Clinician · Educator · Author
Dr. Stephen Thompson
DC, DACM, BCTMB, CNT, FAIHM
Dr. Thompson works with adults who have spent years in survival mode. He helps them build capacity they can keep, with methods that fit the time, money, and energy they actually have.
The short version
Twenty years of clinical work with long-term stress
For more than twenty years, Dr. Thompson has treated patients who stayed alert, kept performing, and pushed through, often while dealing with pain, poor sleep, or illness they kept hidden from coworkers and family.
His clinical work includes chronic pain, fibromyalgia, autoimmune conditions, burnout, and complex stress. Many of the people he sees have stayed highly functional for years while running on very little.
He built Rooted Reclaimers from that clinical experience, his training across several disciplines, and his own recovery.
Credentials and training
| DC | Doctor of Chiropractic |
|---|---|
| DACM | Doctor of Acupuncture and Chinese Medicine |
| BCTMB | Board Certified in Therapeutic Massage and Bodywork |
| CNT | Certified Nutrition Therapist |
| FAIHM | Fellow, Academy of Integrative Health & Medicine |
| BS | Clinical Psychology |
The approach
Four ideas behind his clinical work and Rooted Reclaimers
Many symptoms began as protection
Many symptoms come from protective responses that once helped a person get through a hard situation. Treatment gradually gives the person more choices about how to respond, at a pace they can tolerate.
Small, well-timed practice
Short practices repeated often are usually easier to keep up than big changes. Rooted Reclaimers calls this the minimum effective dose.
Living conditions add stress
Racism, class, disability, work demands, and personal history all add to a person's allostatic load, the cumulative cost of staying on alert. He names those conditions plainly and treats their effects as the result of the conditions rather than a failure on the patient's part.
Support makes practice easier to keep up
Most people keep up a practice longer with support from a clinic, a workplace, a class, or a trusted community, as long as that group practices consent and keeps clear boundaries.
His work
Where Dr. Thompson works
Clinical practice
He sees patients in the Twin Cities, Minnesota area and treats body structure, stress physiology, and metabolism in the context of each person's life.
Education and consulting
He teaches clinicians and organizations how to support performance, recovery, and staff retention at a pace their people can keep up.
Rooted Reclaimers
Rooted Reclaimers turns integrative medicine and trauma-informed care into small practices you can repeat every day, and it's the first stage of The Founded Project.
The Founded Project
His wider set of books, apps, and communities uses Human Enterprise Theory to help people move from survival to agency.
Explore the ecosystemJourney from the Edge
His book lays out the body-first framework behind the Four Pillars.
The goal
The goal is capacity.
Capacity means you can respond when things get hard, recover afterward, and have enough support to plan a life around more than getting through each day.