Can eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR), a psychotherapy technique, work to help people with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in just 5 sessions? The short answer is, yes.
And what about its long-term effects of EMDR? Do the benefits continue even after treatment …
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I have been using EMDR as a treatment for PTSD with my Psychologist who was trained in EMDR techniques. I would say quickly that my PTSD is in all probability caused from a combination of traumatic events; in my youth, as an adult, and as recently as three weeks ago. The bases of the treatments to date have been directly related to being raped at age 13 and another attempted at age 16 (I AM A SURVIVOR). So far, I have had only four treatments but can report the following observations that may answer a question for someone;
1. I would say that this technique has made remember some of the senses and feelings that I had not remembered for a long time about the rape. It brought back memories of parts of the rape very vividly I would say. I do think though that this may be a good thing so that I can deal with all of the repressed feelings that I have been harboring for the last 40 years.
2. I have noticed that for three to four days after the EMDR treatments that I will have significantly more nightmares, not only about the rapes but also about other traumatic events that have occurred.
3. I find that after these sessions I feel both mentally and physically exhausted and that this usually takes about an hour or so. I should say that I find all forms of therapy seem to leave me with feeling this way.
4. I find this treatment causes my headaches to become more prominent during the course of the sessions. I do not see my headaches increase with other forms of therapy however; I may get a small spike.
I will be continuing with these treatments, which I have not had for about three weeks, as there was a very traumatic incident that occurred. My head Psychiatrist and Psychologist have been treating me for this incident although they are going to decide about using EMDR to treat the most recent trauma. As for anything about long term I cannot say, however; I look at EMDR as another form of therapy to help in getting to a place where I can return to work and to try to get beyond where I am at this point in my life. Aside from being treated for PTSD, I am being treated for BPD, Panic/Anxiety, Migraines, and problems with sleep. I am also receiving other types of therapy that includes Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy, Hypnosis, and in a Group setting with other Psychologists and Psychiatrists.
Thank you very much for your first-hand perspective of this treatment! I think such information is invaluable to people considering undergoing this treatment option.
I tend to remain skeptical about EMDR given that we still know so little about how it works, especially claims that it can resolve PTSD symptoms so rapidly. There was a recent metastudy comparing EMDR to other trauma treatments which found that EMDR is about as effective as trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy in treating PTSD (Psychological treatments for chronic post-traumatic stress disorder. Systematic review and meta-analysis. Bisson JI, Ehlers A, Matthews R, Pilling S, Richards D, & Turner S. British Journal of Psychiatry, Feb. 2007: 97-104). A previous metastudy has yielded the same result (Seidler GH & Wagner FE. Comparing the efficacy of EMDR and trauma-focused cognitive-behavioral therapy in the treatment of PTSD: a meta-analytic study. Psychological Medicine, 2006 Nov;36(11):1515-22). I’d include actual links if I knew more HTML.
Poetman does give an accurate account, in my experience, of what it is like to incorporate EMDR in the process of healing from PTSD. Childhood trauma, as Doc John sites, does present a more complicated therapeutic process. Finding a therapist who has formal training with EMDR is imperative as the experience is comparative to lancing a festering wound. There are safeguards put in place and used throughout the process. The therapists keen assessment of the client throughout the process provides boundaries as to how far to push during any given session.
I think it is very important for the client to understand that EMDR does, initially, intensify all the old hurts. But, this allows for the processing of those old injuries that were tucked away and not dealt with. In a safer environment, such as the therapists office, and with their guidance and counceling, the old hurts can finally be processed and laid to rest – or at least allow the intensity of pain associated with those hurts to be decreased. It doesn’t make you forget, EMDR helps to put those feelings and memories in a better place.
Yes, EMDR is exhausting and I find it to be very painful and raw when dealing with those childhood traumas. In fact, the mere mention of “are you up to some EMDR?” can make me dissociate. Nightmares, headaches, flashbacks, dissociation – Poetman gives a good assessment of the after affects. But, over all, I do find it to help.
It’s better than continuing to carry around all of this pain.
I appreciate EMDR and what it does. I work with one of the best in the field. He often eliminates PTSD in one or two sessions.
