When Words Are Not Enough

Talk therapy is beneficial and serves a great purpose. There is much benefit in being able to say out loud the things that have been spiraling around in your head. However, when it comes to memories that exist around Trauma, this can often be re-traumatizing to talk in detail about what happened. 

People who have experienced a traumatic event experience many of the following symptoms:

• Anxiety/Panic Attacks
  
• Depression
  
• Elevated responses to situations
  
• Flashbacks (vivid memories that pop up randomly) 
  
• Nightmares
  
• Intrusive thoughts (thoughts that trigger anxiety, fear, or intense emotion)
  
• Difficulty sleeping 
  
• Outbursts of Anger
  
• Shame (blaming self for what happened) 
  
• Distancing themselves from relationships, even relationships that once felt safe. ​
  

People often downplay their experiences and may not realize or classify their experience as traumatic, which is often accompanied by the thought “what I experienced isn’t as bad as…”

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a highly effective treatment for resolving traumatic memories. To better understand EMDR, I often give the analogy of understanding our brains as a filing system. Because of the way that our brain stores memories, similar memories often get filed away together. However, there isn’t a file system that holds trauma. In fact, our brain doesn’t know how to cope with traumatic memories. This often leaves the brain in a constant state of survival, trying to process the memory, but is often unsuccessful - therefore causing the side effects above. 

EMDR encourages clients to stay in the present while touching their toe in the past. They are simply noticing the memory, instead of being part of, or reliving the memory. EMDR is effective in taking the “charge” out of a traumatic memory, leaving it feeling less vivid and allows for a reduction in the emotions attached to it. 

Coming Soon:
In 2026, Nurtured Hearts Counseling will begin offering EMDR Intensives. Intensives differ from typical processing sessions in that they are often longer sessions focused on processing. If you think of a typical session (50 minutes), an intensive EMDR session ranges from 3 hours to multiple days. This allows for a consistent focus on the memories and therefore brings resolutions more quickly.