What is Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing Therapy?

EMDR is an evidence-based treatment where repetitive eye movement is used to make telling a story easier.

#EMDR #MentalHealth

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[cmsotube]

Highly recommend EMDR. This form of therapy really accelerates desensitization and the brain connecting thoughts, memories, images, feelings, physical sensations from past to present. Once this happens it’s cathartic and no longer has the same intensity and gravity to re-trigger you. No CBT or DBT or any other form of talk therapy has ever had such a profound effect within a short amount of time as EMDR has. 😊

[Dougal-Mcguire]

Didn't realise I had ptsd until a month ago. Had my first emdt session yesterday.
Had some crazy ass dreams last night and woke up today feeling a bit down. But honestly I am positive about the future. Been subdued and controlled by my physical and mental health conditions since childhood and I already feel a weight lifting.
Can't believe it's taken me 30 years to do this

[FromTheHoodTheWoods]

Reading “the body keeps the score” great book. He’s talking about how effective this is.

[victoriagonzalez]

I did 2 sessions of EDMR and it really helped me overcome PTSD

[snugsmom]

I am an EMDR therapist. This therapy is extremely effective for most people. It is not unusual to have an increase in disturbance when the therapy first starts but it is a much shorter therapy that often brings relief very quickly. For those having some disturbance, I recommend listening to "EMDR music" through ear phones or buds. These can be found on you tube as well. Listening to this type of music can be very calming but will not reprocess memories.

[yummypanic]

My therapist is about to start this with me and encouraged me to research it without going in depth with what happens during the sessions so I can’t prepare responses or overthink. I’m excited since no other therapist has ever tried to work through my issues in this way, the way I truly want.

[bombdotcom]

I didn't realize how much trauma I hadn't processed until I began doing EMDR. Since starting, it's genuinely helped me overcome a lot of issues I've had in the past, especially with my anxiety towards going outside. Talking to a therapist is nice, and does help me somewhat, but EMDR is what's helped me the most and I highly recommend people who have issues with regular therapy try it out.

[kaleuh]

i don’t have ptsd but right now my therapist has been doing this type of therapy to help me manage my anxiety and depression symptoms, it’s helped a lot and when i’m out under large amounts of stress i feel as if i can manage it better

[leslieprince]

I have been having EMDR sessions off and on for a year to work on my grief that I repressed from losing my husband in July 2017. I hold a lot on because I feel like I'm a burden to my family and friends. My therapist is the only one I confide in. EMDR is very hard for me because I don't like to feel the emotions and thoughts that come up. Sometimes, I can get thru the 30 minutes of EMDR and other times, we have to quit because I can't handle it. It messes with my mind and heart for a few days, and I get very depressed, but after a few days, I feel so much better. I have years left of these sessions. Our main goal is helping me to process my grief. When I can handle my grief better and deal with my PTSD from watching my husband die tragically. I know I'll get there. I dread of moving on to my next traumas. My sexual assault in April 2000 and from being sexually abused as a child, but with my therapist's help, I'll continue to heal. Much love to those who have had trauma in your life and the courage to get help❤️

[fintan]

4/24/21 - We met for four sessions. He said I did really well. After the second session he said we were finished but I really wanted more time.

In that first session (I’m trying to be very precise here) we were able to take that memory of, what I have always called gang rape when I was 10, which always lived in the forefront of my brain - that I would relive over and over again - and move it far left of my mind. I no longer feel it in my forehead but way far to the left, which is the past for me. I physically feel it so far in the past (to the left) that it no longer effects me. He said that the memory has been forever changed in my mind and I will never remember it as I had. I have no understanding of how that happened BUT IT DID!! I no longer play it over and over. I can’t. I’ve tried but I can’t, nor do I want to. I hope this makes some sense to you. It is hard to take what I now physically feel (in my head) and put it into words.

My experience of EMDR is that it is not the typical therapy where one talks on and on, week after week. Actually I did very little talking. I still don’t understand how it works but it did!

[cheryldavidson]

Please consider redoing this video - there are some big pieces missing/misrepresented. 

The explanation of the "eye movement" piece is misleading - it might be calming or distracting...but that's not why the therapist is doing it, and it's not why the therapy works. Perhaps this video was made to try to explain the benefits of EMDR to laypeople; but without explaining the core reason why it works - trauma gets stuck in the right brain and you need to incorporate both hemispheres in order to fully process the trauma like we do with other experiences - you miss the entire point. If I'd seen this video and stopped there with my research, I doubt I ever would've tried EMDR because it sounds just like hypnotism or other forms of therapy.

