It became apparent that touch was what these clients wanted and needed and at the same time, touch was what they had become fearful of or repelled by.

This was a dilemma for these clients. They wanted to live "normal" lives in terms of touch, yet their history of trauma was obstructing this desire. Ms. Cerio set to work immediately modifying her bodywork techniques to meet the special needs of this client population.

Ms. Cerio was concurrently teaching Massage and Acupressure. Teaching these modalities gave her the opportunity to understand the intricacies of the techniques in such a way that made modifying them to specific client needs easier. Over the years, as Ms. Cerio developed Intentional Touch™, she realized that one of the most important aspects of therapeutic touch for survivors of sexual abuse and violence was intentionality. Therefore, she named her body of work Intentional Touch™.

Originally Intentional Touch™ was developed to work with survivors of sexual abuse. It became clear early on that this paradigm was more widely applicable. Through the years Intentional Touch™ has evolved in response to the needs of clients with chronic long-term illness and or pain and the growing need in the alternative health care profession to have an approach that insures safety and long lasting sustainable solutions for clients. More recently its growth has been in response to the need for a pathway leading to an alliance between conventional and alternative medicine.

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