of being in relationship. In addition to healing prenatal, birth and other early trauma, this process has the principle impact of encouraging loving bonding within primary relationships. Participants commonly state that the process is transformational on a deep level.
The Format of the 'Womb Surround' Process Workshop
The actual format is as follows: The first segment of the workshop (approximately 3 hours) is spent with participants sharing intentions and Cherionna establishing the principles and structure that will make it possible to share and receive at a deeply safe and resourced level. Cherionna will guide the group in settling into a heart-centered receptive witnessing state, as well as deepening into a resourced, fluidic state of being through meditative awareness, often with some gentle breaths, sounds, movement and awareness of Continuum.
Over the course of the workshop, each person has a turn, one at a time, during which the whole group, led by Cherionna, focuses on supporting the participant to explore some aspect of preverbal life. Each step is taken with consciousness, permission from the turn person and with a goal of supporting the turn person's intention in exploring this early material. In this format Cherionna is facilitating not only the individual turn person, but also the other members of the group and interactions between everyone present. Every participant can experience their own healing during every turn.
The methods used to facilitate each turn are determined by the intention and needs of the turn person. Here is what is consistent:
Who's Turn is it?
First there is a group process to determine who will be the turn person. The rest of the group will be the surround. The whole group is involved in this decision in order to insure that everyone is on board to support the turn person.
Your Relevant History
Once the turn person is determined, Cherionna rereads the turn person's history form and the turn person affirms his or her turn. Cherionna and the group then listen to the turn person's story in a guided, resourced, paced, and relational way. Cherionna asks questions pertinent to the person's exploration, coaches the person through slow movement patterns, uses gentle touch and makes suggestions to the turn person and the group for interactive exercises.
During sessions Cherionna coaches the surround members to support each other and the turn person. She guides surround members in applying the same kind of attention that they would as if they were holding a newborn baby.
Embodied Exploration
In this process, Cherionna guides the turn person and the group to interact at a very slow tempo so that each person present and especially the turn person are supported to integrate or make sense of the early body memories. For example, the turn person’s body may begin to move in the unique movement patterns that the person actually moved through during his or her birth. The group quietly and gently holds the turn person so that he or she can move through the birth pattern in a very conscious and integrated way. Doing this at a slow tempo, with warmth, contact and support, re-patterns the experience for the turn person. The whole group is working together as a team in a very respectful gentle atmosphere as if they were at a birth.
Cherionna as Facilitator
In facilitating this process, Cherionna draws on over 25 years experience in studying and practicing prenatal and birth therapy, including 6 years intensive study with William Emerson, whom she has assisted in seminars, and 4 years intensive study with Ray Castellino, whom she also assisted in his clinic, training and countless process workshops, as well as continued supervision with Ray until his passing in 2020.
Cherionna is a Castellino approved womb surround process workshop facilitator. Her background as a therapist for 45 years also includes Occupational Therapist in both physical medicine and mental health settings, Somatic Dance/Movement psychotherapist, massage and bodywork therapist, and Craniosacral therapist. All of these, as well as her many years of mindfulness, meditation, Continuum and other mindful movement practices contribute to her ability to be present with each person and the whole group as potentially intense processes emerge for healing.
Coherence, Compassion, and Healing
As the turn person reveals their history, Cherionna uses this knowledge to help the turn person develop a plausible and coherent story out of their history. As this happens, Cherionna helps the turn person realize how these early imprints led to adaptive behaviors that have affected them throughout their life and how these adaptations to the original trauma have been useful. Participants often discover the limitation of the adaptive behaviors. The process itself opens new possibilities for a broader spectrum of choices in their lives.
Not all participants explore their birth process. Some explore an aspect of ancestral influences, conception, pregnancy, hospitalization after birth, the twin experience, family dynamics of their birth family, adoption or any other events or family patterns that affected them strongly.
Completion
At the end of each turn, the surround members are asked to share a brief essence statement of how the turn person's work touched them.
It is usual for the sessions to end with the whole group in awe and reverence for the sanctity of the turn person's journey and for life itself.
Debrief and Integration
Each morning there is a group settling, check-in, and a debriefing of the previous day's session by Cherionna. (The last day's sessions are debriefed during closure). The purpose of these discussions is to facilitate the integration of the sessions. When the group is in session, the participants are in experiential right-brain mode. During the debriefing following the sessions, participants are in more of a cognitive left-brain mode.
During closure, Cherionna recommends specific activities for the next month to support the participants in the integration of their experiences from the workshop. These include contact with other members of the group, professional support, and suggestions for ways to integrate their new perceptions, needs and ways of being with their families and communities.
Who Attends a 'Womb Surround' Process Workshop?
Anyone who is ready for or who has experience with group process work is welcome to attend.
This workshop is also recommended for professionals as a means to personally experience the profound changes possible with this approach. Those who come with particular skills are encouraged to use them in the group setting. Participants leave with deeper levels of awareness, directly related to prenatal and birth processes, applicable to any professional practice. Many report using their new perceptions and skills in their practices.
This workshop is equally valuable to persons who chose to take it primarily for personal growth and healing.
Couples, pregnant mothers, mothers/fathers and their adult children often take this workshop as well as professionals.
Individuals who are not ready for group process work are best served by individual sessions with Cherionna, therapy in another setting, or both.
Please note that all workshops will be online until further notice due to COVID-19.
All of us facilitating womb surrounds online have been amazed at how effective they are, in some ways even better than in person. We find that, although physical contact is not possible online, the intention for that contact can be felt by everyone involved. We also find that participants often prefer the comfort and resource of being in their own homes while engaging with this early material.
"Participating in the Womb Surround Process (virtually) has been such a profoundly empowering experience. I am still in awe as I notice the unfolding that has ensued. What struck me was how it was not only possible to do this energetic work online, but it was also possible to experience physical touch with just the right amount of pressure that I needed at any point of time. How incredible that one can sit at home and access this work from anywhere in the world now. Thank you, Cherionna."
- Shruti Goutham, Therapist/Coach, Mumbai, India
Preparing for a Womb Surround Process Workshop
It is helpful before attending a Womb Surround Process Workshop to have already established a relationship with the facilitator. Cherionna is available for private one-on-one sessions online or in person in Devon to begin your exploration together. Having one or more sessions prior to the workshop can enhance your workshop experience by deepening the level of sense of safety and renounce you arrive with.
To participate in a womb surround process workshop, it is important that Cherionna have as much detail as possible about your early history. Please download and complete a Womb Surround History Form below and send it to Cherionna along with your deposit.
Scheduled workshops are listed below.
Cherionna is also available to facilitate private groups of 3 or less. If you and your partner, friend or colleague would like to participate together in your own group, please contact Cherionna to explore if this would be appropriate and possible for you.
Please contact Cherionna for more information or to set up a private group.
NEXT WORKSHOP DATES
Please note that start times are exact. Ending times for each day vary slightly depending on what is needed for the process.
ALL WORKSHOPS ONLINE UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE
2025 DATES COMING SOON:
WORKSHOP TIMES:
Thursday - Sunday, 10 a.m. - approximately 5 - 7 p.m. UK time.
We generally take a 2-hour lunch break and shorter breaks as needed each day. Break times on Sunday are slightly different and are negotiated with the group.
2024 DATES:
October 3 - 6, 2024 - FULL with Waitlist
NEW DATES for 2025 coming later this summer
December 5 - 8, 2024 - FULL - private workshop for OJH graduates only
