Swan Within: Healing Through Ballet Email Formats

About Swan Within: Healing Through Ballet

Founded by Meredith Harper Houston, Swan Within: Healing Through Ballet empowers and provides ballet to incarcerated teen girls who have been involved in the commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC), sexual abuse, and physical abuse. We use ballet to heal the wounds from trauma by giving the basic foundations of grace. Research emphasizes the importance of including the physical body in trauma treatment, to decrease physical and mental immobility common in young victims. Participation in dance can stabilize the sympathetic nervous system and improve psychological distress in teens. In addition, and critically important, youth will learn to consider dance as a safe coping skill. An alternative to common victim isolation, our participants will experience dance as an option to express their feelings, connect to themselves and others, and lower the chance for post traumatic stress in adulthood. Meredith Harper started The Swan Within with a (1) week (3) hr intensive classes in October 2016, at Central Juvenile Hall facility with a focus on classical ballet technique, ballet etiquette, and therapeutic Circle Time, the culmination of this project included working with a local business to provide leotards and ballet shoes for a final recital which was viewed by 30 people. Meredith is currently teaching therapeutic/classical ballet (10) hours a week at Barry J. Nidorf Juvenille Hall in Sylmar, California and will be adding additional programs throughout Los Angeles county. Email: meredith@swanwithin.org | Twitter: @swan_within | Instagram: @swanwithin

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