Meet Laura,
Roles at Hydref Collective:
Wellbeing and somatic practices educator; folk medicine and women's health practitioner; designer of ritual spaces.
Favourite Session:
Women in Nature retreat
Instagram @laura.leongomez
Facebook @laura.leongomez
Website www.lauraleongomez.co.uk
"I believe in the revolutionary potential of reclaiming our bodies as primordial territories of wisdom and freedom. I believe that embodiment can help us create a more compassionate world, where care is at the centre of our communities and where healing is not a service delivered from the top down but rather a living, communal practice that belongs to everyone"
Early Years:
Originally from Colombia, Laura moved to Bristol in 2014 and to Wales in 2022, having recently become a mother and looking for a place to finally grow some roots.
First as a translator, then a language teacher and finally a holistic practitioner, her interest in wellbeing practices and folk medicine started about 20 years ago, whilst studying permaculture in Spain. In one of those weird turns of fate, it was during that course that one of the other students gave her a zine about female bodies, birth practices and ecofeminism, which sparked her interest to train as doula and massage therapist after her return to Colombia. Through the years, working alongside traditional and urban midwives, herbalists, bodyworkers, and healers from different countries and traditions, became not only a path to understanding pregnancy and birth, but how bodies exist in relation with their natural and socio-cultural environments.
Her practice is informed by her own journey through Polyendocrine Metabolic Ovarian Syndrome, neurodiversity, motherhood and immigration - experiences that have profoundly shaped her worldview and reaffirmed her conviction that wellbeing is a communal experience; one that is only possible when we are able to create and maintain relationships with our bodies, our stories, our territories, and all the life forms that inhabit them.
Career:
Whilst training as a doula, Laura had the chance to explore a variety of therapeutic tools such as tarot reading, metagenealogy, ritual and symbolic languages, dream interpretation, natural remedies and more. This developed into a variety of spaces designed to hold women’s bodies and emotional processes such as women’s circles, postnatal rituals, somatic work and ceremony.
After moving to Bristol in 2014 she also qualified as a Holistic Sound Therapy Practitioner and added new bodywork skills to her practice, allowing her to create a rich offer of integrative care.
Now:
Laura runs her massage and wellbeing practice from a studio at Molly Emma's Beauty Salon in Haverfordwest, where she offers women focused massage, sound therapy and tarot readings. Because of her creative nature and her consistent interest in how we shape reality through ritual and symbolism, she has recently started offering hand poked tattoo as a ceremony for embodiment and self-exploration.
Hydref goals:
Laura wants to continue to explore how her tools can be weaved with those of the other members of the collective to produce new and exciting practices, outlooks and opportunities for community engagement. More than anything, she loves creative, multidisciplinary spaces for co-creation.
“Healing is possible. Not as a feat of individual strength, but as an act of radical trust. Not as a single moment of clarity but as an ongoing journey through confusion. Not as a forward movement, but as a constant return home. Home to our body, home to our people, home to our land.”
