Up next in 10
What is EMDR? (Part 1)
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Feb 6, 2025
Welcome to Adaptable | Behavior Explained! Join us as we explore the transformative world of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) therapy. This guide is perfect for those interested in understanding EMDR's power, whether you're a potential client or simply curious. Learn how to find a qualified EMDR therapist and uncover the captivating history of EMDR, discovered accidentally by its founder, Francine Shapiro, in a park. www.emdria.org Explore EMDR's core, the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model, addressing past traumas, present triggers, and future anxieties. Discover why EMDR therapy stands out for facilitating profound physiological changes and reprocessing memories. Hear personal stories of EMDR's life-changing effects and understand the eight EMDR process phases that guide clients to healing and resolution. Whether considering EMDR therapy or expanding your therapeutic knowledge, this podcast offers insights into the path of relief, resilience, and lasting change EMDR therapy offers. Don't miss out! I'm Kelly O'Horo, Attachment based EMDR Therapist, EMDRIA Consultant, and Advanced Trainer. I'm a mom of 5, Nonna of 5, wife, and a healer. I have the honor of spending my workdays walking along side people while they brave their healing journeys. I try to live with the generous assumption that we're all doing the best we can with what we know. Therapists are teachers for the "life stuff" and "emotional vocabulary" that may not have been learned due to gaps in our care givers capabilities. In the last 15 years I've learned that people are freaking amazing, resilient, and inspiring. Most importantly, we are hardwired for connection and for healing! I hope to bring an authentic, compassionate, and unpolished approach while we explore a variety of topics such as parenting, marriage, relationships, dating, trauma, attachment, adoption, depression, addiction, anxiety, and love! There's a why for all behaviors and an explanation that makes perfect sense as emotion is at the root of it all. -- Links -- https://linktr.ee/kellyohorolpc
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0:01
foreign
0:07
I'm Kelly ohoro and this is adaptable
0:10
Behavior explained hi everybody thanks
0:13
for tuning in today uh we're going to
0:16
talk a bit about EMDR therapy and I'm
0:19
intending to make this for the layperson
0:22
who's not necessarily a therapist but so
0:24
you know a little bit about what to
0:26
expect when you decide you want to do
0:29
EMDR therapy a little bit about how to
0:31
find someone and where that is and we'll
0:33
have links in the comments below where
0:35
you can find an EMDR therapist in your
0:37
area and we're going to talk about the
0:40
history we're going to talk about a
0:41
little bit about how it works and what
0:44
we can treat with EMDR therapy and I
0:47
have my colleague Justine Bond who is an
0:49
EMDR therapist qualified to be a
0:52
certified EMDR therapist and she's going
0:55
to talk a little bit about this topic
0:56
with me today so thank you so much for
0:58
being here I appreciate your time and
1:00
and energy and hopefully we can make
1:02
this a an approachable conversational
1:04
topic because it's it's a complicated
1:07
topic and it's super weird to understand
1:09
yeah EMDR therapy in general but I think
1:12
it's important that people are aware
1:15
it's it's one of the top two treatments
1:18
endorsed by the World Health
1:20
Organization for trauma and also for the
1:24
VA uh CBT trauma focused therapy is the
1:27
other one according to their endorsement
1:30
and that requires homework and it takes
1:32
a bit longer so part of what I love
1:34
about EMDR therapy and being an EMDR
1:36
therapist is that we can help people and
1:40
have more reduction in their distress
1:42
and their symptoms a little bit faster
1:44
than than some of the other modalities
1:46
but ultimately like I've talked about in
1:49
episodes before we have to address
1:51
trauma in a bottom-up fashion because
1:55
otherwise we're not going to reprocess
1:57
how things get stuck so thanks for being
2:00
here I appreciate it so tell me what do
2:02
you love about EMDR therapy I think it's
2:05
speaking to what you said the bottom-up
