Healing Trauma Retreats with Tess Hunneybell
Depth, care, and meaningful rest,
held in Umbria, Italy.
What This Retreat Is
This is a carefully held therapeutic retreat for women who feel ready to work with long-standing patterns shaped by trauma, loss, or prolonged nervous system strain.
The retreat is designed and led by British trauma psychotherapist Tess Hunneybell and takes place at San Flaviano, her monastery home in the Umbrian hills of Italy.
The structure of the retreat has been shaped through many years of retreat practice and through supporting more than 1,200 women within this format. The work unfolds gradually, allowing understanding to deepen and change to settle at a natural, unforced pace.
Alongside individual therapeutic work, the week includes shared learning, movement, time outdoors, and the gentle rhythm of daily life together. A small, experienced professional team supports the retreat, working within a consistent therapeutic framework held throughout the week.
The retreat offers time, continuity, and steady presence, creating the conditions for healing to unfold in a way that feels grounded, human, and real.
The days are held so you can lean out of effort and turn inward. Practical needs, including onsite therapeutic massage, are quietly taken care of.
Everything around you is taken care of, allowing you to focus on turning your attention inward.
The days allow room for focused work, rest, time outdoors, shared meals, and moments of ease and simple enjoyment.
Who This Retreat Is For
This retreat is open to women from around the world who feel drawn to deeper self-understanding, healing from past experience, or who are simply in need of meaningful rest and a chance to reset.
Women arrive at many different stages of life. Over the years, guests have ranged from young adulthood through to later life — including an 18-year-old who attended with her mother, and an 87-year-old who came on her own. What connects people here is not age or background, but a shared curiosity about themselves and a readiness to engage with the work.
Participants are asked to be able to share space with others, take responsibility for themselves, and respect both personal and shared boundaries. Within this setting, the work is held with care, discretion, and professional attention.
How the Retreat Is Held
The retreat is held within a clear, professionally grounded framework that allows the work to unfold with steadiness, care, and attention.
Days move with a natural rhythm rather than a fixed timetable, blending therapeutic work, time to rest, and engagement with the surrounding landscape. There is also space during the week to relax and enjoy time at the local thermal spa, allowing the body to soften and settle in a different way.
The small group size supports depth, privacy, and individual attention, so each person can remain connected to their own process. Choice and responsiveness guide how the week unfolds, within a clear and supportive structure that allows guests to relax into the experience and feel fully held.
Why No Group Sharing
This retreat is designed to be discreet and private.
Personal work is held individually, with space for one-to-one therapeutic attention where experiences can be explored with care, attunement, and appropriate pacing. This allows each person’s process to unfold in a way that feels contained and respectful.
Within the group, there is no expectation to share personal history or speak about private experiences. Shared time is used for learning, orientation, reflection, and being together, without pressure to disclose or explain yourself.
By honouring privacy and individual boundaries, the retreat creates an environment where people can remain connected to themselves and to others, while allowing the work to stay focused, thoughtful, and well held throughout the week.
The Therapeutic Team
This retreat is held by Tess Hunneybell, who has been leading this work for many years. Tess is supported by a small, experienced team who work closely together to hold the rhythm and care of the week.
Clinical Experience
This retreat is curated and held by Tess Hunneybell, a British psychotherapist known for her calm, attentive, and deeply humane way of working.
With over two decades of professional experience, her approach draws on contemporary psychological understanding and body-based practice, and is shaped by many years of holding women in immersive retreat settings. The work is focused, relational, and precise — allowing meaningful shifts to take place within the week, without forcing or compressing the process.
The retreat is held with care, discretion, and depth, creating the conditions for real change to occur while guests are here.
For those who wish, optional online sessions are available before or after the retreat, offering space to prepare for the week or to continue integrating what has already taken place.
d feel fully held.
Eszter Balázs
Somatic Therapist · Yoga Teacher · Reflexologist
Eszter’s work is rooted in somatic therapy and nervous-system awareness, supporting the body to release long-held patterns of tension, protection, and fatigue at a pace that remains safe and tolerable.
Her approach recognises that trauma is carried not only in memory, but also in posture, breath, and reflexive responses. Through gentle movement, breath-led yoga, and reflexology, Eszter helps guests reconnect with bodily signals in ways that build trust rather than overwhelm.
Sessions are responsive and adaptable, with careful attention to regulation, boundaries, and individual capacity on any given day.
Many guests describe her work as quietly stabilising, creating a sense of grounding and coherence that allows deeper therapeutic work to unfold without force.
d feel fully held.
Viktória Varga
Senior Yoga Teacher · Holistic Massage Therapist
Viktória supports the body’s natural capacity to soften, settle, and restore. Her work is gentle, grounding, and responsive, offering guests a way back into physical presence with care and respect.
