EMDR and Me
Back in 2014 or so when I opened my first private practice in Westfield, NJ, I attended part 1 of the basic training for EMDR. I had so much going on then. I won’t get into all the details here—-it’s much more interesting to wonder, but let’s just say I was feeling personally and professionally adrift. I had precipitously quit a job because I could no longer ethically work there. (No, it wasn’t something I was doing. They just decided to do away with confidentiality and provide advising and counseling to college students anyway. FERPA be damned!) I had registered for the basic training for EMDR before because I kept seeing students with PTSD and I wanted to get them symptom relief as quickly as possible. If you have PTSD or know someone who does, you know how important that is on a visceral level.
During the training, we had practicum which essentially meant we had to practice the techniques on each other and even with limited knowledge and limited time, we all experienced directly that this weird “eye thing” got results.
Is there a simple and direct way to describe EMDR (aka “the eye thing” aka Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing?) Not exactly. The very short version of the treatment is this: the most primitive part of our brain tends to record/take the brunt of our traumatic experiences. This makes us adaptable and responsive in times of crisis, but the problem with the most primitive brain structures is they’re not verbal. By that, while I am strange, no I’m not saying you should grab brains out of jars in labs and try to talk to them because that doesn’t work, but some parts of your brain are better at “encoding” verbal information than others. So when we talk about bananas, most structures in your left hemisphere go, “Oh yeah, bananas are a tasty fruit. We love bananas. We can put them in bread or shakes.” Your right hemisphere just gets a picture and smell of bananas. It might have an emotional association, but it’s a strong silent type,
The idea with EMDR is to take thoughts and feelings that are “running the show” behind the scenes for you (EMDR is very cinematic in its terminology for reasons I have yet to understand) and help you reformulate them into a more adaptive response. The visual I get when I think about this is a pinball machine where one side represents your right hemisphere, the other represents your left hemisphere and the pinball starts at the top where we’ve identified your target memory/trigger and bops back and forth down to the bottom where it drops into the basket of a more positive self-belief and bells go off.
Hours of consultation and experience with clients and that’s what I have for you: a pinball analogy. The really weird part is it works. I have used EMDR for panic attacks, I’ve used it for PTSD, and I’ve used it for depression. It is very effective for panic attacks. Everyone knows about PTSD. It’s highly effective for treating that, but it’s great for other problems too. Also, if you aren’t a big talker, it’s definitely a good approach.
Some people get concerned because they aren’t “visual” people. That’s okay. You can use your other senses. Sound and smell tend to be powerful for people. Whatever makes up your target memory, go with that.
