about merreley


i'm a somanaut.
Props to Gil Hedley for the term "somanaut" as a way to describe someone who is dedicated to exploring inner space and the body. ​
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I have always been drawn to somatic and relational work and have spent the last 25+ years playing in the intersections of the body and psyche as a Somatic Experiencing practitioner, Structural Integration practitioner, a movement educator, certified coach, nature lover, mom and human.
the bullet point credentials:
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Somatic Experiencing Practitioner, SEP
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Somatic Practice: Touch Work For Trauma Therapists, Kathy Kain
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Transforming Touch Practitioner, Stephen Terrell
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Dr. Ida Rolf Institute, Certified Rolfer
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Certified Co-active Coach, CPCC from Co-active Training Institute
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Certified Embodied Meditation Teacher through Realization Process, Judith Blackstone
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Certified MELT Method Instructor
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Certified Franklin Method Level 1 Instructor
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Certified SourcePoint Therapy Practitioner
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Licensed Massage Therapist
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Trained Birth Doula and apprenticed with a midwife for a couple years.
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Certified In Cranial Sacral Therapy
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Studied and practiced Yoga for many years
but more personally,

A little over 5 years ago I began to notice a constant feeling of stress, exhaustion and chronic anxiety. We were also in the midst of a pandemic, so for me and most everyone else, everything intensified. I felt almost daily panic trying to make "all the things" happen...including my bodywork practice, raising two children as a single Mom, managing my multiple side hustles, my new relationship and living with the continual feeling that "it would never be enough." I was super stressed and stuck in survival mode. Moving so quickly all the time, I can remember literally running around town doing my errands. I would find joy, gratitude and peace, but always seemed to be just a few steps away from anxiety getting the better of me.
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During my Rolfing Structural Integration Training, I had learned about Somatic Experiencing® and of Dr. Peter Levine, the creator of SE. Peter had studied closely with Dr. Ida Rolf, the creator of Rolfing® Structural Integration. One of the main goals of Rolfing® is to help our clients down-regulate their nervous systems. I became aware that though I could help other people with their own nervous systems, I was having trouble regulating my own. I knew that I needed help understanding my own
nervous system and how the effects of my stressful life experiences (aka traumas) were affecting every part of my daily life.
During this time, a friend introduced me to an SE Practitioner and serendipitously, I found out that the first SE Training was soon to begin in Alaska. This began my own healing journey with Somatic Experiencing®.
Getting to know my nervous system and creating a new relationship with my nervous system by working with SE has been such a blessing, not only inside my own internal landscape, but for the community that I am now a part of. I still and will probably always get anxious and disregulated, but the tools and support I have learned how to give myself, and more importantly how to recognize and ask for support when I need it are priceless. Working with and practicing SE has made such a dynamic shift in the quality of my life and in my relationships. I am so grateful for this work! I am thrilled to be currently assisting in SE trainings in Alaska and in Colombia.
A little bit about my coaching history: After becoming a mother, and while I was still in my marriage, I started doing group coaching with a women’s group, led by the woman who would eventually become my coaching mentor. I was in this group weekly for 10 years and it helped me open my heart and gave me the support, love and shared experience I so needed during that time. I was stunned by the ability of good coaching to use just a few words to change my whole perspective and shift into a more whole and conscious perspective. I wanted to learn more about how to help others with this shift of perspective and I completed a multi-year coaching training and became a Certified Co-active Coach (CPCC).
I was already a bodyworker at that time, and had my Rolfing practice. Rolfing gave me a deep appreciation for how our bodies hold, and in many ways determine, the way we experience our lives. As the years in my practice went by, I became more and more interested in the link between the body and the nervous system, and how we can learn to nurture and affect our nervous systems.
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I began training in work that would build a heartier bridge between the body and psyche in my work: how to experience and guide other people to experience true embodiment through Realization Process, how to be with people on a transformative journey through process coaching, and how to help people shift their nervous system states with Somatic Experiencing.
As a Somatic Practitioner, the work that we do together is the integration of this path.
i live in valdez, alaska
With my partner, two teenagers, a cat, a dog and 5 chickens. I love this land and never tire of exploring the Chugach Mountains and exploring the Prince William Sound surrounding Valdez.
I love to dance, I participate in both ballet and contemporary dance. I love to ski, hike, bike and to be outside. I am also a bee keeper, and you will often find me foraging for wild plants of the land and sea.