2:07
approach you know I'm someone who gets
2:10
really in my head too right and I feel
2:12
like well I know a lot of the things but
2:14
that's not really what this is about
2:15
because trauma's not stored there if
2:17
trauma made sense we wouldn't probably
2:19
be here and having these symptoms or
2:22
chief complaint issues right so it's
2:24
dropping in and using myself as that
2:27
process in the room just to be with the
2:29
client where they're at and getting to
2:31
the work that way that's a beautiful
2:32
transformation I was lucky enough to
2:35
have people talk about EMDR therapy in
2:37
my graduate program and so I knew about
2:39
what it was but I didn't personally get
2:41
it and one of my professors was very
2:45
research based and so he talked about
2:46
this as you know the number one
2:48
treatment for PTSD and at that point we
2:50
didn't have anywhere near the clinical
2:52
trials that we do now and so we'll talk
2:55
about more of the research and how we
2:57
know that it is really effective to
2:59
treat
3:00
pretty much all presenting issues in
3:02
some way shape or form so we'll talk
3:03
about that I have to say my history with
3:06
it is I saw a psychodynamic therapist
3:08
for about a year when I was in um my
3:12
early career profession and I really
3:15
loved it so it was valuable to learn
3:17
more about my history how I adapted
3:20
you know my relationship with attachment
3:22
with my mom and with my dad and and some
3:25
of the things that happened in my story
3:26
that were contributing to my symptoms
3:29
which was preoccupied anxiousness
3:32
needing to know what where my husband
3:34
was what was going on and even when he
3:36
didn't do anything to earn my anxiety I
3:39
was anxious and so I loved what I gained
3:42
in my year of of psychodynamic therapy
3:45
and a talk therapy fashion but when I
3:47
transitioned to an EMDR therapist I was
3:49
like holy this is what's been
3:52
missing because I had such a different
3:54
relationship with the distress that I
3:56
was in and I started to be able to make
3:59
so much more sense of why I was acting
4:01
the way I was acting and so part of my
4:04
love is that I had such Dynamic
4:07
physiological changes because of my own
4:09
personal work with an EMDR therapist
4:11
right and so do you have some experience
4:14
in your own personal EMDR that you'd be
4:16
willing to share
4:18
I think what I've learned the most
4:19
through my own EMDR process was as I
4:22
mentioned before I know a lot and I I
4:25
can think my way through a lot of things
4:27
or what I like to tell my clients are we
4:29
solutionizing it
4:30
right and that's all fine and good for
4:33
some time but it's not getting to really
4:35
what's going on because two weeks later
4:37
I'm feeling the same thing and it's like
4:39
damn I thought I worked through this
4:40
right no right so my EMDR therm
4:44
therapist taught me how to drop in and
4:46
really come to that place again of
4:48
what's my body holding on to what's my
4:50
body picking up in my environment that's
4:52
telling me threat alarm Bells
4:54
something's off right now and how are
4:55
you adapting in the now as a result of
4:58
that distress exactly right right it
5:00
makes sense yeah yeah so the other thing
5:03
that I think is
5:05
relevant is after going through some of
5:08
my own EMDR therapy I was I was in this
5:12
major state of I have to get trained in
5:14
this I have to learn how to do this
5:15
because I was I was primarily a CBT
5:17
therapist and my my clients really I I
5:21
did great with the relationship and the
5:23
validation and I understood in their
5:25
narratives what was going on but I just
5:28
was frustrated that I wasn't able to
5:30
make system changes for them and that
5:32
they would come back week after week
5:33
with some of the same presenting issues
5:35
and I wasn't seeing it shift as as uh
5:38
drastically as I would have liked and I
5:40
certainly wasn't seeing it shift like I
5:42
felt like I was shifting because of the
5:44
work I was doing in EMDR therapy so I
5:45
went and got trained as fast as possible
5:48
and I had a mentor that was that was
5:50
really encouraging jump in I want you to
5:52
really try this with as many patients as
5:54
you can so that you can get comfortable
5:56
with it and you can see how powerful it
