What is EMDR therapy and how does it work?
Short answer
EMDR is psychotherapy for memories that never settled. You hold part of a memory in mind while your attention moves rhythmically left and right — eye movements, pulses in your palms, or tones. The aim is for the distress to come down and for the memory to stop acting like the present. The exact mechanism is not settled. The World Health Organization recommends it for PTSD.
The acronym stands for eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing. The name describes one tool rather than the whole job, which is why it sounds stranger than it is.
Why some memories never settle
Most of what happens to you gets processed and filed as the past. Your brain knows when it was, knows it is over, and when you recall it you are remembering — not reliving.
When something is too big, too fast or too long, that filing never finishes. The event stays recorded the way it arrived: with the image, the smell, the sound, the tension in your body, and the conclusion you drew about yourself at the time. No date is attached to it. So a door slams and the whole file opens at full volume, as if it were today.
That is not a matter of character and it is not a matter of willpower. It is a matter of storage.
What actually happens in the room
I ask you to hold part of the memory in mind — the worst image, and what you feel in your body alongside it. While you hold it, I move your attention alternately left and right. Usually that is my hand, which you follow with your eyes; it can also be two small devices that pulse in turn in your palms, or tones through headphones.
It runs about thirty seconds. Then we stop and I ask what came up. I do not interpret and I do not correct — I ask. Whatever came up is the next thing you hold in mind, and we repeat.
After several rounds the memory starts to shift on its own. People describe the image moving further away, losing colour, or stopping being the first thing that comes to mind.
You do not have to tell me what happened. You only need to be able to bring it to mind.
Eight phases
The whole protocol, briefly
Processing begins at phase four, desensitisation, and continues through the ones after it. Assessment and preparation come first so the work has a clear target and a safe pace — and most of it happens before anything opens at all.
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01
1–2 sessions
History
What happened, and the order we will work in. I do not ask for details you do not want to give.
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02
before processing
Preparation
Concrete ways back to steady, and an agreed signal you use to stop me mid-session.
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03
processing begins
Assessment
We pick one memory: the image, the conclusion about yourself attached to it, and where you feel it.
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04
several sessions
Desensitisation
Rounds of bilateral stimulation. This is where the charge comes down, and the part people call "EMDR".
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05
same session
Installation
The old conclusion is replaced by the one that is true now — not as a phrase, but until the body accepts it.
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06
same session
Body scan
We check whether tension is left. If it is, it is not finished — and that is information, not failure.
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07
end of each session
Closure
Each session ends with time for stabilisation and a check on how you are.
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08
next session
Re-evaluation
Next time we check whether it held. If it did not, we go back — that is expected.
Four things people expect that do not happen
- Not hypnosis
- You are awake throughout, you know where you are, and one word from you stops it.
- Not retelling
- You talk far less than you expect. You never have to say the details out loud.
- Not reliving it
- If you are reliving it, we went too fast — and stopping us is my job, not yours.
- Not erasing the memory
- It stays yours and you still know it. What changes is the weight it carries.
What is actually known
EMDR is one of the most heavily tested trauma treatments there is. The World Health Organization recommends it for post-traumatic stress disorder, in adults and in children, alongside exposure therapy and trauma-focused cognitive behavioural therapy — the WHO guidance is public.
What is not settled is why bilateral stimulation helps. There are several explanations and none of them is a closed question. Anyone who tells you it is resolved is selling you a certainty the field does not have.
Practically, that means one thing from me: I will tell you after the initial assessment how many I expect this to take, instead of guessing now.
Start with twenty minutes on the phone
No charge and no expectation that you continue. If I am not the right person, I will tell you and refer you to someone suitable.