Trauma and stress can affect us in profound ways and leave a lasting impact on our psychological, emotional, and physical wellbeing. In therapy, we can address past, present, and the future impacts of the trauma. Often people come to therapy hoping to find a way to relieve the pain that they are experiencing. This can look different depending on the type of therapy that our providers utilize. One model for addressing trauma is eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy, more commonly referred to as EMDR.
What is EMDR Therapy?
EMDR therapy is an evidence-based psychotherapy technique most often used to treat trauma, anxiety, depression, and other stressors. It follows the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model, which suggests that trauma disrupts how memories are processed, leading to distressing symptoms. In EMDR therapy, an EMDR-trained clinician will guide you through eight phases.
The 8 Phases of EMDR
History taking: this phase involves your clinician asking about your history and collaboratively developing a treatment plan. Together, you identify the main “targets” for the reprocessing sessions—specific memories or issues to address.
Preparation involves learning new skills to manage distress. Most often this is done to ensure that when the traumas are revisited in reprocessing sessions, you feel equipped to manage any distress that may come up during reprocessing, or in between sessions. This is also the time that your therapist will go through what you can expect the sessions to look like, and make sure you are good to go into reprocessing.
Assessment occurs when your therapist activates the memory network and help get to the target memories that you jointly planned for in the earlier phases. This is done through asking a specific set of questions about the images associated with the memory, a strong negative belief about yourself or the world around you, and helping you connect with the emotions and feelings in your body that are present.
Desensitization begins immediately after the assessment phase, and this is often what we refer to as the reprocessing phases and what people most often associate with EMDR. In the desensitization phase, you are holding onto the distressing memory while engaging in eye movements, sounds, or taps to elicit bilateral stimulation. The goal is to reduce the emotional charge and disturbance associated with the memory. Desensitization may take several sessions, depending on the client and the trauma.
Installation is the fifth phase of EMDR, and it takes place once the negative belief and distress have gone down to 0. In this phase, the client and therapist work on strengthening positive associations to replace the negative beliefs that previously accompanied the memory.
Body Scan takes place after the client is able hold a more positive cognition alongside the memory. Research has shown time and time again that trauma is often stored in the body. In this phase, your therapist guides you to notice any lingering physical tension when recalling the target memory. The goal is to achieve a sense of physical ease and comfort. Once a client reports a clear body scan, then the target is officially considered “cleared”
Closure occurs after any EMDR session, whether the target has cleared, or reprocessing is ongoing. During this phase, clinicians will check in with the client about any observations, reflections, or general feedback about the process. Most closures will also bring back some of the skills from phase 2, as a way to help you feel more present and comfortable at the end of the session.
Re-evaluation happens at the beginning of each session, where the you and your clinician review general symptoms, changes, and reflections.
For more information on EMDR therapy, please visit the EMDR International Association website at emdria.org
Ready to Start Your Healing Journey?
If this something that you’re interested in learning more about, reach out to us at hello@thebtrc.com to schedule a consultation with our compassionate, trauma-informed therapists.