What is Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR)?

EMDR is a type of therapy that helps you to process traumatic memories from your past. These memories can make you feel stuck. It can feel as though you are still in the past, reliving the event over and over again with the same distressing feelings as when it first happened.

In EMDR, we use bilateral stimulation (such as eye movements, tapping or sounds) to help your brain process those difficult memories so you no longer experience those distressing emotions. When you no longer feel distressed, you are more able to live your life in a way that feels good to you.

EMDR is typically used to treat Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, but there is lots of new evidence stating it can be used to treat other difficulties such as anxiety and low mood.

What are EMDR sessions like:

A lot like CBT, in the early sessions, we explore your difficulties and understand more about what happened in your life and how it is affecting you now. We will help you to understand more about EMDR and practice bilateral stimulation together to show you what’s involved. After this we will begin processing your memories, we will need 90-minute sessions at this point of treatment. In EMDR you don’t have to talk through your difficult memories, you just need to be able to update us on what you are noticing as we go through the memory processing. It’s normal to feel upset and become distressed when we are processing memories. We are here to support you with this.

Please be aware that you are fully conscious throughout the processing, EMDR is not a form of hypnosis.