What is Trauma?

If you’ve experienced something deeply distressing or disturbing, you may be suffering from trauma. It can can overwhelm your ability to cope, cause feelings of helplessness, and may limit your capacity to feel emotions fully. This may be from a single event or may have occurred over a period of time, like childhood. Emotional distress, flashbacks, damaged relationships, and even physical issues like headaches or nausea are among the long-term repercussions. Even though these feelings are common, some people find it hard to carry on with their regular lives. If that’s you, you could likely benefit from the help of trauma counselling to develop effective coping skills for your emotions and symptoms.

How EMDR Trauma Therapy can help

The brain has a built-in mechanism for handling trauma. As part of our natural "fight, flight, or freeze" reaction, we get an adrenaline surge while dealing with a crisis. It provides us with the ability to handle these situations. Events are then resolved in our brains, thanks to communication between various brain regions. However, sometimes the brain needs assistance in processing upsetting situations. If the trauma hasn’t been processed properly we continue to experience its impact.

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) therapy allows us to revisit traumatic situations safely and to manage them better. EMDR is recommended and recognized by many international health authorities, including World Health Organization (WHO), UK Department of Health, and US Veterans Affairs.

What else can EMDR help treat?

✔ It can help reduce symptoms of PTSD

✔ Can help reduce anxiety

✔ Helps reduce symptoms of depression

✔ Panic attacks

✔ Eating disorders

✔ It can help with fears and phobias

✔ It can help process grief and loss

What are the advantages of EMDR therapy?

People of all ages, from children to adults, can benefit from EMDR treatment. It alleviates the stress associated with specific events or themes and enables people to get "unstuck" from particular memories. EMDR also has a distancing effect, making an issue seem smaller. It alleviates the pain and unpleasant emotions associated with painful memories.

How does EMDR therapy work?

In EMDR, you’ll recall past events while being stimulated on both sides of the body, either physically (by tapping either side) or bilaterally (by moving their eyes to the side). The therapist will lead you and this will assist your brain in processing little pieces of memory at a time. To help you overcome trauma, the therapist will work with you at your own speed. The idea is to recall the event without recreating the negative thoughts and feelings accompanying it.

Offering in-person counselling in North Vancouver at 1940 Lonsdale Ave. Online appointments are also available for BC residents.