Lifespan Integration® (LI) Therapy
Our experiences shape how we move through the world. While many become part of our life story, others can continue to affect how we feel, respond, and relate to others long after the experience has ended.
You may understand intellectually that something happened in the past, yet still feel its effects in your body, emotions, relationships, or sense of self. Present-day situations may trigger anxiety, shame, anger, fear, shutdown, or a strong need to protect yourself, even when part of you knows that the present is different.
Lifespan Integration® Therapy is a gentle, body-based and attachment-focused approach that helps the brain and nervous system integrate unresolved experiences across time.
A central part of LI is temporal integration: helping the nervous system recognize that time has passed, that you have continued to grow, and that what happened then is not happening now.
At Hollyburn Support Services, Lifespan Integration Therapy is available in person in North Vancouver and virtually across Canada for children, teens, and adults.
What Is Lifespan Integration?
Lifespan Integration was developed by Peggy Pace and is grounded in attachment theory, trauma psychology, and nervous-system regulation.
LI recognizes that insight alone is not always enough. You may understand why you react in a certain way and still find that your body responds automatically.
The therapy uses a simple chronological Timeline made up of brief memory cues from across your life. Moving through these cues helps the nervous system register the passage of time and place earlier experiences within the wider context of a life that continued.
The aim is not to erase memory or deny what happened. It is to help the past feel more clearly located in the past, so that it has less influence over the present.
What Can Lifespan Integration Help With?
Lifespan Integration may be helpful for:
- Single-incident trauma, such as a motor vehicle accident, medical trauma, assault, workplace incident, or another overwhelming event
- Complex trauma arising from repeated, prolonged, developmental, or relational experiences
- Childhood and developmental trauma
- Attachment wounds and early relational experiences
- Sexual abuse and interpersonal trauma
- Betrayal and relational trauma
- Anxiety, panic, and chronic stress
- Emotional overwhelm, shutdown, or disconnection
- Grief, loss, separation, and divorce
- Burnout and compassion fatigue
- First responder trauma and cumulative operational stress
- Veterans and military-related trauma
- Healthcare worker stress and burnout
- Repeating relationship patterns
- Persistent shame or negative beliefs about the self
- Significant life transitions
LI may also be helpful when you understand your patterns intellectually but still feel unable to change them. to your experiences rather than following a one-size-fits-all process.
How Lifespan Integration Works
Lifespan Integration uses a chronological Timeline of brief memory cues from across your life. These cues may include ordinary experiences as well as difficult or overwhelming events. They are kept short and do not require detailed retelling.
Moving through the Timeline helps the nervous system register that time has passed, life continued, and the present is different from the past. Over time, earlier experiences may feel less immediate, present-day triggers may become less intense, and you may feel more grounded in your current life.
A Personalized Approach to Healing
Lifespan Integration is not used in the same way with every person.
The work is shaped around your unique nervous system and the way your system has learned to interpret safety, danger, connection, and threat. Therapy is paced within your window of tolerance – the level of emotional activation you can manage while remaining present, connected, and able to process what is happening.
For some people, therapy may focus on a specific overwhelming event. For others, the work may involve complex trauma, attachment wounds, relationship patterns, or the longer-term effects of difficult childhood experiences.
The process is adapted to you rather than expecting your nervous system to fit a standard approach.
Who May Benefit from Lifespan Integration?
Lifespan Integration may be a good fit if you:
Want trauma therapy that does not require repeatedly recounting painful experiences in detailaccumulated over time, therapy is designed around your individual history.
- Have experienced an overwhelming event that continues to affect you
- Know that something is over but still react as though it is happening now
- Feel emotionally younger, trapped, powerless, or abandoned during conflict
- Experience anxiety, panic, hypervigilance, shutdown, or emotional overwhelm
- Feel affected by difficult childhood or attachment experiences
- Notice recurring relationship patterns you would like to change
- Carry persistent shame, self-blame, or negative beliefs about yourself
- Struggle to trust others, receive care, or feel secure in relationships
- Work in emergency services, healthcare, policing, firefighting, paramedicine, corrections, or the military
- Are experiencing burnout, compassion fatigue, or cumulative stress
What Happens During a Session?
Your therapist will begin by getting to know you, your history, and what you hope to change through therapy. Together, you will decide whether Lifespan Integration is a suitable approach and what area of your experience should be the focus.
You may be invited to create a simple Timeline of brief memory cues. The work is collaborative, carefully paced, and adapted to your nervous system and your window of tolerance.
There is no expectation that you will repeatedly describe painful experiences in detail.
Frequently Asked Questions
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No. LI may support both recent and earlier experiences, including a single overwhelming event, complex or developmental trauma, attachment wounds, relational difficulties, grief, and cumulative stress.
Not usually. Lifespan Integration does not require prolonged or repeated retelling of traumatic experiences.
Yes. LI may support first responders, veterans, military personnel, healthcare professionals, and others affected by repeated exposure to distressing events, cumulative operational stress, burnout, or compassion fatigue.
No. The focus and pace are adapted to your history, nervous system, current needs, and therapeutic goals.
Yes. Lifespan Integration Therapy is available in person in North Vancouver and virtually across Canada.
Meet Our Lifespan Integration® Therapist
Tracy Cairns, RCC, CCC, offers Lifespan Integration Therapy to children, teens, and adults in person in North Vancouver and virtually across Canada.
Her work is informed by trauma psychology, attachment theory, nervous-system regulation, and relational psychotherapy. Tracy understands that many present-day difficulties began as ways of coping, protecting, surviving, or staying connected during earlier experiences.Treatment is individualized according to each client’s history, nervous system, needs, and goals.
Why Work with Tracy?
Tracy is a trauma specialist who works with children, teens, adults, couples, and families. Her areas of focus include single-incident trauma, complex trauma, relational trauma, attachment wounds, anxiety, grief, burnout, and cumulative stress. Her work integrates Lifespan Integration with attachment theory, somatic awareness, parts-based therapy, interpersonal neurobiology, and psychodynamic formulation. She works carefully within each client’s window of tolerance, supporting greater steadiness, connection, and choice.
Above all, Tracy is committed to creating a safe, attuned therapeutic relationship in which clients feel heard, supported, and able to move toward lasting change.
Tracy Cairns, RCC, CCC, LI
*In-Person – North Vancouver *Virtual * Walk & Talk*
Book a Lifespan Integration Therapy Session
Lifespan Integration offers a gentle, individualized way to work with experiences that continue to affect your present life.
Contact Hollyburn Support Services to book a free consultation or schedule a Lifespan Integration Therapy appointment in North Vancouver or online across Canada.