Trauma

EMDR
(Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing)

EMDR is one of the most effective methods of treating Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, and is used by the Veterans’ Administration to treat combat-related stress. It is based on the theory that bilateral stimulation (i.e., watching lights move back and forth, touches on both sides of the body, or listening to alternating tones) stimulates both sides of the brain; if this is done at the same time as the client is remembering a traumatic event, her brain will help her process information which at the time of the trauma she was too overwhelmed to assimilate.

Whereas before the memory was stuck in the part of the brain which screams “Danger!” bilateral stimulation engages the frontal lobe which enables the use of language and linear memory. Whereas before EMDR trauma survivors commonly experience flashbacks and nightmares, they report that after EMDR the event loses its power to overwhelm them emotionally and physically. Clients who expended constant energy attempting to wall off and avoid the horror are able to see it as one event in the narrative of their lives. People who have been made anxious, irritable, and depressed by the intrusion of memories and the feeling of helplessness they cause, are able to put the event in the past and reclaim their future.

People are able to place events in the past.

While EMDR is empirically supported as a treatment for trauma, I have found it to be effective with depression, anxiety, phobia, and the effects of long-term trauma such as child abuse or domestic violence. All of these frequently cause the sufferer to become divided against herself and sometimes even to hate herself, which only complicates recovery. For instance a woman who was sexually abused as a child may have within her one very young self-part which blames her for being a bad girl who had sexual thoughts, another part which sounds like her mother who minimized her pain and tells her that happened a long time ago, a hard part which tells her never to trust anyone, and another part which tells her the only way to stop the agony is to kill herself. EMDR is a very effective tool for integrating these often-warring parts, developing a stronger sense of self which can learn how to soothe those which need soothing. In doing this work I make much use of Internal Family Systems Therapy, developed by David Schwartz.