EMDR
You may have heard or read about Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR) recently and wondered "what is this that all about?!" Prince Harry apparently talked about his experiences of EMDR and the benefits he found for his mental health and this made many people curious to know more. As a clinical psychologist, I have certainly seen an increase recently in the number of people contacting me who are considering this type of therapy or wanting more information. As a concept, EMDR can seem a little daunting at first as it differs from traditional 'talking therapy', so I hope this article gives you a bit more of an insight about what it's all about!
EMDR is an effective therapy developed by Dr Francine Shapiro, an American Psychologist in the 1980's. She realised as she was walking along a beach one day that eye movements from left to right, left to right....appeared to decrease the negative emotion associated with her own distressing memories and she believed that these eye movements had a desensitising effect. She added in other treatment components as well as the eye movements, including cognitive work, and developed a standardised procedure for EMDR.
Since then a vast amount of research has been conducted demonstrating its benefits in treating distress and psychological difficu often linked to traumatic events such as attacks, road traffic accidents, abuse/neglect and adverse childhood events. It has been shown to be effective in helping with difficulties including anxiety, depression, phobias, low self-esteem and more.
The first step in EMDR is to undertake an initial assessment with your therapist where a full history will be taken and together you can discuss whether EMDR might be suitable for you. If it deemed to be suitable, you would then talk about the EMDR model together and explore a little of the theory behind it.
Before working on the key difficulties you would begin by doing some relaxation/ breathing / imagery work to provide you with some practical skills to help when working through what can sometimes be emotive memorie
Your therapist would then begin the visual, auditory or tactile stimulation whilst you think about the relevant distressing event. You may for example be asked to follow your therapists fingers with your eyes or watch a dot move across a computer screen or tap your shoulders with your arms crossed - this is known as bilateral stimulation. You would be doing these activities whilst holding in your mind the difficult or traumatic event that is being worked on in therapy. Your therapist will ensure that sufficient time is protected at the end of the session to ensure you feel safe and calm before continuing with your day. After a number of regular EMDR sessions the aim would be for the client to see a reduction in the levels of distress or psychological difficulty and also a sense of having healed from or 'processed' the traumas or tough life experiences from the past.
I am fully trained by the EMDR Academy to deliver EMDR both in-person and online, and am an approved member of the EMDR Association UK. I have seen first-hand the significant benefits this therapy can have for my clients..
If you would like to chat with me in more detail about EMDR and whether it might be useful for you, please get in touch.
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