In my personal practice I use a variety of other modalities (NLP, Energy Meridian, kinesthetic modality shifts, etc.). In most cases with most trauma memories, I see total resolution and neutralization with just one session. That may sound preposterous, but with all the humility I can muster up, that is what happens often. I am amazed at how slow the traditional methodologies are.
I’ll admit I’m fairly sceptical about EMDR. I’m an awful lot more sceptical of NLP, however, since most of its major claims have been falsified (check out the skeptics dictionary available online).
Placebo can be really very effective. Freud found that placing his hand on his female clients foreheads and insisting that they remembered their childhood trauma similarly got them getting into the carthartic thing. Is EMDR similarly effective to other such techniques? Don’t get me wrong, placebo can be very effective indeed (people had wonderful results with magnets and hypnotism) but placebo it was. I’m not sure what I think about EMDR…
6 month follow up isn’t really long term…
I’ve had my share of experiences with psychotherapists and different types of “therapies”, like EMDR. I know people are looking for hope, but EMDR is false hope. Please do your homework on these types of therapies before paying money or asking your insurance to. A good place to start would be mentalhealthwatch.org. Good Luck!
I don’t know if EMDR works or not. The successes claimed may be happening because of suggestibility present in the subject.
Hyper-suggestibility occurred in victims of Jumping Frenchmen of Maine disorder. Although that does not seem to have a connection to this discussion, operant conditioning has been posited as the cause of the 1880′s episode and therefore suggestibility. Similar startle-matching behaviors still happen around the world as Culture Bound Syndromes.
PTSD is posited in the DSM as an outcome of remembered trauma. But there is no proof that this is true.
It may be that the same exposure that caused JFMMD is actually at the bottom of the believed “trauma induced” PTSD.
The vivid episodes of PTSD could be the brain’s response to “panic attack” like episodes caused by Subliminal Distraction exposure.
Simply creating a “cure scenario” with placebo treatment might be the source of EMDR’s success.
Oh, please… I’ve been in the field of helping people for many years and I have constant eyewitness of many folks (around 95% of my patients) experience trauma, phobia, etc. disolution. I suspect that folks that are down on EMDR and NLP are probably not trained in it and therefore are speaking from “internet reports” and possibly out of touch with their own emotions and live in the cranial world only. Just my take. No offense intended.
Facts are facts. Shapiro, the so-called inventor of EMDR received a PhD from an unaccredited school, so its essentially worthless. There is not a single controlled study accepted by the medical community that EMDR has any benefit whatsoever. If you still want to beleive it is a legitimate treatment despite the truth, then I wonder just how far out of touch you are with reality.
http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/mentserv.html#EMDR
“been_there_done_that” should talk to all the patients I constantly see that over year later, still have no residual trauma effects having been treated via EMDR or other similar modalities. I work with the former Director of the National Pain Society and also another former director of a large rehabilitation dept. Both went on to start their own clinic. Both believe and apply EMDR in treating psychological trauma from incapacitating injuries. Like them there are many.
The Shapiro argument is a poor one. YOu are correct on her Ph.D., however, you ignore the vast legitimate Ph.D.’s that use it. The body of literature is growing. I rather choose the healing I constantly see that holds over the long haul than this gentleman’s implied alternatives that typically take years if at all there is healing.
My husband has gone to an exhaustive number of cognitive behavioural counselling sessions for his PTSD. My husband did not improve and actually got a bit worse.
With our marriage on the brink of destruction, I asked him to try EMDR with a different therapist. I read about EMDR and was intrigued. I have seen more change in him from the EMDR sessions he has gone to, than anything else. He also reports feeling 100% better.
After seeing the results in my husband, I have actually gone myself for EMDR, to treat my panic attacks caused by my husband’s affairs (stemming from his childhood PTSD). I am feeling much better. The memories are still there, but not nearly as painful as they were. I can actually function now.
I am not a scientist, a skeptic, or a hopeful looking for a miracle. But I can say that as a patient, EMDR is helping us.
Samuel
You say that the “body of research is growing.” Can you please provide me with links to an independently funded study addressing EMDR’s effectiveness when compared to other treatment modalities and placebo? How about some studies that show that the Eye Movement portion works as intended (e.g. EMDR w/ and without Eye movements)? Please, have these studies be published in reputable journals and with significant treatment sizes. I’ve read the “case studies” on EMDR and they are just that – case studies.
