ABOUT HEAR
After more than 25 years of providing care to traumatized people in a variety of capacities, HEAR was created in the late winter of 2023. These letters have personal meaning to me as they are the initials of women who guided and shaped my life and were pivotal in my own journey. However, when these letters are combined, they become the embodiment of the necessity of recovery: being heard, seen, witnessed, and acknowledged. HEAR represents Healing, Empowering, Advocating, and Recovery in trauma.
MY APPROACH TO TRAUMA RECOVERY
My approach to trauma recovery is rooted in Internal Family Systems (IFS) and somatic practice while drawing from a wide range of counseling modalities and creative approaches. Depending on the person and what is needed, our work may include art, music, movement, narrative, mindfulness, cognitive and grounding skills, and other ways of exploring what has been experienced and what the body and mind have learned in response.
I began this work at 18, providing suicide prevention and intervention at a counseling center near my college campus. I knew early that I wanted to journey with people living with trauma and its effects, but over time found traditional models of psychotherapy too restrictive for the kind of care I wanted to offer. Too often, I encountered people with diagnoses and labels but little hope that healing was possible. I wanted to ask something different – not simply What is wrong? But What happened, how did you survive it, and what does healing look like for you?
For me, the answer was whole-person care.
Trauma can affect us emotionally, cognitively, relationally, physically, and spiritually. Recovery must be able to attend to all of these dimensions while making room for the ineffable within each person – the Authentic Self, soul, spirit, inner wisdom, or whatever language a person chooses for that part of themselves that is more than what has happened to them.
This conviction shaped my doctoral work at Drew University, where I focused my research on the neurobiological protection of the Authentic Self following trauma. It continues to shape my practice today, which has grown from decades of study, specialized training, research, and the privilege of accompanying people as they make sense of what they have lived through.
The work we do together is highly individualized.
We begin with the person – not the modality – and draw upon the approaches that best support their particular process of recovery, reconnection, and healing.
Aemina Razzano has spent more than 25 years accompanying individuals, families, and communities impacted by trauma. Her training and professional experience span rape crisis counseling, child abuse prevention and advocacy, church and spiritual trauma, suicide intervention and prevention, palliative and end-of-life care, and disaster mental health. Her career has included serving as a chaplain at three New York hospitals, executive director of a community-based nonprofit organization, and pastor of a church. She has also provided trauma-informed education and consultation to organizations seeking to better care for the people and communities they serve.
Working across clinical, community, spiritual, and organizational settings has given Aemina a deep understanding of the systems in which people live, seek care, find belonging, and sometimes experience harm. Her approach recognizes the intersections of race, gender, sexuality, family of origin, spirituality, and other aspects of identity and experience.
While Aemina deeply loves her work, she also believes in intentionally making room for the things that bring joy, restoration, and connection. You will likely find her digging in her garden or outside playing and hiking with her dogs, Huckleberry and Scout. She is also perfectly happy binge-watching documentaries or a favorite show. A cup of coffee is rarely far away.
Aemina earned her Doctor of Ministry from Drew University and her Master of Divinity from Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School. Her postgraduate studies have included training with Bessel van der Kolk, Stephen Porges, and Richard Schwartz, as well as a certificate in Traumatic Stress Studies. She is currently completing her Somatic Practitioner Certification.
