Salayeh’s journey was not built only through qualifications or professional training — it was forged through lived experience, survival, healing, and more than 25 years of deep personal development and transformational work. After experiencing multiple traumas, the path led her to become a Clinical Trauma Therapist, Creative Arts, Somatic and Expressive Therapist, Individual and Couples Sex-Therapy-Informed Practitioner, Counsellor, Executive Coach, Social Worker, and Experiential Therapist. She is also currently studying a Master’s in Modern Day Slavery and Sex Trafficking, deepening her commitment to trauma recovery, systemic change, and survivor rehabilitation.

Her work integrates both clinical and alternative approaches to healing, drawing from extensive training in Internal Family Systems (IFS), EMDR, CBT, ACT, Somatics, Polyvagal Theory, nervous system regulation, inner child healing, shame recovery, attachment work, sexuality, trauma-informed practice, and many other transformational and experiential modalities. She is also trained as a Somatic Polyvagal Recovery Specialist and Certified Narcissistic Abuse Treatment Practitioner, bringing a deep understanding of coercive control, relational trauma, emotional abuse, and the long-term impacts of survival-based adaptation.

Alongside her private practice and transformational work, Salayeh also works as a First Responder Crisis Counsellor supporting individuals experiencing domestic and family violence, sexual violence, coercive control, narcissistic abuse, trauma, suicidality, and crisis-related distress. This work places her directly on the frontlines of trauma support, where she witnesses both the devastating impacts of abuse and the extraordinary resilience of the human spirit.

Salayeh founded HeartArise from a much larger vision: to build creative rehabilitation, trauma recovery, and sexual empowerment centres that challenge the shame, silence, and secrecy surrounding trauma, sexuality, abuse, and pleasure. Her long-term mission is to support survivors of sexual trauma, domestic violence, coercive abuse, and sex trafficking in reclaiming safety, dignity, healing, purpose, and power — while helping transform the systems and narratives that have kept so many people trapped in survival.