5:59
is and so that's part of why I'm such a
6:01
proponent of this kind of therapy and
6:04
and another bottom-up therapies that
6:07
really affect the physiology of how
6:09
things are stored absolutely so tell us
6:13
a little bit about how EMDR came to be
6:15
in the history of it sure so back in
6:18
1987 Francine Shapiro who invented and
6:21
discovered EMDR therapy by accident was
6:24
walking through the park and she noticed
6:26
that her eyes were moving in a bit of a
6:28
bilateral way along with her walking and
6:31
she realized that as she was thinking
6:33
about something distressing she saw the
6:36
the effects of the distress start to
6:38
desensitize or decrease and so she
6:41
thought there's something to this so
6:43
thus began her research and her studies
6:46
about what she had experienced
6:48
personally in a reduction of stress and
6:51
in that timeline she was she came up
6:54
with EMD which was the kind of the baby
6:56
form of EMDR early on and it was kind of
6:59
originally seen as just a
7:00
desensitization technique and that's a
7:04
little bit it's helpful but it doesn't
7:06
help us to learn something new it
7:08
doesn't help us to reprocess things
7:10
things that are that are stuck in time
7:12
and so it's evolved since then there's
7:15
been like more than 30 random controlled
7:18
trials showing its efficacy more than 28
7:22
controlled trials learning about
7:24
different protocols and how we can
7:27
address different presenting issues with
7:28
the MDR therapy so it's really come a
7:31
long way it's a way for people to free
7:33
themselves from destructive memories and
7:35
it seems to work even in cases where
7:37
years of conventional therapy have
7:40
failed
7:41
no one understands exactly why this
7:43
method succeeds only that it does then
7:46
at least like Eric discovered a new and
7:48
unique kind of therapy it's called EMDR
7:52
eye movement desensitization and
7:54
reprocessing it's being practiced by
7:57
some 7 000 therapists across the country
7:59
and the numbers are growing okay so how
8:03
does EMDR work
8:05
so EMDR therapy is based on the model of
8:10
adaptive information processing and this
8:12
model suggests that we are hardwired for
8:15
healing that we have an innate ability
8:18
to lean ourselves towards health and
8:22
wellness and to resolution and it's it's
8:25
a learning theory so it suggests that
8:28
everything that we have ever experienced
8:30
in our life is is seen and learned and
8:34
in our environments we learn to adapt to
8:38
our environments based on what we're
8:40
experiencing and so we're taking in
8:42
information all the time and in so doing
8:45
we learn to course correct or shift or
8:49
adapt so for example if I had a family
8:54
where my parents were fighting all the
8:56
time and they were really angry I might
8:58
learn to adapt to stay small just keep
9:01
to myself to not be a problem to be a
9:04
peacemaker to to try to get everybody to
9:07
calm down to be a perfectionist and
9:09
never be the reason that anyone's upset
9:11
so I learned to adapt to my environment
9:13
and kind of everything that we are doing
9:16
in our life we learned somewhere and so
9:19
what I love is the reverse engineering
9:22
process of EMDR therapy as a therapist
9:24
is really getting curious about what
9:28
happened to cause someone to behave in
9:30
whatever presenting issues they're
9:31
behaving yeah so so how does it exactly
9:34
work though where does it go so
9:36
everything with the MDR therapy is about
9:38
memory work okay how is memory encoded
9:41
and I love the movie Inside Out because
9:44
they do such a good job illustrating how
9:47
memory Works they show core memories
9:50
that are positive and then over time you
9:52
kind of see memories shift depending on
9:54
how people showed up for you and then
9:58
when we get to resolution and there's a
10:00
repair you see the way that memory is
10:02
held shift to a more positive way and in
10:05
that scene and I think we'll show a clip
10:08
right here of the scene that I'm talking
10:09
about where the way memory is encoded
10:12
drastically drastically affects how we
10:14
show up in the world
10:15
anyway these are Riley's memories and
10:18
they're mostly happy you'll notice not
10:19
to brag
10:20
[Music]
10:25
they're really in
10:28
