Frequently Asked Questions
Compassionate Inquiry® – FAQ
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Compassionate Inquiry® is a trauma-informed psychotherapeutic approach developed by Dr. Gabor Maté and expanded by Sat Dharam Kaur ND.
It helps uncover the unconscious emotional patterns, survival beliefs, and nervous system imprints that influence your relationships, self-perception, and health.It’s not about fixing you, it’s about understanding you, and gently meeting the parts of you that never got to be seen, felt, or heard.
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Unlike traditional therapy, Compassionate Inquiry® guides you beneath the story — into what your body holds.
This somatic, present-moment method works with the felt sense and emotional memory, beyond words.You explore not just what happened, but how it still lives in your thoughts, nervous system, behaviors, and relationships.
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Midlife is more than a hormonal shift — it’s a deep emotional and psychospiritual awakening.
As hormones like estrogen decline, your protective veil lifts.
Old stories, survival strategies, and repressed emotions rise to the surface.Compassionate Inquiry® offers a grounded path through this transition, turning symptoms into signals and supporting your return to your true self.
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• Perimenopausal mood swings, brain fog, or emotional overwhelm
• Anxiety, burnout, or emotional dysregulation
• Inner child healing and attachment wounds
• Autoimmune or inflammatory conditions with emotional roots
• Fertility grief, birth trauma, and hormonal imbalance
• Chronic people-pleasing, boundary collapse, or self-abandonment
• Recovery from trauma, addiction, or toxic stress -
Not at all.
Many women enter this work unsure of what “went wrong,” yet feel pain, anxiety, or illness they can’t explain.You don’t need a dramatic trauma story, your body already holds what needs to be seen.
Even small childhood misattunements can shape how you handle stress, connection, and change. This work honors every part of your experience.
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In a one-to-one session, we begin with gentle conversation. You don’t need to prepare or perform — we follow what arises in the moment.
Together, we slow down and notice your thoughts, feelings, body sensations, and nervous system cues.We trace what’s happening now back to its emotional and developmental roots, always with compassion, never with force. You are held in a safe, attuned space where your body leads, and your truth is honored.
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Yes. Compassionate Inquiry® is deeply supportive during hormonal transitions, which often unearth old emotional layers.
If you’re noticing increased emotional sensitivity, irritability, grief, brain fog, or relational tension these are not signs of dysfunction, but signs of awakening.
You explore not just what happened, but how it still lives in your thoughts, nervous system, behaviors, and relationships.
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Not at all. Many women come to this work feeling that “nothing big” happened in their past, yet they carry anxiety, illness, or relational pain they can’t explain.
Compassionate Inquiry® understands that trauma is not just what happened to you, but what didn’t happen, the emotional needs that went unmet.
Even subtle mis attunement in childhood can shape how you respond to stress, connection, and transition in adulthood. This work honors every layer of your experience.
Compassionate Inquiry® offers a grounded path through this transition, turning symptoms into signals and supporting your return to your true self.
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Yes. Compassionate Inquiry® is deeply supportive during hormonal transitions, which often unearth old emotional layers. If you’re noticing increased emotional sensitivity, irritability, grief, brain fog, or relational tension, these are not signs of dysfunction, but signs of awakening.
✧ ACE Questionnaire
Reflect gently, this is not a diagnostic, but an invitation to understand your nervous system through a compassionate lens. Each “yes” signals a place where deeper tending may be needed.
Before age 18…
1. Did a parent or other adult in the household often swear at you, insult you, put you down, or humiliate you? Or act in a way that made you afraid you might be physically hurt?
2. Did a parent or other adult in the household often push, grab, slap, or throw something at you? Or ever hit you so hard that you had marks or were injured?
3. Did an adult or someone at least 5 years older ever touch you sexually, or try to make you touch them sexually, or actually have oral, anal, or vaginal sex with you?
4. Did you often feel that no one in your family loved you or thought you were important or special?
5. Did you often feel that you didn’t have enough to eat, had to wear dirty clothes, or had no one to protect you? Or that your parents were too drunk or high to care for you?
6. Were your parents ever separated or divorced?
7. Was your mother or stepmother often pushed, grabbed, slapped, or had something thrown at her? Or was she hit or threatened with a weapon?
8. Did you live with anyone who was a problem drinker or alcoholic, or who used street drugs?
9. Was a household member depressed, mentally ill, or did they attempt suicide?
10. Did a household member go to prison?
Ready to start your healing journey?
Not sure what’s right for you?
Let’s talk it through together.