Where I’m Coming From
Hello–I’m Sarah Cotten.
I'm a somatic therapist, licensed social worker, artist, and mother. I'm also a late-diagnosed Autistic and ADHD woman, a lifelong mindfulness practitioner, and an outside-the-box thinker. I believe healing happens most deeply when we bring three things to it: curiosity, respect, and compassion.
I live and work in downtown Tucson, Arizona, on the ancestral lands of the O'odham people.
My path into this work
My journey began early. Growing up alongside a mother with chronic illness and mental health challenges, I witnessed how rarely people are truly supported in navigating pain and vulnerability. That experience sparked a lifelong inquiry into what it means to be human — and how we might move through life with greater agency and vitality.
That inquiry led me through 30 years of meditation, 15 years of teaching yoga, and a career as a functional medicine health coach. Over time I became captivated by the neurobiology of stress — the way the body holds both our deepest suffering and our greatest capacity for healing.
Where clinical training meets lived experience
For the past eight years I've practiced Somatic Experiencing (SE), a body-based approach to healing trauma and chronic stress. This work shaped a core belief: healing isn't something we think our way into. It's a language the nervous system learns through safety, attunement, and choice.
My work is also deeply personal. Discovering my own identity as an Autistic/ADHDer allowed me to reframe a lifetime of sensory sensitivity and overwhelm — to see my nervous system not as "too much," but as different and worthy of care. That shift, from shame toward authenticity, informs everything I bring to sessions.
How I work with you
You are not broken. Your symptoms make sense given what you've been through. My role is to walk alongside you — helping you listen to your body's signals, ease anxiety at its roots, and reconnect with your innate capacity for healing. Together we create conditions for the clarity, freedom, and aliveness you deserve.