Hope Stanger, HHC
Founder and Therapist
Therapy Beyond Walls
Hope Stanger is a Therapist, Health Consultant and Nutritional Counselor who educates and empowers people to have complete ownership over their health and well being and live the life they desire. With over twenty years in practice, she brings a passion and compassion to her work and a commitent to do whatever it takes to help her clients have amazing lives. Hope has designed a cutting-edge methodology to heal adult and childhood trauma, strengthen relationships and treat eating disorders. She counsels individuals, couples and groups worldwide.
Hope also has a specialty practice devoted to counseling individuals and couples in the Jewish and Chassidish communities. She is the author of Weigh Your Words and Throw Away Your Scale! The Jewish Woman's Guide To Losing Weight and Feeling Great (Targum Press, 2016).
My Mission:
I created Therapy Beyond Walls because I saw what wasn't working in the therapeutic model and had to do something. I believe we need to go beyond the standard model of therapy to truly heal. Trauma is the basis for so many physical and emotional symptoms that manifest later in life, and I wanted to take therapy to the places trauma gets triggered; recondition our early belief systems that formed who we are; and bring us back to who we were born to be before trauma happened. We can meet trauma where it lives and walk through it together. I believe we each deserve to have the life we long for.
My Commitment:
Is to help you go "underneath the underneath," to see how early messages stored in your body helped create the emotional blockages, pain and suffering you experience in the present. Our traumas are old experiences that get stored in our body memories. If they continue to exist in our current lives, they continue to build new memory and new symptoms. Once we learn to let go of our attachment to them, they no longer have the power to take up space inside of us. Our relationship patterns and beliefs, addictions and disorders are only symptoms of the trauma. I will teach you how to easily identify and transform those memories into potent new tools for a powerful life. Whatever is keeping you stopped in moving forward gets cleared out with new, healthy beliefs and messages to takes its place.
Areas of Focus:
Trauma:
Childhood Family Trauma:
It is this trauma that often clouds our lives when we are older, and no matter what we do to get rid of it, it seems to affect imporant parts of ourselves and make it difficult to have stability or be who we want to be. That's because trauma that occurs when we are young gets housed in our tissues and we need to clear out the messages that keep telling us we are in trauma - those are the messages that tell us we are not allowed to feel good, be successful or be loved. Once we give them a voice and allow the body to understand safety, we can release the trauma and bring in a new foundation - of confidence, hope, strength and joy. When our present is no longer based upon our past, our lives move in a whole new direction.
Sexual Trauma:
This can occur from the youngest age possible to the present; one time or repeatedly; overtly or in very subtle ways that make it hard to figure out what really happened; from a family member or from someone we never met before. Our body's response can trigger feelings of guilt, shame, confusion, anxiety, fear, numbness, dissociation or pain. It can result in addiction, immobilization, obsessive-compulsive behavior or just a knowing that you don't feel like everyone else and "something's wrong"
because of this "thing" that happened or keeps happening. Mixed messages are common - we might have even enjoyed it while it happened and don't understand why. We could have hidden all of this for years because it only confused us. Together, we will look at it with clear and loving eyes, help heal the trauma and let you step back into and reclaim your body as only yours.
Marital/Partner Abuse and Trauma:
If you are still in a traumatic situation or relationship, I will help you discern what needs to happen to stop the trauma now, walk through it with you safely step-by-step and teach you how to live your life trauma-free and FREE. I will help you clear out the pattern of trauma and teach you how to believe you deserve a healthy, kind, loving and fabulous relationship - and LIFE! We will build a support team that believes in you, too. Your true self can come out of hiding, stop surviving and start to THRIVE! If you need to leave the relationship, I will take you through it every step of the way. If your relationship has the potential to be loving and fabulous, I will help you learn how to get there.
Traumatic Events:
If you have suffered from witnessing or being connected to any traumatic event, we will start by releasing the trauma from your body so that you no longer feel triggered or experience symptoms as a result. I will guide you in reclaiming your life so that it is once again pleasurable, safe and thriving.
My Philosophy:
I believe it is simple to let go of trauma and replace it with self-love; we merely need to re-connect with our true selves before the trauma occurred. The result is a deep level of intimacy between our physical, emotional and spiritual health.
Hope Stanger, HHC
Relationships:
Finding the Relationship that's Perfect for You:
Whether you are in a relationship or wanting to be in one, we will look at the patterns and habits that show up in your relationships, get really, really clear about your "dealbreakers," and make the internal shifts that allow you to bring in relationships that love, respect and honor who you are. I will give you the tools to strengthen communication and connection in the relationships you already have. You will learn to manifest magnificent relationships.
Eating Disorders:
Anorexia/Bulimia/Binge-Eating Disorder/or Just Plain Struggling with Food:
When we are together, we get out of our heads and into our bodies in a whole new way. Your body has lots to say but you've been finding so many ways to push its messages away. Even the act of connecting with your body in any way can seem daunting, but how can you eat at all or stop over-eating if you can't stand your body or are terrified of it? Balanced eating comes naturally once we let go of the forced need to do it and focus on saying hello to our bodies. When we heal the fears, we begin to want to nourish our bodies lovingly because we actually like them! Most people think that someone dealing with an eating disorder is super connected to their body. I believe that it's actually the opposite; eating disorders make us obsessed with repetitive thoughts about our body but we are completely disconnected from our actual body. It's our mind, not our body that rules the roost when we are living with an eating disorder, and our mind that tells us what to do. Through somatic (body-centered) therapy, we'll process the pain and I'll teach you how to listen and actually hear what your body wants - not through the ears of an eating disorder, but like a mother taking really good care of her child. It's a together process; we start at the beginning, and I help you create a safe and easy relationship with your body...it's worth it.
Testimonials:
Your Voices:
I have to pinch myself if its real!!
I just feel so much better than yesterday and the day before.
My focus, my strength my ability to think through things is so powerful and full of magic.
Hope, I feel gifted; I feel like I owe you my mind.
Thank you!!! And can't wait to continue.
Rockland County, New York
When I first met Hope, I was a shattered person, hopeless, helpless and lost. With so much love, kindness and wisdom, Hope gently took me by the hand, so to speak, and guided me out of the dark pit and into the light. I'd never experienced before such levels of devotion. With endless patience, Hope encouraged me, coaxing me along a path strewn with difficult and complex obstacles, constantly infusing me with hope and anticipation of good things to come. Not only did I feel Hope's constant presence when I so needed to feel that I wasn't alone, but she also helped me grow. She gave me tools for life to continue on my journey, and navigate its hills and valleys on my own as well. I cannot thank her enough!!
A Very Grateful Client, Jerusalem
I was blessed in this life to have gotten to know Hope Stanger. She is not just another therapist; she is a human being in her therapy and a human being who is hard to find. I have been working together with her over a long period, and naturally have tested her capacity in almost every area. She has always won the test in outdoing her ethics, selflessness, professionalism, boundaries, expansiveness, creativity, integrativeness, angelic spirituality and connectedness. Hope helped me create a safe space while I was in a traumatic situation, heal while still surrounded by the trauma and claim my life even while in this situation. I learned how to choose my life from health and not from trauma. The ability to do this is not cookie-cutter; it is outstanding. I know many others in my community who feel the same about Hope.
Forever Grateful, NY
Before meeting Hope, I was depleted of all my energy, to the point where I was spending most of my days in bed. I had to think twice before walking from one end of the house to the other. With Hope's holistic counseling, I have regained my energy, lost 25 pounds, and tapped into enduring joy.
Israel