It is a therapy used to help people recover from distressing events and the problems they have caused, like flashbacks, upsetting thoughts or images. It can be an effective treatment for, those who witnessed or experienced accidents, violent crimes, medical traumas; people with phobias, chronic pain, anxiety and many other difficulties.

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When a person is involved in a traumatic event, they may feel overwhelmed and their brain may be unable to fully process what is going on. The memory of the event seems to become “stuck” so that it remains very intense and vivid. The person can re-experience what they saw, heard and smelt and the full force of the distress they felt whenever the memory comes to mind.

EMDR aims to help the brain “unstick” and reprocess the memory properly so that it is no longer so intense. It also helps to desensitise the person to the emotional impact of the memory, so that they can think about the event without experiencing such strong feelings.

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It does this by asking the person to recall the traumatic event while they also move their eyes from side-to-side, or feel a tap on each shoulder alternately (butterfly tap). These side-to-side sensations seem to effectively stimulate the “stuck” processing system in the brain so that it can reprocess the information more like an ordinary memory, reducing its intensity.

The effect may be similar to what occurs naturally during REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, when your eyes move rapidly from side to side as the brain processes the events of the day.

If you are interested specifically in EMDR approach I will offer you initially assessment sessions which could help me and you decide whether this is a suitable approach for you and your difficulties. EMDR is a complex  and intensive therapeutic process and not everyone and not every difficulty would be appropriate for EMDR treatment.