Trauma Therapy
Help with PTSD using EMDR
How EMDR Trauma Therapy Help You
PTSD Treatment with Excellent Results for Many People
In terms of trauma therapy, EMDR stands for Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing. It’s a long phrase. But broken down, you can understand better what it means. It’s a type of trauma therapy that uses eye movement while recalling a traumatic experience. The treatment addresses portions of the incident at a time. And it desensitizes the experience. In other words, it lessens your emotional and physical reaction to it.
When anyone experiences trauma, there are typically three reactive responses: fight, flight or freeze. All three are very uncomfortable responses. Fight triggers aggressive emotions like anger or antagonism. Flight immerses you in fear—you can’t escape fast enough. And freeze—well, that’s awful too because freeze traps you in numbness or fear, making you feel powerless. Meanwhile the threat continues, consuming all of your energy and attention.
Long after the trauma is over, the negative emotions and memory of it can remain. PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) is often the result. In everyday life, when a stressor triggers the trauma, you keep reliving the negative responses. These responses impact your life in one form or another.
Are you a candidate for EMDR?
Here are some questions that may help you consider whether EMDR might be right for you:
- Have you ever faced a life threatening situation that left you depressed, afraid or numb afterward?
- Has a doctor diagnosed you with PTSD?
- Have you experienced PTSD as a result of serious medical problems, war or mass violence, sexual assault, a natural disaster or a car accident?
- Are you having flashbacks or nightmares?
- Do guilty, angry or worrisome feelings linger and bother you?
- Do you have out-of-body experiences where the world doesn’t seem real anymore?
- Did you experience something terrible that stripped you of all your confidence and you’ve never been the same since?
- Is anxiety or depression a pressing problem?
- Do you suffer from panic attacks?
How does EMDR work?
The therapist targets a particular traumatic experience for processing. Then, you follow the horizontal movement of their finger while recalling part of the traumatic experience. Or the therapist may use hand tapping or audio stimuli instead of trauma therapy eye movement.
The treatment unblocks you and frees you from the trauma. This allows healing to take place. Given the chance, it is natural for your mind to heal.
EMDR was developed 25 years ago and since then millions of people have experienced success using this treatment. Here are some EMDR statistics from various studies:
- 84%-90% of single-trauma victims no longer experienced PTSD after three 90-minute sessions
- 100% of single-trauma victims and 77% of multiple trauma victims were no longer diagnosed with PTSD after six 50 minute sessions.
- 77% of combat veterans overcame PTSD in 12 sessions
Of course we can’t promise a particular result. Even so, the success this type of treatment has brought to many people is encouraging. Also, some people have said they ended up feeling empowered by the end of the therapy. They felt stronger, more present, more transformed.
Find out more about EMDR trauma therapy
We’re glad to answer your questions. Our NJ trauma therapist can explain the EMDR therapy approach in greater depth.