I don't want to get too technical but
10:29
these are called core memories each one
10:32
came from a super important time in
10:34
Riley's life like when she first scored
10:36
a goal that was so amazing
10:41
and each core memory Powers a different
10:43
aspect of Riley's personality like
10:46
hockey Island
10:48
[Applause]
10:50
goofball island is my personal favorite
10:52
come back here you little monkey and so
10:55
everything with the MDR therapy is about
10:57
memory work and we're working to resolve
11:00
memories that were maladaptively encoded
11:02
with very specific set of information
11:05
how we feel emotionally how our body
11:08
takes in data the sensations that are
11:11
with it and then the thoughts that
11:12
couple up about myself you know I'm not
11:15
good enough I'm not smart enough I'm not
11:17
safe I'm powerless there's nothing I can
11:20
do the way we experience the world we
11:23
sometimes get stuck because of the way
11:26
memory gets thwarted in time and it kind
11:29
of acts as if it's still happening right
11:31
so we end up with with with trauma
11:34
responses that are based in a Time
11:36
orientation issue in the past yeah and
11:39
so ultimately we're working with memory
11:42
and all of the memory work that we
11:44
address in EMDR therapy has to do with
11:47
resolving memory that was thwarted in
11:49
time so what if I only have one
11:52
traumatic event happen to me
11:54
some people claim they don't have any
11:56
traumatic events but they know
11:58
something's not quite right very true
12:00
and they come in and they go my
12:01
childhood was perfect everything was
12:03
great my parents loved me I have no
12:05
problems but I don't know why I am so
12:08
anxious or I don't know why I always
12:11
have to be perfect or I don't know why I
12:13
can't tolerate when my husband's upset
12:15
with me and so we take whatever the
12:18
presenting issues are and we decide how
12:20
are we going to approach from an EMDR
12:22
therapy approach or the AIP lens what
12:26
are we going to use are we going to need
12:27
to use some techniques that help just
12:29
create some stress reduction or some
12:32
symptom reduction is that primarily what
12:34
someone wants to address or is there a
12:36
specific protocol maybe they want to
12:38
address an addiction or maybe they have
12:40
a phobia or about something so we might
12:43
want to use a specific protocol to
12:45
address a presenting problem but the way
12:48
I tend to approach my clients for the
12:50
most part is really with a full
12:53
comprehensive psychotherapy approach
12:55
because what I love about EMDR therapy
12:58
is it doesn't just it's not just for
13:01
symptom reduction
13:02
we can address problems with low
13:04
self-esteem we can address developmental
13:07
deficits from attachment injuries and
13:10
help to promote adaptive responses in
13:13
the now that better match our current
13:16
level of safety in our current selves
13:18
and ultimately a more adult response
13:21
that has space between the stimulus and
13:24
our reaction so that it matches who I
13:27
want to be more in line with the values
13:28
that I hold today so it can be a really
13:31
comprehensive full self approach and I
13:35
think that it's so beautiful because it
13:38
promotes personal growth it promotes the
13:41
Therapeutic Alliance so the relationship
13:44
is so critical kind of like an EFT
13:46
therapy honestly where we really rely on
13:51
in a full comprehensive
13:52
psychotherapeutic approach that the
13:54
relationship is the greatest predictor
13:56
for outcome and that's in all therapies
13:58
quite frankly right and so I love with
14:00
with using MDR therapy that there's this
14:03
moment to moment Attunement and
14:05
awareness where we're able to help build
14:08
in real time repair right we'll be we're
14:11
able to show up for a client now in ways
14:14
that people didn't address them in the
14:16
past and so they can start to make new
14:18
memories in accordance with what's true
14:21
now and so through the therapeutic
14:23
relationship and uh connection and
14:26
safety in the now people start to build
14:28
more capacity to tolerate distress but
14:31
they also build trust and resilience
14:33
right right I think that speaks so much
14:35
to about how humans are made for
14:37
