Jo Guerreiro
My story and mission
For many years, I struggled with numbness, disconnection, anxiety, incorrect mental health diagnoses, navigating complex trauma and unhealthy relationships. Nothing I tried really worked. Traditional talk therapy helped my hyper-intellectualizing brain understand and validate “what was”, but it didn’t translate into “what still is” and had lasting change in how I lived my life. I thought that the way I experienced life - with my nervous system’s constant tension, my repeating patterns, my disconnection from pleasure, my struggles with intimacy - was just how it was meant to be. To be honest, I didn’t know any different so I accepted it.
That started to shift when I became a client to someone trained in Somatic Experiencing. Truth be told, it was deeply unfamiliar and somewhat awkward and uncomfortable at first (“What do you mean where do I feel that in my body??”), but after a while, and for the first time since I could remember, I felt those feelings (yep, even the uncomfortable ones) and connected with my body in a way that made me feel empowered, hopeful, safer and deeply curious.
I slowly began to relearn the language of my nervous system, uncovering and integrating what it was holding, and discovering a capacity to feel and connect that I didn’t know I had in me. This was the first time I experienced real, lasting change in sessions that translated into my day-to-day life. I built resilience for life’s natural ups and downs, improved my relationships, and rediscovered my pleasure, sexuality, and intimacy in ways that I had never dared to before (or at least, that I didn’t have capacity for before).
This embodied learning, this deep, felt, body-based shift outside sessions, is what actually stuck for me. It changed the course of my life (I know - cliché right?), and it’s what led me to this work. I felt grief that this knowledge and support hadn’t been available to me sooner, and gratitude that it eventually was. All of this shapes everything I bring to my work.
I also know first hand that this path takes patience, vulnerability, and hard work. It often requires unlearning, re-discovering how we really want to live our lives, and reclaiming ways of being that may have been suppressed or ignored. It’s not always easy. It’s awkward, messy, confusing, and tender. But it’s also deeply human. It’s about expanding our capacity to feel life fully - joy, love, pleasure, grief, pain (…) - without letting any one thing take over or linger for longer than it serves us.
I want this work to feel grounded, real, and accessible. Not detached or “woo-woo,” not a cure-all or fix-all. But about learning to live with your body, your nervous system, your sexuality, your relationships and all the things that make you human - on terms that feel uniquely sustainable for you. About building the tools to navigate life and intimacy in a way that feels present, embodied, exciting and expansive. About holding space for yourself and being held in the process, without judgment or pressure to be “fixed”.
I often say I wish this was taught in schools. If everyone grew up learning how to attune to their bodies and navigate life in more conscious connection, I’d happily be out of a job. That’s my dream.
I’m gonna be real with you - I don’t believe in full “healing.” Life is always happening, and hard moments, difficult emotions, and challenges will always arise, some influenced by us, others completely beyond our control. But what we can do is learn to move through life with more support, awareness, compassion, and presence - so we can also feel the beauty, joy, and pleasure of being human, alongside the messiness and the pain that naturally comes with our existence.
That’s why I do this work. Not to heal you, not to fix you. But to walk with you as you take steps home back to yourself, offering space, support, and presence that might feel unfamiliar to you otherwise. In hopes that you reconnect with your body, your pleasure, your intimacy, your loved ones and your life - on your terms.