My sense is that the CBT portion of EMDR and suggestibility of the treatment milieu are the most important here. I also suspect that, there is very little to no difference when comparing EMDR to other treatment modalities. Comparing them to a control group (untreated) is pointless.
I am a recipient of EMDR and I am amazed at how quickly it gets me in touch with the gut pain of the trauma, but just as quickly leads to resolution in the session. It doesn’t remove the memories of my childhood abuse, but it removes the ongoing anxiety, fear, paralysis that I feel as an adult. That pain belongs to the young child, and I experience it as such in the emdr, so that I no longer have to be haunted by it as an adult. It really does work!!
I too have been undergoing EMDR and I have to say after YEARS of working with the typical treatments and practices that are out there I have seen a dramatic reduction in my PTSD from on the job experiences. It really does work!
To “been_there_done_that” and other skeptics of EMDR or any other treatments: Whether you think it is legitimate or not is not important. What matters is that it works for a lot of people (even if it is a placebo – it still WORKS). So, please don’t discourage people from trying something that could ultimately change their lives for the better.
Here’s a GREAT collection of links about EMDR & Mindfulness from psychologist and former PESI speaker who was trained in EMDR in 1995 under the direction of Dr. Francine Shapiro, EMDR’s originator:
http://www.ThePsychologist.com/pesi.htm
Like any therapy, the practice of EMDR is effective, especially when incorporated into an overall integrated therapy approach. Nothing is going to work the same for everyone. EMDR has been proven to work in scientific studies. Go to EMDRIA’s website for more details.
Hmmmm.
I really think it is an unfair question. After being an EMDR therapist for over 12 years, the answer there is no set time.
There are way too many variables. My approach is extremely direct, I talk during the eye movements and I challenge alot of the myths to accelerate the process. For some people this is great, they get quick results. For other people this is a poor approach and they need to go slower.
Then there is the variable of how many threads are there are to the trauma. Have they done any work on it before. Is there a trauma they blocked that now is coming up.
In my experience I have seen results in just one EMDR session, usually unresolved grief. 6 EMDR sessions for a Viet Nam Vet. 3 for a rape survivor, and 10 for a different survivor of Rape.
So my answer is there is no answer.
I would tend to remain skeptical myself at this point. Too new and generally nothing comes quick and easy. Maybe, as was mentioned, the effect is more placebo than anything. I won’t rule it out, but I would remain skeptical.
These posts begin in 2007 and there are now a lot more people who have been significantly helped with long term stable results using EMDR. The research is now substantial and the people who have been helped don’t care about sceptics who have never witnessed therapeutic transformations from what was a living hell. Placebos don’t transform, only temporarily placate. It is not possible for the recipient of life saving therapy to be a sceptic. The fact that some who receive EMDR for a time get worse, more nightmares etc – and I have heard this before – is a concern and raises questions as to how it works. I do not employ EMDR in my practice but I know therapists who successfully do. I use TIR (Traumatic Incident Reduction) and note that I have never seen this happen. TIR addresses an incident and stays with it till it resolves. This occasionally makes for a longer session but the pain trapped in the event releases and has never come back in my experience. My understanding of the mechanism of traumatic events (as explained in TIR literature) makes this logical. With the “charge” no longer in the memory, there is no longer anything there to trigger and being truly resolved (always signified in the session) it cannot create itself again. People have said in earlier posts that these therapies don’t get rid of the memory but the pain goes. No therapy would claim to get rid of a memory except perhaps lobotomy. Memories are not the enemy, only the unbearable emotional pain in them.
I know someone who is doing EMDR. Does it help? I haven’t decided that yet. I can say that this person feels that unless their entire family goes to therapy there is no hope for this person to get better. That in some way they are being denied their reality because their entire family isn’t in therapy. The family feels that if this is what this particular person needs to feel better, being in therapy, then so be it and by all means go. But they also feel that it is unfair for the one person to demand that the entire family be in therapy when they absolutely don’t feel that they are the ones who need it. This is like saying if you all don’t go to therapy then it is all your fault that I don’t get better. What say all of you.
I like PsychCentral and have referred clients here, but I have to say that I’d be more impressed with EMDR and this article if EMDR were studied against anxiety treatments other than SSRIs and placebo.
This seems a bit of a rehash that EMDR is better than Prozac (an antidepressant) or doing nothing.