In celeb land, people nowadays swear by EMDR therapy. This form of therapy is especially effective for people who suffer from PTSD. If experts are to be believed, we will be hearing more and more about it in the coming years.
Discovered by accident
The letters EMDR stand for ‘Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing’. Several celebrities, including prins Harry, swear by it. It is a form of therapy that was developed more than 35 years ago by Francine Shapiro, an American psychologist. EMDR was primarily intended for the treatment of people suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). “Shapiro ran into this approach when she herself talked about her childhood trauma,” says EMDR therapist Nor Kalayjian. “When she started talking, her eyes started moving. She continued and noticed that her trauma subsided.”
How a treatment is done
every therapist who has had EMDR training may supervise sessions of that form of therapy. Usually such a session lasts an hour to an hour and a half. Most people need two sessions a week, over a period of three to six weeks. It all starts with planning and preparing for therapy. The patient and therapist then discuss in detail which memories will be viewed during therapy.
During the sessions, that memory is then focused on while the patient is subjected to bilateral stimulation. He/she must follow clicks through headphones or hand movements. Several rounds of that stimulation are performed each time. Each session ends with an observation of the patient’s feelings and a short meditation session. At each session, it is also discussed how the previous session went and what can be improved.
Depends on the person
Although EMDR has been around for decades, how it works is still not completely clear. “We know it’s effective, but we don’t fully know how,” he said Sonya Norma, who works at PTSD Center for American Veterans. Indeed, research has shown that EMDR is very effective in combating PTSD. According to Norma only come prolonged exposure therapy in cognitive processing therapy close to EMDR in effectiveness. According to her, which of the three methods works best is personal.
Less effective
Best of all: As far as we know, EMDR therapy has no nasty side effects. However, it is true that it is not suitable for everyone. According to Kalayjian, the therapy is less effective in people with borderline personality disorder of personality dissociative disorder. With them there is a good chance that they shut themselves off both mentally and emotionally from their past and present. They can’t focus enough on the trauma, when that’s exactly what it takes for the therapy to work.
EMDR has become more and more popular lately, which Kalayjian is happy about. “It works very well and I don’t think it’s being used enough.” There are also more and more people in training to become EMDR therapists, in order to be able to help as many others as possible in the future to process their trauma.
Source: InStyle | Image: BrunoPress
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