¿En qué debo pensar durante la EMDR?

Understanding EMDR Therapy

La terapia de desensibilización y reprocesamiento por movimientos oculares (EMDR) se diferencia de las terapias tradicionales en varios aspectos. Aunque se habla un poco, lo que incluye hablar de la historia y centrarse en los pensamientos de ansiedad o angustia, el objetivo es reprocesar esos pensamientos mediante estimulación bilateral.

Your therapist will guide your eye movements back and forth as you focus on those thoughts, but if you're not familiar with EMDR or what to expect, that idea can feel a little overwhelming or even confusing. What are you actually supposed to think about?

This is one of the most common questions clients ask when beginning their EMDR journey, and it's completely understandable. Whether you're considering EMDR for anxiety, exploring EMDR for depression, or seeking healing from past experiences, knowing what to focus on during sessions can help you feel more prepared and confident as you begin this transformative therapeutic process.

Centrarse en un objetivo

Your therapist can help you find focus for selecting EMDR targets

Throughout your EMDR sessions, your therapist will have you focus on a specific targeted memory or thought. For people utilizing EMDR for trauma, it isn't always easy to "go back" and focus on the traumatic experience you had to go through. But your therapist will be with you every step of the way, guiding you through the experience in a safe setting.

Sometimes the target is obvious: if you’ve suffered a recent trauma and you are experiencing acute symptoms such as feeling afraid all of the time, having intrusive thoughts about the trauma, having difficulty sleeping and concentrating. Whatever recent event caused the trauma will likely be a target for EMDR therapy.

But sometimes, people are starting to realize that their daily lives are still being affected by trauma that occurred years ago, such as child abuse, bullying, or an unhealthy relationship. It can seem difficult to know where to start with these types of traumas, but your EMDR therapist can help guide you to find the most effective targets for processing complex trauma. Usually a good EMDR target has a clear visual memory, a clear negative belief about yourself, clear emotions attached to it, and clear physical sensations associated with the memory. It can be helpful if this memory also generalizes to other areas of your life.

This targeted approach is what makes EMDR therapy so effective for various mental health challenges. Whether you're working through EMDR for complex trauma, processing a significant loss with EMDR for grief, or addressing other emotional difficulties, the method remains consistent: identifying and reprocessing specific memories that are contributing to your current distress.

Each session will likely focus on a different targeted memory or thought. You should think about those things during the desensitization and reprocessing periods. As you become desensitized to the memory or thought, you'll be able to change your perspective on it. The purpose of EMDR isn't to make these thoughts disappear. It's to shift the way you see them so they don't have so much control over you.

For younger clients engaging in EMDR for teens, therapists may adapt the targeting process to be more age-appropriate, using creative methods to help identify and process difficult memories without overwhelming them. The core principle remains the same regardless of age: finding the memories that need attention and allowing your brain's natural healing processes to do their work.

What if the idea of EMDR sounds scary?

Sometimes the fear of trying EMDR comes from the fear of the unknown and imagining worst case scenarios. Sometimes the fear is your body’s intuition telling you that you are not ready for this. If you feel that you want to try EMDR but you are not ready, you and your therapist can make a plan to work up to trying EMDR together. As your therapist learns more about your fears, your supports, and your strengths, they can find targets that are less distressing, or take a big target and break it down into little pieces that are more manageable.

We can also do resourcing, which is basically using EMDR to enhance something good instead of using EMDR to desensitize something too disturbing to process. Some of our EMDR therapists are also trained in a protocol called The Flash Technique, which was developed especially for addressing trauma targets that feel too overwhelming to process with regular EMDR.

Our therapists have lots of creative tricks for helping clients make doing EMDR feel manageable. But, there is a big difference between “I want to do this but I am scared” and “I don’t want to do this.” If you don’t want to do EMDR, we respect your choices. EMDR is just one of many treatment options available for addressing PTSD.

Sepa qué esperar

Su terapeuta le hablará del proceso EMDR y de lo que puede esperar a lo largo de las sesiones. Cada terapeuta utiliza la estimulación bilateral de forma diferente. Algunos mueven el dedo de un lado a otro. Otros utilizan un objeto o incluso emiten un sonido de golpeteo.

At first you might feel confused and overwhelmed with all of the different stimulus. Taxing the working memory is actually part of what makes EMDR so effective. But, your therapist will work with you to find the right level of stimulus to get the effect of EMDR without feeling totally overwhelmed. In time, you get used to doing EMDR and it begins to flow naturally. You can instead focus on your specific memory or thought without getting caught up in the process itself. If you start to feel overwhelmed, talk to your therapist about it. Together, you can work on establishing a safe space in your mind that you can use to calm down and feel more grounded.

Confíe en el proceso

EMDR es una experiencia única en el mundo de la terapia. De nuevo, es diferente de muchas formas tradicionales de terapia conversacional. Por lo tanto, es importante desarrollar una relación positiva y sana con el terapeuta. Estás entregando algunos de los pensamientos y recuerdos más profundos y negativos posibles. Eso puede resultar abrumador al principio. Trabaja siempre con un terapeuta que dé prioridad a tu comodidad en todo momento.

El terapeuta adecuado hará que sea más fácil confiar en todo el proceso EMDR. Puede que acabes experimentando emociones que hacía mucho tiempo que no sentías. No pasa nada por dejar que afloren. Eso es lo que ocurre cuando no fuerzas ciertos pensamientos o recuerdos y dejas que afloren de forma natural. Es un proceso curativo, pero como la EMDR es una terapia relativamente breve, es probable que veas resultados rápidamente.

Si estás interesado en saber más sobre la terapia EMDR o tienes preguntas específicas, no dudes en ponerte en contacto conmigo. Estaré encantada de proporcionarte más información o de concertar una consulta.