EMDR Therapy

'We are naturally wired to heal from trauma'. F. Shapiro.

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WHAT IS EMDR THERAPY?

EMDR, Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing, is a type of psychotherapy developed to help you re-processing difficult experiences and recover from the way they may affect your life.

This type of psychotherapy is non-intrusive and  involves using bilateral stimulation such as eye movements combined with talk therapy in a safe, carefully assessed, and structured format. 

EMDR therapy can enable you to see and perceive things from a different perspective, while alleviating and releasing the symptoms that you are experiencing.

 

The mind can often heal itself naturally, in the same way as the body does. Much of this natural coping mechanism occurs during sleep, particularly during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. Francine Shapiro developed Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR) therapy in 1987, utilising this natural process in order to successfully treat Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Since then, EMDR therapy has been used to effectively treat a wide range of mental health problems.

 

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU EXPERIENCE TRAUMA?

Most of the time your body manages new information and experiences without you being aware of it. However when something out of the ordinary occurs and you are traumatised by an overwhelming event (e.g. a car accident) or by being repeatedly subjected to distress (e.g. childhood neglect), your natural coping mechanism can become overloaded. This overloading can result in disturbing experiences remaining frozen in your brain  or being 'unprocessed'. Such unprocessed memories and feelings are stored in the limbic system of your brain in a 'raw' and emotional form, rather than in a verbal 'story' mode. 

This limbic system maintains traumatic memories in an isolated memory network that is associated with emotions and physical sensations, and which are disconnected from the brain's cortex where we use language to store memories. 

The limbic system's traumatic memories can be continually triggered when you experience events similar to the difficult experiences you have been through. Often the memory itself is long forgotten, but the painful feelings such as anxiety, panic, anger or despair are continually triggered in the present.  

Your ability to live in the present and learn from new experiences can therefore become inhibited. EMDR therapy helps create the connections between your brain's memory networks, enabling your brain to process the difficult experience in a very natural way.

 

WHAT IS AN EMDR THERAPY SESSION LIKE?

EMDR therapy utilises the natural healing ability of your body. After a careful assessment you will be asked some non-intrusive questions about a disturbing memory or for example an upcoming event that might cause anxiety. Eye movements, similar to those during REM sleep, will be recreated simply by asking you to watch my  fingers moving backwards and forwards across your visual field. Sometimes a bar of moving lights or tapping can be used in a combined way. The eye movements will last for a short while and then stop. I will then ask you about your experience during each of these sets of eye movements. This may include changes in thoughts, images, feelings and body sensations. 

With repeated sets of eye movements, the 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.
 

WHAT CAN EMDR THERAPY HELP WITH?

EMDR therapy was originally developed to treat trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It is a non-intrusive form of psychotherapy recognised by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) as a treatment for PTSD.

EMDR therapy can also be used to treat a range of other problems, such as:​

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• Complex PTSD

• Anxiety

• Panic attacks

• Depression

• Stress

• Phobias

• Complicated grief

• Addictions

• Pain relief

• Self-esteem

• Performance anxiety 

• Behavioural difficulties and relationship issues.

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Often many of these problems can be rooted in some kind of trauma, for example being humiliated, attacked, bullied, criticised or abused, either during childhood or as an adult. Although this may not always be acknowledged.

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CAN ANYONE BENEFIT FROM EMDR THERAPY?

EMDR therapy can facilitate  the whole psychotherapy journey by resolving the impact of your past traumas and allowing you to live more fully in the present. It is not, however, appropriate for everyone. The process is rapid, and any disturbing experiences, if they occur at all, last for a comparatively short period of time. Nevertheless you need to be aware of, and willing to experience, the strong feelings and disturbing thoughts, which sometimes occur during sessions.

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HOW LONG DOES TREATMENT TAKE?

EMDR therapy can be a brief focused treatment or part of a longer psychotherapy journey. EMDR therapy sessions can be for 60 to 90 minutes.

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WILL I REMAIN IN CONTROL AND EMPOWERED?

During EMDR treatment, you will remain in control, fully alert and wide awake. This is not a form of hypnosis and you can stop the process at any time. Throughout the session, I will support and facilitate your own self-healing and intervene as little as possible. Reprocessing is usually experienced as something that happens spontaneously, and new connections and insights are felt to arise quite naturally from within. As a result, most people experience EMDR therapy as being  natural and very empowering.

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WHAT EVIDENCE IS THERE THAT EMDR THERAPY IS A SUCCESSFUL TREATMENT?

EMDR therapy is an innovative clinical treatment which has successfully helped over a million of individuals. The validity and reliability of EMDR therapy has been established by rigorous research. There are now nineteen controlled studies into EMDR therapy making it the most thoroughly researched method used in the treatment of trauma, (Details on www.emdr-europe.org and www.emdr.org) and is recommended by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) as an effective treatment for PTSD.

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