Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing Therapy
Do you feel like you have tried everything to work through past trauma and you still feel the past is haunting you?
Do you feel you keep facing triggers and engaging in behaviours that are leading you away from living your life the way you want to?
I offer EMDR therapy which has been extensively researched and proven effective for the treatment of PTSD and trauma. It has also been shown to be a powerful treatment for behaviours that have turned problematic like substance use, anger, sex addiction, gambling, pornography, eating to name a few (DeTur protocol).
The idea is that when bad things happen to us and we aren’t able to fully process them and file the memories away it is like these experiences are loose files in a cabinet. Our brain has been so overwhelmed by the experience we can’t file them away. So, they get easily triggered and lead to increased anxiety, nightmares, flashbacks, dissociation and negative thoughts and beliefs about ourselves and it is like we are right back there again. The right and left sides of the brain have not being able to fully integrate and adapt from the experience.
The goal of EMDR is to develop internal resources and then clean up, so to speak, those loose files by using right/left alternating stimulation (bilateral stimulation). This can be eye movements, tapping, tactile stimulation/ buzzies in your hands, or sounds in your ears as you process and desensitize to the past. Those loose files start to get sorted in the right folders and you start to feel you can look at the past differently and have more adaptive ways of coping with those experiences. Your brain is the one doing the healing, nothing is being done to you. The idea is that its similar to REM sleep where your eyes move back and forth as you digest/process/make sense of the days events.
The neat thing about EMDR is that you don’t even have to tell me WHAT happened all you have to do is just think about it and picture it and we go from there.
Watch this video to learn more about the approach and how it can help you move past the events that may be keeping you stuck with PTSD symptoms, anxiety, prolonged grief etc.
I have attended Basic training in EMDR in addition to advanced training in DeTur addiction protocol, complex PTSD and Dissociation, early developmental trauma protocol and EMDR with children and youth. I am also a member of EMDR Canada and EMDRIA.
Check out this video for an overview.
Detailed information on the 7 phase protocol.