connection right and if we can model
14:40
that as a therapist and they can try it
14:42
on in the real world quote unquote I say
14:44
right what a beautiful thing as almost
14:46
an investment to themselves long term as
14:49
you're talking about for all these
14:50
future relationships they practice they
14:52
practice with us yeah so that they can
14:55
they can emulate or replicate the safety
14:59
in this relationship yeah and moving it
15:01
out into the real world with their other
15:03
relationships I always say borrow it
15:04
from me until you own it for yourself
15:06
Perfect Right absolutely so EMDR Works
15:11
to address three prongs IT addresses the
15:14
past IT addresses present triggers and
15:16
present issues and it also addresses
15:19
future
15:20
experiences so when someone comes in and
15:22
they say something like I've never been
15:25
in a plane crash I've never had anything
15:27
bad happen to me in an airplane but I am
15:29
just petrified to go on an airplane we
15:32
can actually Target proactively an
15:35
anticipatory anxiety and we can address
15:38
imagining being in the plane Imagining
15:41
the worst case scenario and we can
15:44
reprocess future anxiety around worst
15:47
case scenario situations bringing relief
15:49
to a person and allowing them some
15:51
capacity to go on that that plane trip
15:53
that's so awesome right you know being
15:55
able to think ahead in that way too so
15:58
I'm coming to therapy and I'm ready to
16:00
start EMDR what exactly does that
16:02
process look like so EMDR therapy is an
16:06
eight phase process and a lot of times
16:08
clients will say you know I went to
16:10
another EMDR therapist but you know we
16:12
never did any reprocessing and I say how
16:15
many times did you see them oh I went
16:17
four times but we never did any
16:18
reprocessing and so I'll say Well when
16:21
we're using this lens of treatment we're
16:24
thinking through things globally and so
16:27
there are eight phases in the first
16:29
phase and you might have only ended up
16:31
in the first couple of phases and maybe
16:33
that's why you didn't do any
16:34
reprocessing but we have to do a
16:36
thorough history taking if we're doing a
16:38
a comprehensive approach so we still
16:40
have to get a thorough history from our
16:42
clients people need to tell us you know
16:45
their stories and we need our
16:47
generational history we need Grandma and
16:49
Grandpa we need Mom and Dad because the
16:52
way I'm listening is how far back did
16:55
someone need to learn the adaptations
16:57
that they are currently dealing with and
17:00
so I'm listening for the landscape of
17:02
their story their history their uh their
17:06
socioeconomic backgrounds the the
17:08
careers and jobs that their parents and
17:11
grandparents had I'm listening for where
17:14
were their parents in birth order was
17:16
there any trauma in their families
17:18
stories so there's a lot of history that
17:20
I want to be thorough about especially
17:22
when thinking about that developmental
17:24
lens and the attachment traumas that
17:25
happen in so many people because I want
17:28
to hear where did these fractures
17:30
originate and it might not just be in
17:32
the story of the client in front of me
17:34
it might be that they're carrying some
17:36
of the generational burden of their pain
17:38
yeah absolutely so the second phase that
17:41
we have to address is the preparation
17:43
phase this is where we do
17:45
psychoeducation we do stabilization we
17:48
teach some coping skills but most
17:51
importantly we learn if the client can
17:53
State change meaning I can go from a
17:55
state of arousal and I can trust that my
17:57
body can bring me back to a state of
17:59
calm call me enough we don't have to be
18:01
calm calm but we have to know that we
18:03
can shift a little bit and that's what
18:05
we're working on to understand in the
18:07
preparation phase and and it's important
18:09
that once we have the ability for State
18:11
change that we can do some summary
18:14
processing so phase three is the
18:17
assessment phase this is where a client
18:18
says to us
18:20
this is what I want to work on these are
18:22
the problems that I'm struggling with
18:23
this is how I want my life to look when
18:26
it's effective and then this is where we
