When Pain Persists: A Somatic Approach to Playful Healing 🌿
Join us online for this transformative experience.
3-Part Live Zoom Series | June 2025 | Dates TBA
90 minutes per session | Recording Included | CEs available
$243
Is your client’s pain not responding to treatment—shifting, lingering, or defying diagnosis?
This innovative series offers a whole-person lens on chronic pain, integrating neuroscience, trauma-informed care, and the healing power of play.
Co-Facilitated by: Camille France, OT, Bennet Davis, MD, and Barbara Collier, LPC
What You’ll Learn
This 3-part training will help you:
Understand pain as a protective response — not just a sign of tissue damage
Identify how early adversity, trauma, and stress shape the nervous system and pain perception
Discover how joy, novelty, and play can interrupt chronic pain cycles and support healing
Integrate science-backed, somatic strategies into your clinical or personal practice
Course Overview
Part 1: The Neuroscience of Pain – Beyond Tissue Damage
Pain as a threat response, not just a signal from injury
Central sensitization, neuroplasticity & immune shifts
The revised IASP definition and its clinical implications
Optional experiential: Reflective mapping of personal/professional pain perceptions
Part 2: Trauma, Adversity & Chronic Pain
ACEs, chronic stress, systemic trauma, and their imprint on pain
Dysregulation of the HPA axis, PTSD, and immune function
How psychosocial histories inform better pain care
Optional experiential: Journaling or group dialogue on trauma-informed assessments
Part 3: Play, Joy & Novelty as Medicine
The neurobiology of play: dopamine, vagal tone, anti-inflammation
Creative expression, relational safety, and co-regulation
Gentle ways to invite delight and agency, even in pain
Optional experiential: Practice-based strategies for inviting play into clinical care
Includes exploration of:
• Nociceptive Pain (tissue damage)
• Neuropathic Pain (nerve injury)
• Stress-related Pain (trauma, adversity, dysregulation)
Why This Series?
Chronic pain isn’t just physical. Emerging neuroscience and trauma research show how stress, early adversity, and emotional threat can shape the nervous system, heighten pain sensitivity, and fuel long-term health issues — but they can also be reversed.
Play, joy, and novelty aren’t luxuries — they’re biological tools that regulate threat physiology, shift brain networks, and support healing from the inside out.
Who It’s For
Perfect for:
Physical & occupational therapists
Physicians, mental health professionals
Somatic practitioners & bodyworkers
Anyone interested in personal healing
Earn Continuing Education Credits
Details will be provided prior to the series launch.
Meet Your Facilitators
Camille France, OT – Founder of Desert Quail Therapy, known for nature-based and movement-informed healing, with advanced training in adaptive therapies and nervous system regulation.
Bennet Davis, MD – Pain specialist integrating neuroscience and somatic awareness.
Barbara Collier, LPC – Licensed therapist with deep experience in trauma healing and psychosomatic integration.
Join us to reimagine what’s possible in pain care — grounded in science, guided by story, and uplifted by joy.
Dates announced soon.
3-Part Live Zoom Series | June 2025 | Dates TBA
Recording Included | CEs available
$243 for three 90-minute interactive sessions
*Please inquire if you are in need of financial support to attend
*All times listed in Pacific Time