I've done 3-4 sessions of EMDR after the preparatory resourcing. 1 session in particular seemed to help contextualize a childhood memory around sexual abuse that I felt a lot of shame for. I was able to see myself as an innocent child and how ridiculous it was to blame myself.
Our next session was around a different childhood sexual abuse memory, and was met with a lot of internal resistance. I've always been impatient to fix myself, so I wanted to dive in. Some part of me was so unbelievably angry for attempting to do EMDR around this memory. Perhaps it was my attitude toward it—trying to rid of the emotional damage instead of sitting with my inner child compassionately. I communicated the intensity of this resistance to my therapist and it seemed to startle him a bit. He was a middle aged guy with lots of wisdom, but quite new to the profession. We were both kind of scared to return to that memory, and that was my last session of EMDR.
I'm not a mental health professional whatsoever, but I do agree with those who contend that EMDR isn't the most helpful for complex trauma. EMDR professionals will emphasize that the procedure can be done around a feeling, idea, or core belief; however, it seems like it's best designed to target a particular memory. The nature of complex trauma is that, in many cases, no one memory is solely responsible for the damaged caused.
To my knowledge—and please correct me if I'm wrong; I'd love to learn more—no research has been done to determine whether the bilateral stimulation component of EMDR is therapeutically necessary. Maybe all that's really needed is conjuring a painful memory and processing it with a professional. Somatic therapy is another vehicle for re-contextualizing past memories. Some professionals say that the bilateral stimulation in EMDR mimics sleep REM cycles, where unconscious memories are processed and integrated into long-term memory. Scientifically speaking, the dream state is infinitely more complex than simply stimulating both hemispheres of the brain.
For these reasons I'm skeptical of this modality of therapy. It's likely that I have a fear of the procedure given my last experience with it. Perhaps if I tried EMDR with a gentler attitude and expressed my skepticism to my therapist, I'd have a better experience and change my mind. However, EMDR is often touted as a panacea. It offers a cure to my emotional pain; an intense, but relatively fast cure. I just feel like healing for complex trauma will inherently be a complex process. It's certainly not the case that all important work must be long and arduous, but there is an achievement mindset built into these types of acute trauma healing that doesn't resonate with me.
I don't mean to invalidate anyone's experience or excitement around EMDR. Psychologist Ellen Langer famously states that any therapy—medication or otherwise—is only as effective as the patient's belief that it will work. This speaks to the power of rituals and spirituality for healing—modalities that have much less empirical support. "What works" must then be fairly specific to the individual. Whichever route we choose to take, at least we're not alone
Our next session was around a different childhood sexual abuse memory, and was met with a lot of internal resistance. I've always been impatient to fix myself, so I wanted to dive in. Some part of me was so unbelievably angry for attempting to do EMDR around this memory. Perhaps it was my attitude toward it—trying to rid of the emotional damage instead of sitting with my inner child compassionately. I communicated the intensity of this resistance to my therapist and it seemed to startle him a bit. He was a middle aged guy with lots of wisdom, but quite new to the profession. We were both kind of scared to return to that memory, and that was my last session of EMDR.
I'm not a mental health professional whatsoever, but I do agree with those who contend that EMDR isn't the most helpful for complex trauma. EMDR professionals will emphasize that the procedure can be done around a feeling, idea, or core belief; however, it seems like it's best designed to target a particular memory. The nature of complex trauma is that, in many cases, no one memory is solely responsible for the damaged caused.
To my knowledge—and please correct me if I'm wrong; I'd love to learn more—no research has been done to determine whether the bilateral stimulation component of EMDR is therapeutically necessary. Maybe all that's really needed is conjuring a painful memory and processing it with a professional. Somatic therapy is another vehicle for re-contextualizing past memories. Some professionals say that the bilateral stimulation in EMDR mimics sleep REM cycles, where unconscious memories are processed and integrated into long-term memory. Scientifically speaking, the dream state is infinitely more complex than simply stimulating both hemispheres of the brain.
For these reasons I'm skeptical of this modality of therapy. It's likely that I have a fear of the procedure given my last experience with it. Perhaps if I tried EMDR with a gentler attitude and expressed my skepticism to my therapist, I'd have a better experience and change my mind. However, EMDR is often touted as a panacea. It offers a cure to my emotional pain; an intense, but relatively fast cure. I just feel like healing for complex trauma will inherently be a complex process. It's certainly not the case that all important work must be long and arduous, but there is an achievement mindset built into these types of acute trauma healing that doesn't resonate with me.
I don't mean to invalidate anyone's experience or excitement around EMDR. Psychologist Ellen Langer famously states that any therapy—medication or otherwise—is only as effective as the patient's belief that it will work. This speaks to the power of rituals and spirituality for healing—modalities that have much less empirical support. "What works" must then be fairly specific to the individual. Whichever route we choose to take, at least we're not alone