Behavioral Health Clinical Educator Track

The Advanced Certification in Prenatal and Perinatal Wellness and Health Promotion provides rigorous, evidence-based data and approaches for the sophisticated learner. We are currently working on 12 modules that will integrate Averse Babyhood Experiences, Behavioral Health Science, Trauma-Informed Approaches with the Science of the Stress and Threat Responses that include basic Practitioner Skills, and Fetal Brain Development Research. 

Practitioner Track

We offer practitioner training for 
  • Prevention and Healing of Birth Trauma: The Integrated Prenatal and Perinatal Dynamics program
  • Pediatric Bodywork
  • Early Family Somatics
  • Advanced Bodywork in Prenatal and Perinatal Somatics
​All practitioners are expected to do sessions with recommended providers, provide documentation of case for supervision, and continue to do personal work with PPN somatic professionals. A full list is in our Referral Network . We also recommend Womb Surround Process or Birth Process Workshops. You can see a list of those practitioners on the Castellino Training website here.

Assistant Track

We provide training for graduates of our programs to assist in the program they studied. We currently have assistant training for the Integrated Prenatal and Perinatal Dynamics course. This one course prepares graduates to assist, with skills of presence, tracking, conflict resolution, integration and more. 

Assistants are required to do personal sessions with prenatal and perinatal practitioners trained by Ray Castellino, or practitioners recommended by the lead teacher. Assistants are also expected to get supervision for cases in their private practice. 

Provider Track

Assistants who have assisted our full training may now be providers of the work for students at the invitation of the lead teacher only. Eventually, our students will be required to complete a certain number of sessions to graduate. 

Faculty Track

Assistants will be mentored into teaching roles upon invitation from the lead instructors, and as they feel led. We are interested in creating teachers so that the work can live on in different circles. Handbooks and manuals are being completed. This training is ideal for small groups where teachers can be assisted by 1 or 2 people, and then the small teams can take learners deeper. We will be supporting teachers with training of trainers as we grow. 

Requirements for becoming a teacher include assisting a training twice, practice and helping to train other assistants, and time in private practice helping to prevent and treat birth trauma. Trainers in training will be expected to teach parts of the modules, and be evaluated by students and lead trainers. The faculty will be fluent in our practitioner rubric, and be fluent in:
  • ​5 practitioner skills
  • Creating Coherency
  • Autonomic Nervous System Stress and Threat Response, and Shifting States
  • Layers of Experience
  • PPN Somatic Layers
  • Double Binds in the Modern Birth Setting
  • Prevention and Treatment of Birth Trauma

Assistants and teachers are expected to:
  • Uphold ethics and be models of the work,
  • Continue to do their own personal work,
  • Create peer supervision circles, and
  • Continue to get supervision to deepen their own capacity to be with the stress and threat responses that come up in the work we do.
Assistants in the faculty track will be
  • Fluent in transference, countertransference,
  • Resistance and boundary setting elements of the work, and
  • Expected to self-reflect,
  • Know how to make repair, and
  • Show up for conflicts when they arise. 

There are currently several possibilities:
  • Graduates who complete faculty requirements will discuss with the lead trainer and co-creators of the work what they feel qualified to offer and practice teaching sessions will be offered to have their teaching skills assessed. 
    • Assessment includes evaluation from the teaching team and students.
    • Teaching requires several teaching exercises per module. 
  • Graduates may also be invited to go deeper into the training and teaching role, with collaborative co-teaching with lead instructor, and sharing in the income from training based on a percentage level. The graduate will be offered co-teaching roles with the lead teacher and receive mentoring.
    • ​First level teaching includes offering settling meditations, descriptions of the Principles, and exercises in the 5 Practitioner Skills.
    • Second level teaching includes offering education about the autonomic nervous system, PPN sequencing and the Leading Edge skills (deepening and broadening from Anna Chitty, Blueprint Resonance).
    • Third level teaching includes leading somatic trauma resolution skills with early imprints and threat responses.
    • Fourth level teaching includes offering teaching in the Double Binds in the Modern Birth Setting.
  • Final options include an invitation to be training staff. This option includes payment and travel stipend. 
The Prenatal and Perinatal Somatics Institute is an official training organization within the USABP.