About Groundwork Trauma Education
Groundwork Trauma Education was created for therapists ready to practice in a way that actually feels like them.
Most training teaches you what to do.
Groundwork is about how you show up.
This is a space to slow down, think clearly, and develop the clinical confidence that comes not from memorizing protocols, but from learning how to trust yourself in the room.
 At some point in your work, things start to click. You realize you know more than you think you do. You stop trying to do therapy “the right way” and start responding to what is actually happening in front of you.
Groundwork exists to support that shift.
 This is not about abandoning training or structure. It is about loosening the grip of rigid ways of working that keep therapists boxed in and disconnected from their own instincts, their clients, and the work itself.
 The truth is, much of what has shaped this field was not built with flexibility, creativity, or client-led work in mind. And many therapists feel it. The pressure to get it right. The fear of doing it wrong. The sense that there is a way you are supposed to be.
Here, we do something different.
Groundwork is a space where you are allowed to be a human first and a therapist second. A place where you can say, “I don’t know,” and stay in the room anyway. Where curiosity matters more than certainty. Where your voice, your perspective, and your way of working are not only welcome, but necessary.
This is not a one-time training.
It is an environment for growth.
A community of therapists learning how to think more deeply, show up more authentically, and practice in a way that is both grounded and sustainable.
About Melanie Reese, LMFT, CCTP
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Melanie Reese is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, AAMFT Approved Supervisor, and Certified Clinical Trauma Professional with over 15 years of experience specializing in complex trauma and nervous system-informed care.
She is the founder of Trauma Therapy of Nashville and the creator of Groundwork Trauma Education, where she trains therapists to move beyond rigid, protocol-driven work into a more attuned, flexible, and clinically grounded way of practicing.
Melanie is trained in EMDR, Brainspotting, parts work, somatic therapy, and ketamine-assisted psychotherapy, and serves as a Brainspotting Consultant. Her work centers not on any single modality, but on how therapists think, track, and respond in real time.
She is known for helping clinicians step out of the pressure to “get it right” and into a deeper level of clarity and confidence in the room. Her teaching challenges the idea that effective therapy comes from following a formula, instead, it emphasizes clinical discernment, nervous system awareness, and the ability to stay present in complexity.
Melanie’s approach has been shaped by years of direct clinical work, sitting with clients in the nuance and unpredictability of trauma healing. The work that cannot be scripted. The work that asks the therapist to think, not just apply.
 Through Groundwork Trauma Education, she is building a community of therapists learning to practice with more depth, more intention, and a stronger connection to their own clinical voice.
