Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing

What is EMDR?

EMDR is short for Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing is a form of therapy that was developed to help people who have experienced trauma or other distressing events.

It involves having the person recall the traumatic event while simultaneously engaging in some form of bilateral stimulation, such as eye movements, hand tapping, or auditory tones.

When a traumatic event is detected, the EMDR Therapist helps you focus on these memories and related events and present situations that cause distress and then remove the power of the memories associated with these experiences.

The goal of EMDR is to help you process your emotions and memories related to the trauma so that you can better cope with the experience and move on with your life.

What is the Purpose of EMDR Therapy?

The purpose of EMDR is to help you work through traumatic and distressing experiences, memories, and emotions to reduce the negative impact the event has on your life.

By recalling the traumatic event and engaging in bilateral stimulation, such as eye movements or hand tapping, you can access and process these memories and emotions, allowing them to be integrated into your overall understanding of the situation.

Through this process, EMDR is intended to help reduce the intensity of negative emotions and physical sensations associated with the traumatic event and improve your overall functioning and quality of life.

EMDR helps people who suffer from:

How Does EMDR Work?

Throughout your life, your brain connects experiences with emotions.

This is how you learn to avoid danger, like burning your hand on the stove, salivating when you smell popcorn or a song that reminds you of a trip with friends.

These are all examples of how our brain creates connections in our day-to-day life.

Unfortunately, traumatic experiences are no exception to the connections in your brain, and they can carry powerful emotions with them.

One example may be a fear of kittens because you were scratched by one as a child.

Hating a favorite food because you got food poisoning once while eating it.

Sometimes these connections are not fair.

You may one day meet a gentle and sweet kitten, yet, because of the link that has been made in your brain, the soft, adorable kitten still feels very scary.

You may give up eating your favorite food because you fear you will have the same reaction as last time.

EMDR encourages you to feel the emotion connected to the experience and allows your brain to re-evaluate whether or not that emotional connection is fair.

Feeling fear toward the kitten that scratched us is a valid physical response; however, should we feel afraid of all kittens?

EMDR provides a space for your brain to answer that question and separate the connections when necessary.

Over time, you will feel more in control of your immediate responses to the things around you. 

The strong emotions connected to traumatic experiences will begin to lower in intensity.