18:28
reverse engineer what we're dealing with
18:31
the presenting issue and that it's tied
18:34
back in memory somewhere in the past and
18:37
these are where the presenting issues
18:39
are stuck or thwarted in real time and
18:43
so we'll assess and then we get into the
18:46
desensitization phase and in that phase
18:48
we are actually actively reprocessing
18:51
memories in that phase we are combining
18:54
a set of specific elements and we are
18:57
using specific protocols in order to
18:59
address the uh the maladaptively encoded
19:02
material and so after the
19:06
desensitization phase we are then doing
19:09
what we call an installation phase so we
19:11
are plucking out the negative belief
19:13
that got stuck in our trauma time and we
19:16
are installing something that's more
19:18
adaptive so if my negative belief was
19:21
you know I'm not good enough then my
19:23
positive belief is I am enough I'm good
19:27
enough as I am and so it's really
19:29
beautiful because now we're working our
19:30
way still reprocessing but on a more
19:33
adaptive side of our memory networks and
19:35
it's so powerful and exciting to get to
19:38
see people really start to believe the
19:40
truth about what's now which is I am
19:42
enough even if other people don't like
19:44
what I did or what I said or I don't
19:46
have to be perfect I'm enough as I am
19:48
and then of course the next phase is our
19:52
body scan when we are dealing with
19:55
trauma our body is the first to adapt
19:57
and it's the last to let go so we're
20:00
checking our work we're we're fully
20:03
installing a positive belief after we've
20:05
reprocessed the memories associated with
20:07
current day issues and we are checking
20:11
the body for any residual tension or
20:13
tightness or perhaps information or data
20:16
that says we've got more work to do and
20:18
so we check the body for for the rest of
20:21
the work related to this memory
20:24
and then we do closure so this is where
20:26
we do some grounding and stabilization
20:28
and make sure that the client is in a
20:30
good space so that they can go back into
20:32
the world because they can feel a little
20:33
jumbled and messy through this
20:35
reprocessing experience and we want to
20:38
ground them and make sure they're
20:39
they're good to go off to the races yeah
20:42
and if we don't get through the entire
20:44
sequence of the arousal and dearousal of
20:47
reprocessing a memory we at the next
20:50
session or or afterward we'll need to
20:52
reevaluate and see what we still need to
20:54
do where does the memory sit and what do
20:58
we need to address still that's not
21:00
fully resolved yeah absolutely I think
21:02
just speaking to also like phase five
21:05
that installation phase right
21:07
that's like I feel like we're we're so
21:09
much of the magic is too because that's
21:11
that investment part right that's the
21:13
piece that clients can take with them
21:15
after because now they have this
21:16
newfound this new meaning they're making
21:18
from their trauma which is so awesome
21:20
right so yeah and that's what is That's
21:22
Where It's At yes we can totally be in
21:25
love with the fact that I don't just
21:28
have a reduction in symptoms and I don't
21:30
have a reduction in distress right but I
21:32
feel like an entirely different person
21:34
right I'm not just oh I'm not good
21:36
enough and like I got rid of that no I
21:37
put something else there now that I can
21:39
move forward with how incredible I love
21:41
it so good well thank you so much for
21:44
for joining me today and for us to talk
21:47
about EMDR therapy a little bit and just
21:49
give our viewers a bit of a taste of
21:51
what they can expect with EMDR therapy
21:54
and how it works and of course why we
21:56
love it so thank you so much of course
21:59
thank you thank you so much for tuning
22:01
in like we talked about we talked about
22:03
the history of EMDR therapy a little bit
22:05
about how it works we also talked about
22:08
the phases in EMDR therapy and I will be
22:11
talking more about this topic what it
22:14
can treat and how we think it works in
22:17
our next episode don't forget to lead
22:19
with love it'll never steer you wrong
22:23
foreign
22:26
[Music]
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