Your nervous system isn't broken
it just never felt safe enough to settle
Somatic therapy for adults who've tried to think their way to regulation and found it isn't quite enough. Especially for those who are neurodivergent: AuDHD, autistic, ADHD, and more.
If you're neurodivergent, your nervous system has likely been working overtime for most of your life, navigating a world that wasn't built for the way you're wired. Sometimes there's also a specific moment layered on top of that: a sudden event, a medical scare, a situation where you felt trapped or out of control. You may have told yourself it wasn't that big a deal. But your body felt it, and it hasn't quite let go.
Since then, you might find yourself more easily overwhelmed, shutting down in situations that used to feel okay, or reacting in ways that catch you off guard. The emotional floods. The freeze. The sense that your responses don't match what's actually happening around you, and not knowing how to get back to yourself.
I'm Paul Shin, a Somatic Trauma & Relational Therapist based in Wexford, Ireland, offering in-person and online therapy to adults across Ireland and the UK. I'm on my own neurodivergent journey, and somatic work is what finally helped me find emotional regulation that actually stuck by learning to work with my body rather than against it.
Therapy with me is paced, body-led, and Neurodiversity & LGBTQ+ affirming 🌈. We go at your speed, follow what your nervous system is doing in the room, and work gently toward settling without pressure, without forcing, and with you in control throughout.
The body remembers
what the mind tries to release.
When your system has been
working overtime your whole life
For neurodivergent people, dysregulation isn't always tied to one event. It's often the accumulation of navigating a world that wasn't built for you. Sometimes there's also a specific moment layered on top. What matters isn't the label. It's whether your body has been able to settle. You don't need to relate to all of these.
This might include
It can show up as
These responses aren't signs of weakness or being "too sensitive". They're often signs your system has been doing its best in difficult conditions.
“Trauma is not what happens to us, but what we hold inside in the absence of an empathetic witness.”
— Peter A. Levine, PhD, founder of Somatic Experiencing®
What this work
can open up
This work is about giving your nervous system a chance to complete, settle, and feel safe again.
- Reactions that felt instant and uncontrollable start to slow down
- The flood or freeze begins to have an edge, a place where it can stop
- Saying yes when you mean no starts to feel like a choice, a pause, a moment to decide
- Your own needs and limits become easier to locate and to stay with
- Setting a boundary feels less like a threat your body has to brace against
- Everyday situations feel less charged, less loaded
- You can stay present in your body without bracing or shutting down
- Connection and trust begin to feel steadier, less risky
- You can breathe more fully because your system finally allows it
The aim is not to change who you are. It is to help your nervous system feel safer, so your history stops interrupting your present.
Taking the next step
Finding the right therapist matters, especially when your sense of safety has been affected.
I offer a free 15-minute consultation so you can ask questions and get a sense of whether working together feels right.
No pressure. Just a first conversation.
Paul Shin is registered with the Health & Care Professions Council (UK) and is a pre-accredited member of the Association of Professional Counsellors and Psychotherapists, ensuring professional standards are upheld in both Ireland and the UK.
Couples Therapy
Support for couples navigating conflict, disconnection, or communication challenges and for those wanting to rebuild a sense of safety, closeness, and understanding together.
Learn moreEMDR Therapy
Support for processing traumatic memories, distressing experiences, anxiety, and emotional triggers in a safe, structured, and gentle therapeutic space.
Learn more
You can feel the fight coming
before either of you says a word
Most couples who find me are tired in a particular way: tired of holding themselves together and holding the relationship together at the same time, until there is nothing left for either. None of it means you're broken, or wrong for each other. It means two nervous systems are protecting themselves faster than two people can talk. Couples therapy is where we slow that down, together, so you can tend to yourself and the relationship at the same time. They were never actually in competition.
- The key in the door, a certain sigh, and your chest is already tight. The argument has started before anyone speaks.
- One of you gets louder and faster. The other goes somewhere far behind their eyes.
- You've explained it a hundred times and they still don't get it. They've explained it a hundred times and you still don't get it.
- A raised voice puts one of you somewhere older, and suddenly you're strangers in your own kitchen.
- You take their words literally; they hear things you never said.
- You fought the world to be together. Now the fight lives at home.
- By the time you've kept the peace, kept the schedule, kept it all together, there is no you left to bring to the relationship.
- LGBTQ+ couples who want affirming support, without having to explain or defend who you are 🌈
- Neurodivergent relationships, where you love each other and still keep missing each other
- Partnerships carrying trauma, where old survival patterns show up between you
- Any couple stuck repeating the same fight and wanting a different way through
- Mid-argument, something in you looks up and notices: we're doing it again. And just like that, it's a little less automatic.
- You feel the old reply rising, and find you can put it down. Not every time. More and more.
- The sigh that used to mean you've done something wrong starts to sound like what it is: a long day.
- Arguments lose their heat sooner, and the silence afterwards lasts an hour instead of days.
- You stop translating and start feeling understood.
- When something old gets touched, you can say so, and be helped back.
- You can be close without disappearing, and be yourself without leaving.
- Looking after yourself and looking after the relationship stop being two different jobs.
No pressure. Just a first conversation, together.