Somatics for queer and trans people
As a queer and trans person, I’ve found somatic work to be nothing short of radical, says Yolanda Adamson
It’s helped me start healing in a way that honours all of me – not just the parts that are deemed acceptable or understandable by society. It’s taken my experience of connect-ing with myself beyond the binaries, beyond the roles we’re told to play, and the scripts we’re handed about how our bodies should look or behave, to a whole new lev-el.
Our bodies as queer and trans people often become something to be scrutinised and judged, something that can lead to disconnection from ourselves, even if we don’t re-alise it’s happening. For me, and for so many others, the body has sometimes felt like a place of shame, discomfort or even danger. Whether it’s because of dysphoria, socie-tal pressure, or just trying to stay safe, it can be easy to end up living mostly in your head, thinking, analysing, trying to make sense of things, and your body ends up tak-ing a backseat.
That’s where somatic work has really shifted things for me.
Somatics comes from the Greek word soma meaning “the living body”. For me, this journey has been about learning how to listen to my body in a way that feels kind and honest. It’s about tuning into what it’s been holding, what it remembers, and what it’s trying to tell me. Not just mentally processing things, but feeling them.
Growing up in a world that pathologises or polices queer and trans bodies, it can be easy to internalise shame, whether it’s from cultural narratives, family dynamics, or the systems we navigate every day, those messages can land deep in the body.
What I love about somatic work is that it flips that story. It says, “You make sense.” If you feel tension, numbness, hypervigilance – it’s not because there’s something wrong with you. It’s your body doing its best in a world that hasn’t always made space for you. Somatics offers us the tools to meet those responses with curiosity instead of judgement. It helps us explore what becomes possible when we offer our bodies a bit more safety, space and choice.
And when I think about transition, whether it’s social, medical or otherwise, I see that as a somatic transition too. Transition can change the way you feel emotions, the way you experience hunger and desire, the way you and your body move through the world. Surgery, hormones, voice work – they all shape not just how you look or sound, but how you feel. This can all kick-start a completely new relationship with your body.
Changes in how we see ourselves and how the outside world interprets those changes can be complex too. There can be grief alongside the joy. Uncertainty mixed in with the clarity. And somatic practice helps me hold that complexity, instead of rushing to make it neat or palatable. It’s helped me notice what I actually want in my body and identity – not just what I’ve been told I should want.
One of the most powerful things somatic work has taught me is how to pay attention to what’s happening in the moment. Not just the story I’m telling, but the sensations – the tightness in my chest, the flutter in my belly, the urge to withdraw. Especially as someone who hasn’t always felt safe being fully seen, learning to feel safe in my own body has been life-changing.
It’s also helped me build something called capacity – basically, the ability to feel more, to come back to myself more quickly after stress, and to trust that I can meet whatev-er’s coming with a bit more steadiness. It’s given me more space, more agency, and more connection with myself.
And while somatic work is often thought of as an individual relationship to your body, I’ve found it to be deeply relational too. So much of the pain queer and trans people carry comes from relationships – from being left out, misread, or misunderstood. So when we practise somatics in community – whether that’s a queer yoga class, a trans-led exercise group, or just being able to let go in a space with people who really see us, something beautiful happens. We get to show up as we are, in real time, and feel wit-nessed. That kind of presence is healing.
For me, somatic work has become a practice of coming home. Not to someone else’s idea of what my body should be, or what my gender should look like – but to me. It’s helped me move from just surviving to actually living in my body. With more joy. More ease. More trust.
Yolanda Adamson is a sexological body-worker, working from our Brighton and Islington centres. Their approach is gentle, non-judgemental, meeting you where you are on your somatic journey – soft.sentience@outlook.com.
