Trauma Therapy and EMDR

Are you struggling with:

• panic and anxiety

• depression

• flashbacks

• nightmares

• intrusive thoughts

• irritability

• being easily startled

• zoning out

• hypervigilance?

These symptoms can be signs you’re suffering from trauma and can leave you feeling hopeless, but therapies like EMDR can help. If you’ve tried traditional talk therapy without much success, EMDR might be the right fit you’ve been looking for.

What is EMDR?

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a psychotherapy that enables people to heal from emotional distress that is the result of disturbing life experiences. EMDR utilizes the natural healing ability of your body.

After a thorough assessment and development of a treatment plan, I will ask you specific questions about a particular disturbing memory. I will create eye movements similar to those that happen during REM sleep, simply by asking you to watch my fingers moving side-to-side. Sometimes, we might use a bar of moving lights, hand buzzers, or headphones instead. We may even have you tap your shoulders or knees with alternating movements. Whichever techniques we use, the movements will last for a short while and then stop. I will then ask you to report back on the experiences you had during each of these sets of movements. Experiences during a session may include changes in thoughts, images and feelings.

With repeated sets of movements, the traumatic memory tends to change in such a way that it loses its painful intensity and simply becomes a neutral memory of an event in the past. Other associated memories may also heal at the same time. This linking of related memories can lead to a dramatic and rapid improvement in many aspects of your life. Take a look at this short video (2 min and 13 sec) to learn more: