What to Expect from EMDR Therapy for Trauma and Stress

Traumatic experiences can, without a doubt, have a lasting impact on your psychological, emotional, and even physical wellbeing. And while some people tend to recover naturally as time passes, others can find themselves stuck with this, experiencing all kinds of symptoms that can interfere with their daily lives, relationships, work, and their overall mental health. Those kinds of events can leave your brain feeling stuck and make it difficult for you to process and move beyond the painful memories, which is precisely why getting help is of utmost importance.

Here is a bit more on coping with traumatic events: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/coping-with-traumatic-events

So, getting professional help after having experienced some traumatic events is of utmost importance. It can help you process those difficult emotions and ultimately feel better and develop better coping skills, while at the same time strengthening your relationships with other people and generally making it easier for you to develop close partnerships. Psychotherapy has emerged as a rather useful tool that can help people process those traumatic events within a safe space, and thus learn how to rebuild their lives without letting the trauma completely overwhelm them.

Since you are here, though, it is safe to say that you already understand the importance of, well, asking for professional help when you need it. Furthermore, it is also safe to assume that you have come across a specific therapeutic approach that you’ve become interested in, given that it has actually gained significant recognition for helping people address trauma and stress. To cut right to the chase, we are talking about Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, which is more commonly known as EMDR therapy. It has originally been developed in the late 1980s, and it is nowadays widely used by mental health professionals all around the world in order to help individuals process those distressing experiences and reduce their emotional impact.

Of course, you are considering EMDR in Vancouver, but you don’t want to jump right towards it before getting answers to some important questions. You want to know what this actually is, as well as what it is that you can expect from EMDR therapy for trauma and stress, as that will get you prepared and more confident if you decide to start the process. So, what we are going to do right now is answer those important questions for you below, hoping to shed more light on this approach and to get you more familiar with what you can expect should you decide to go for it. Without much more ado, thus, let us get started.

What Is EMDR Therapy?

Okay, unsurprisingly, we are going to begin with the most basic question here. Put simply, before you start searching for EMDR therapy in Vancouver and scheduling your appointments with some amazing professionals, you want to make sure that you actually understand what it is. So, to cut right to the chase, EMDR is actually a structured psychotherapy approach that is designed with the aim of helping people process those traumatic memories and other distressing life experiences.

It is actually based on the idea that traumatic events can, well, overwhelm the brain’s natural ability to process information. As a result of that, memories of those experiences can become stored in a way that will continue to trigger emotional distress much long after the event has passed. And when such a memory remains unprocessed, you can find yourself experiencing symptoms such as anxiety, panic attacks, intrusive thoughts, flashbacks, nightmares, difficulty concentrating, hypervigilance, emotional numbness, low self-esteem and similar.

So, what EMDR does is it helps your brain reprocess those memories so that they can become less emotionally charged and disruptive. One of the most distinctive aspects of this type of therapy is the use of bilateral stimulation, which often involves, of course, guided eye movements. Furthermore, therapists can also use alternating sounds or taps. That kind of stimulation is incorporated while the clients are focused on the distressing memories within the structured therapeutic process.

Another thing to understand here is that EMDR is not only for major trauma, and this is important to mention because a lot of people actually associate it with some severe trauma such as violent assaults, combat experiences, or perhaps some major accidents. The truth is, though, that this type of therapy can be useful for a much broader range of experiences, from bullying, relationship difficulties or workplace stress to phobias, grief and loss, childhood trauma and low self-confidence. And even those experiences that may not seem traumatic to others can definitely leave lasting emotional effects, which is why EMDR focuses on how the events have impacted you as the individual, rather than trying to assess if they meet some specific trauma definitions. Click this to learn a bit more about it.

What to Expect From It for Trauma and Stress?

Okay, so, what is it that you can expect from EMDR when it comes to trauma and stress? Well, the first session, or a couple of them, usually focuses on assessment and preparation. The therapist spends time learning about your concerns, your symptoms, your history and your treatment goals, and then you work together to identify those experiences that may be contributing to your distress. The preparation phase can include relaxation exercises, grounding techniques, mindfulness strategies, safe-place visualizations, emotional regulation tools and similar.

Another important thing to understand is that you don’t have to share every detail of your experience. Sure, conversation is involved, but the therapist guides you towards focusing on specific aspects of a memory while using bilateral stimulation, which means that the emphasis is on your brain’s internal processing instead of repeatedly retelling the story. And that can be extremely useful for people who find it difficult to talk about their painful experiences in details.

When the preparation is complete, you will start the reprocessing phase. You will be asked to focus on a distressing memory, associated emotions, physical sensations and the negative beliefs that are connected to the experience. As the processing unfolds, new thoughts, emotions, insights and memories can gradually emerge. Finally, you should know that everyone’s emotional reaction is different, and you can experience a range of emotions during a session, from relief and increased awareness to sadness, anger, and fatigue. And you can expect benefits such as reduced anxiety, fewer intrusive thoughts, less emotional distress, better sleep, improved self-esteem, increased sense of safety and similar.