I Was Skeptical, But EMDR Therapy Changed My Life — 'It Felt Like Relief From The Confines Of My Mind'
The journey sucked, but the view at the end is incredible.
dimaberlinphotos, kieferpix | Canva EMDR, or Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, is a type of psychotherapy treatment whose goal is to reduce and reframe triggers associated with trauma through a series of eye movements.
Research indicates that adverse life experiences may be the basis for various psychological and physiologic symptoms. EMDR therapy research has shown that processing memories of such experiences results in the rapid relief of negative emotions, beliefs, and physical sensations.
Before EMDR Therapy, I was skeptical of its efficacy.
The first time I was offered EMDR therapy as a possible treatment plan, I was hesitant. At the time, I had been diagnosed with chronic depression and anxiety, not PTSD — which is what I thought EMDR was for. I never characterized the tough situations I went through during my life as trauma, but like most things, it’s a spectrum of severity and impact. In my naïve (delusional) mind, although I served in the military, I never went to war, so my tough experiences would never amount to those brothers and sisters in arms who lost friends or limbs.
I thought that going through EMDR meant I would have to talk about each excruciating detail of those experiences. I was particularly hesitant about revisiting my mom’s death and the night I found out I was adopted. I couldn’t talk to my family about these two events without crying, so the thought of being open and vulnerable with a stranger didn’t feel appealing.
During EMDR Therapy: Pain
EMDR works in phases, and everyone’s experience will be different. The first phase was to choose the ten most distressing events in my life. My therapist had me choose three soft throws that we could start with to ease into the process. That was the next step: identifying, desensitization, and reprocessing.
I had to focus on an image during the event, like a screenshot. For example, if the memory involved failing a test, an image you could focus on would be the moment you were handed the test back. You would be asked something like, “What’s the negative belief tied to this event?” For this example, it could be something about feeling like a failure. Then, you were asked the opposite about what the positive belief should be, and it could be something such as, “I am not a failure.”
You would focus on that image by incorporating rapid eye movement from left to right at a controlled pace. Your psychologist would guide you through the memory by asking things like, “What were you feeling?”, “What are you currently feeling physically?” or “What color would you describe the memory?”
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After each session, I was asked about my level of distress. Most of the time, I couldn’t remember what number I had said after the last session, so my answers were always genuine. The events caused a lesser level of distress after some time working on them. It could take 3-4 sessions on the lesser distressing events to bring a level 5 event to level 0. One of my level 10 events took a month and a half long (about 14 sessions) of hard work to reprocess through, and it was so excruciatingly painful.
What I imagined was happening was that I was reopening a wound that had healed incorrectly or become infected, cleaning it out slowly and thoroughly, and allowing it to heal correctly. Some of the most arduous sessions revealed things that had led me into a panic of tears. After the session the only way I can describe myself feeling was bone-weary.
I was exhausted, sad, skittish, scared, and in a state of vulnerability that screamed for isolation. I experienced terrible headaches, nausea, nightmares, insomnia, and mood swings. The reprocessing doesn’t stop after a session is over either; it continues, and that’s when the healing happens.
After EMDR Therapy: Freedom
A 1998 study found that military veterans exposed to EMDR experienced a 77% remission in their PTSD diagnosis within 12 sessions. Another analysis found that EMDR was just as if not more than, effective as exposure therapy in its ability to minimize PTSD symptoms efficiently.
Am I cured? No, but only because I don’t think there was anything to cure. I didn’t just magically forget all the traumatic events that I addressed in therapy. A few things did happen, and although I wouldn’t say that EMDR is for everyone, I do believe that therapy, in general, is.
Therapy showed me the coping strategies that would work best in my daily life. EMDR specifically gave me an intense feeling of relief from the confines of my mind. My mind was overloaded by negative thoughts, feelings, and beliefs that had gone unaddressed for too long. I started to buckle under all that pressure.
It was a combination of having an incredible therapist, being open to trying EMDR, and my hard work to slowly chip away at all the weight I had been carrying for so long. As a result, my identity and self-perception changed and readjusted itself to something more natural to me. And like a domino effect, the relationships around me also started to change.
I got closer to some family members while distancing myself from others. I got closer to some of my friends while I grew apart from others that I considered lifelong friends. I have a lot to thank EMDR for, but most of all, I’m proud of myself for doing the hard work needed to get through my toughest memories.
Monica Robles is a California-based writer and an editorial intern for YourTango.