How does EMDR work?

EMDR works by helping memories or "neural networks" that are stuck in the brain link up with more resourceful, creative, and expansive networks in the brain. This is done in session by having the client process memories, feelings, or sensations, while receiving some form of alternating stimulation to each side of the body. The result is that the memories, feelings, or sensations that felt stuck now seem to move toward a greater sense of ease and resolution and no longer feel troubling. I believe as many others do, that this is truly the mind and body's natural tendency to move towards integration and healing.

EMDR entails an eight-phase approach guided by an information processing model that views pathology as based upon perceptual information that has been maladaptively stored. Consequently, EMDR treatment focuses on the perceptual components of the memory (affective, cognitive, and somatic) in order to expedite the accessing and processing of disturbing events and facilitate an attendant learning process. More specifically, EMDR aims to (i) facilitate resolution of memories of earlier life experiences (e.g.,
elicitation of insight, cognitive reorganization, adaptive affects, and physiological responses), (ii) desensitize stimuli that trigger present distress as a result of second-order conditioning, and (iii) incorporate adaptive attitudes, skills, and desired behaviors for enhanced future functioning.

So what would be causing those parts of the brain to have too much or too little activity going on?

All patterns (brain activity patterns, thinking patterns, emotional patterns, behavior patterns, communication patterns, relationship patterns)--both the good ones and the bad ones--are simply the result of an accumulation of experiences stored in your brain and nervous system. Most of the negative “patterns” people come to me wanting to change have been caused by one of two things, sometimes both. The first is something called imprinting. From the time you are born, maybe even earlier in the womb, your brain starts developing very rapidly, and how it develops is shaped tremendously by everything being pulled in through your five senses. This creates an “imprint” on your developing brain which becomes sort of a “default mode”--the conditioned way you will naturally tend to think, feel and act, unless other forces have somehow reshaped this imprinting later on. So early life experiences; even ones you can’t consciously remember)--especially experiences with caregivers and others close around you--have a massive influence on your personality development.

The second major shaping influence for these patterns is stress. Pretty much from conception onward, anytime you’re under any type of stress your brain triggers certain glands in your body to produce a large amount of hormones we can “stress hormones”- -things like adrenaline, cortisol, and some other things. During these periods of time, your brain does NOT process the information coming in through your five senses the way it normally does. This leads to a chain reaction of effects in your nervous system - it’s a little hard to explain, but it’s kind of like “undigested” sensory data that creates “blockages” in your nervous system, alterations to pathways within your nervous system and alterations to brain chemistry where your neurotransmitters; such as seratonin, dopamine, chetacholamine, epinephrine, nor-epinephrine, etc.) get thrown out of balance.

The bottom line is - it’s the build up of the effects of this “stress response” in your body, brain and nervous system that we believe to be the culprit behind most of the emotional difficulties that people experience. Basically, you’ve reached a point where certain things are triggering a pattern of neurological impulses in your body to fire off over and over again. The most challenging thing is that over time all these patterns get stronger and stronger--it’s like working out a muscle, the more you work it the stronger it gets (on a neurological level, it’s actually more like water running through a trench--the more water that runs through it, the deeper it becomes carved out until it gets to the place where it seems like everything flows into that trench much too easily!

The Brain