PTSD presents in many different ways, including the extremely common symptom of experiencing a sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight) response due to triggers, and memory loss. Incorporating these into the video would provide a more complete picture as well. "When a person has PTSD, it usually means that painful memories become a problem in a person's life, " while not inaccurate, there are many, many of us who experience the opposite. We have intense reactions, but can't figure out why. We have negative thought patterns, but haven't relived the memories from the initial trauma(s) that started that thought pattern in years, so we have no awareness of why we do things like drink alone or can't get out of bed in the morning, think we are worthless, are stuck in a job or relationship that is unhealthy, etc. This is at least as common as the "memories on a loop" presentation of PTSD, but arguably more important to call out because people often do not realize this could be PTSD and EMDR can help with that.

I appreciate your efforts to present EMDR in an accessible way. I think with a few small tweaks this could be a great video.

[CoreDreamStudios]

Been offered this treatment yesterday by my therapist, since I have some unsolved pieces of my life in childhood I need to address. Excited yet scared but also want to get things back to a bit more normal again.

[chesramos]

I think I have PTSD now. I am a trauma ICU nurse and absolutely love what I do. I feel like an amazing nurse, I care for my patients, I’m capable of critically thinking about what I need done for my patient, and love seeing positive outcomes come to fruition. I am also capable of completely separating myself emotionally from my patients.

However, I began to develop really disturbing thoughts. Before I would sleep I’d just stare blankly at the ceiling imagining myself getting into a really bad car accident. I’d imagine the car hitting me head on. Or I’d imagine myself getting stabbed or a person sneaking into my home and choking me to death. And it was terrifying because I’d imagine the persons face performing those terrible things to me. I’d imagine their facial expressions, the sounds they’d make as they took my life. And it didn’t only happen to me but also to my loved ones and friends. I’d walk around imagining people in their caskets. I could see a person who is totally alive and perfectly imagine them laying in their coffins, lifeless, pale, in their suits or dresses.

The thoughts started becoming really intense and id remember snapping myself out of it but not after id really thought deeply about the heinous acts or tragic accidents that happened. I would snap out of it with a frown because I can’t believe id thought of such horrible things.

I tried to rationalize these thoughts and think it’s normal to feel this way. I decided to make a post on the nursing subreddit today and asked how to make the thoughts stop. I then started getting lots of replies saying that what I’m stating sounds exactly like PTSD. After so many people are mentioning that what I’m experiencing is PTSD a lot of things started to make sense. I guess the idea of PTSD never popped up into my mind because I thought that in order for me to experience PTSD I had to be my patient experiencing the trauma, but now I realize that the traumas I witnessed seeped into my reality and has been messing with my mind unknowingly.

I know I need a formal diagnosis but it has given me tons of hope that I may have something that I can treat. I honestly had no idea until today what these thoughts were. But I’m glad I made that post. I will seek professional help and hopefully get EMDR as it seems so effective.

[plantbakker]

I was in therapy for three years and my psychotherapist performed EMDR on me. She also told me it didn't work for everyone. From my own experience, I can't stress enough how much the success depends on your willingness to go as deep as possible. Often during those sessions I had enough of thinking about traumas and my mind started wandering around, and that would make it much less effective.

[alexandria]

I highly recommend this type of therapy!

[DivineLightPaladin]

I've tried over 20 years of CBT and while it helped me thru difficult times to have a support person I'm not sure it helped heal my trauma. I finally found a therapist that can do this, starting soon and looking forward to the results.

[kelleybright]

I taught myself this and i can not wait till im at 100% almost ther

[StrawberryShortCake]

Im starting EMDR with my therapist next week. I pray this works...as ive had many years of therapy and coping skills, mindfulness, all that jazz..PTSD is a doozy for me and causing me intense anxiety anymore. Its the wierdest thing too because i supressed most of my memories until after my mom died, then it felt like flood gates of horrible memories opened in my brain and i suddenly remembered things. I hate it. I hope this therapy works

[ericalavallee]

I just started this with my therapist 💚

[BlueTeaLeaf]

My therapist is currently making me use this for my mild anxiety. Supposedly he took 60 hours worth of classes on this and spent 40 hours trying to debunk it, but couldn't so I hope it works!!



Edit 1: I’m happy to say i’m on medicine, and done with therapy! I’ll get to be off the medicine in a year. I still get anxious every now and then, but it’s all ok. For those people thinking that EMDR is scary, it really isn’t. Just make sure to focus!