What in the world is EMDR?

EMDR stands for Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing. It’s a mouthful, but it really works for some people.

EMDR was discovered by psychologist, Francine Shapiro, Ph.D., in the 1990s. She happened upon the technique by accident while she was having her own personal crisis.

She was walking along and thinking about her problems. She realized that her eyes were moving back and forth in her head, and somehow this movement helped her start to feel some relief from her stress.

Crazy, huh? Wouldn’t it feel nice to not be a puppet to your trauma history?

Since then, Dr. Shapiro has done a lot of research…

Now, EMDR has become an evidence-based practice for trauma.

How does EMDR work?

It is still not completely clear how it works, but researchers think that EDMR’s effectiveness has something to do with mimicking what takes place in our brains during sleep.

Researchers think that the back-and-forth movement of the eyes in REM sleep is related to how we process the emotions of the day in the memory centers of our brains.

Somehow it affects the left and right hemispheres of the brain in a way that changes how distressing experiences are stored.

This brings relief.

Is EMDR right for me?

EMDR is not used on everyone for everything…

Not everyone is ready to stir up old memories without having the mental health skills and resources to handle these emotions.

So, it requires further conversation and evaluation with a therapist to determine if it is right for you.

I’m interested… what’s my next step?

Before moving forward with EMDR, we’ll do some exercises aimed at building your mental health resources…

And those exercises will help determine if proceeding with EMDR will be appropriate for you and your goals.

Give me a call (323) 363-9237, and we will discuss if EMDR might be right for you!