Yoga and massage sessions are always invitational and adapted to each individual, with careful attention to safety, consent, and nervous-system awareness. Many guests describe her presence as quietly reassuring — steady, attuned, and deeply respectful of where the body is on any given day.
The Healing Trauma Workbook
Each participant receives a 97-page Healing Trauma Workbook, created by Tess Hunneybell to accompany the retreat.
The workbook is designed to be used selectively. Not every section will be relevant to every person or every retreat experience, and there is no expectation to read it in full. Guests are invited to dip in and out of the sections that feel useful at different moments.
It offers reminders of work explored during the week, gentle prompts for reflection, and accessible psychoeducation, as well as material that many people return to later for ongoing reference and integration.
The workbook supports continuity between therapeutic conversations and provides a way to orient when experiences are difficult to name. Anything you write is entirely private and remains your own.
About the Venue · San Flaviano
San Flaviano is a former monastery in the Umbrian hills of central Italy, restored by Tess Hunneybell and now her home, where the retreat is held.
The oldest parts of the building date back to the 9th century, with the main church completed in the 15th century. The church itself was built on the ruins of an earlier temple dating to around 750 BC.
The land is historically known as The Land of Light, where the Doves meet, a name recorded in the original land title and associated with centuries of gathering, refuge, and continuity.
Surrounded by open countryside, woodland, and wide skies, San Flaviano offers a sense of quiet and spaciousness that many people feel as soon as they arrive. The rhythm of life here is shaped by the landscape, the seasons, and the simplicity of daily routines.
The house is intentionally lived-in rather than styled as a retreat centre. There are shared spaces for meals and conversation, quiet corners for rest and reflection, and outdoor areas where time can unfold gently. The atmosphere supports both connection and solitude, without expectation.
San Flaviano holds the work of the retreat in a way that is grounded and human — a place where it is possible to slow down, feel supported by the environment, and allow attention to turn inward.
2026 Retreat Dates
- 20–26 May 2026
- 3–9 June 2026
- 17–23 June 2026
- 8–14 July 2026
- 22–28 July 2026
- 5–11 August 2026
- 26 Aug – 1 Sept 2026
- 9–15 September 2026
Wed arrival · Tue departure · Max 5 guests
Food & Nourishment
Guests are nourished with lovingly prepared Italian meals made from seasonal ingredients, rooted in vegetarian and pescatarian cooking.
The food is generous, comforting, and supportive, created to care for the body as the therapeutic work unfolds. Dietary requirements are welcomed and thoughtfully accommodated.
Yes, chocolate. Yes, espresso.
Water throughout the house comes from a fresh mountain spring and is available as drinking water from all taps.
Investment & Accommodation
This is a fully held, all-inclusive trauma retreat hosted at San Flaviano in Italy.
The investment includes:
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6 nights / 7 days accommodation
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Three nourishing meals and snacks each day
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The complete therapeutic programme
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Daily yoga, somatic therapy, and body-based work
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One-to-one therapeutic sessions and workshops with Tess
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An afternoon at the local thermal spa
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A small, carefully held group (maximum of five participants)
Early Booking (Limited Availability)
A 30% early booking rate is available for a limited time and is confirmed on a first-come basis.
This rate applies to both room options and is offered to support early commitment and planning.
A 25% deposit secures your place. The remaining balance is due four weeks before the retreat. The deposit is calculated based on the price paid at the time of booking, including any early booking rate.
all taps.
Private Room in the Monastery
A quiet, comfortable private bedroom offering space to rest and withdraw between sessions. Rooms are kept at a steady, comfortable temperature of around 24°C, supporting rest and regulation throughout the year.
€4,400
€3,150 (30% early booking rate)
Private room with ensuite bathroom
A full (100%) refund is available for cancellations or date changes made within 30 days of booking.
Shared Room (Two Guests)
A spacious 90 m² church mezzanine room shared with one other guest, with clearly defined sleeping areas. The space is kept at a steady temperature of approximately 24°C and has access to two bathrooms.
€3,900 per person
€2,730 per person (30% early booking rate)
Shared room · two bathrooms
bathroom
A full (100%) refund is available for cancellations or date changes made within 30 days of booking.
An Invitation
If something here feels like it’s speaking to you, you’re welcome to get in touch.
I offer a relaxed discovery call — a chance to ask questions, hear a little more about the retreat, and see whether it feels like a good fit for you. There’s no obligation, and no expectation to decide anything on the call.
Sometimes it’s simply helpful to speak things out loud and feel into what’s right.
You’re warmly welcome to reach out when it feels right.