Overcoming trauma with Eye Movement Desensitisation & Reprocessing (EMDR)

EMDR therapy can be particularly helpful to people suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, depression, and other trauma-related conditions. It is also useful for those who have gone through big life stressors or who have unfinished traumatic memories.

In EMDR therapy, you will be guided by your therapist in inducing disturbing memories onto a bilateral stimulation, guided eye movements, or tapping, for example. This reduces the emotional intensity of memories, and then allows reprocessing and integration. The therapy largely proceeds in an eight-phase approach: history-taking, preparation, assessment, desensitisation, installation, body scan, closure, and reevaluation.

EMDR therapy is especially appropriate for those who have suffered trauma that interferes with their being able to carry on an active, productive daily life. Specifically, it’s useful for those whose experiences have generated emotional and psychological diffuse disturbances. EMDR therapy will involve the reprocessing of traumatic memories in such a way that their impact becomes non-disturbing.

EMDR therapy is a strong tool in quickly reducing the symptoms of trauma and other distressing life experiences. EMDR has been shown to work effectively to bring about significant improvement in PTSD and other trauma-related conditions. This type of therapy reprocesses the traumatic memories of clients so that, through time, distress is diminished, while self-esteem and emotional welfare are enhanced.