Memories are made of thoughts, mental images, emotions, and body sensations. When a traumatic or stressful event happens, the brain is not able to fully process the experience. The memory is stuck in your body. You cognitively know the event is over, but it still feels vivid and upsetting. It doesn’t feel like a normal memory.

It is thought that EMDR works similarly to REM sleep. During REM sleep, your eyes rapidly move back and forth and your brain is active. This stage of sleep is essential for emotional processing, memory consolidation, and learning. EMDR helps your brain put all of the pieces of the memory (thoughts, images, emotions, body sensations) together and store them in the correct part of the brain.

Once we have chosen the problem you want to work on, we’ll make a list of upsetting memories that represent it. We will often start with processing the earliest memory you have of a problem.

When we are ready to start reprocessing, I will ask you to think about the memory and any associated emotions, body sensations, and negative beliefs about yourself. While holding all of this, you will rapidly move your eyes back and forth with the help of remotEMDR. remotEMDR is an online tool that allows me to operate the bilateral stimulation during our session.

The bilateral stimulation will pause after about 60 seconds and I’ll briefly check in with you to see if you’re noticing any changes in emotions, body sensations, or thoughts. The bilateral stimulation will re-start. We will continue alternating between processing and briefly checking in until the memory no longer feels distressing.

Once the memory does not feel distressing, we will evaluate any negative beliefs about yourself that are still tied to the memory. We will use the bilateral stimulation at a slower pace to connect what’s left of the old problem to the new way you think/feel about it.

After successful processing, the memory will feel less vivid and upsetting. Memories are transformed on an emotional level. For example, a survivor of sexual assault can go from believing, “I should have done something to stop it,” to “I’m strong and I survived.”

EMDR and Brainspotting are both brain-body based treatments that utilize the eyes, but they are different.

EMDR uses bilateral eye movements (rapidly moving your eyes from side to side) to process issues. Other kinds of bilateral stimulation can be used if someone cannot tolerate eye movements, like tapping or sounds (sound that jumps from one ear to the other without being panned).

Brainspotting uses specific eye positions to process issues through focused mindfulness and BioLateral music (sound that gently pans from one ear to the other) can be used to aid with processing.

Some people have difficulty engaging in focused mindfulness, which can make EMDR a better choice for them. EMDR is excellent for healing trauma related to distressing birthing experiences, pregnancy loss, sexual assault, car accidents, serious illness or injury, or natural disasters. Brainspotting is often a more effective choice for healing CPTSD.