Emdr And Confusion..

[samson]

One of the things that happened when I first started making any kind of progress is I would notice a couple of days after a session my negative thinking patterns would kick back in. I asked my T if my brain would try and fight this healing process and he responded with these words: "Yes. Your old scripts were built in response to memories. those scripts are what you have "believed" about reality for a long time. Your brain now has to reassess the memories to come up with another explanation of reality. So you get to rewrite history. Feel the power!!!"

I don't know why - but that really helped me understand that what was happening was normal and I had some level of control over what I believed the truth to be about myself.

 

[zaniara]

I asked my T if my brain would try and fight this healing process and he responded with these words: "Yes. Your old scripts were built in response to memories. those scripts are what you have "believed" about reality for a long time. Your brain now has to reassess the memories to come up with another explanation of reality. So you get to rewrite history. Feel the power!!!"

It's so strange that you wrote that; because it was just what my therapist and I ended up talking about last session. He said that my old script of course would resist the changes, and thus that the evil/self-harming thoughts will increase when we start to work with the traumas that caused me to create those scripts. It was really helpful to hear him say this and at the same time read what you wrote. Because it give me some understanding to what's happening and I've started to try and tell those old scripts in my head to shut up. :D It's actually helping a bit.

But I didn't really get that last part of it: in what way you get to rewrite the history?

 

[zaniara]

it can cut through layers of seemingly unprocessable trauma and cognitive/emotional distortion that, for me, have been pretty immune to other forms of therapy.

This has been my experience as well. I've worked so hard to change a lot of the old scripts inside of me, but it never helped. "My inner truth" never changed, but I've noticed that the EMDR really does change stuff for real. Faster than any "talk-therapy" or other therapy ever could have. Very grateful for that. (My therapist says that when so much of the traumas is from such an early age: and thus are less "pictures" but more body-memories and such EMDR is an excellent tool. I've noticed!)

That said, it isn't always feasible, or reasonable, or helpful, to maintain that speed and intensity for more than short contained periods of time. I have taken many many breaks from EMDR, both to consolidate and rework its outcomes, and because of challenges and threats to my own coping and stability

That's reassuring to read. And I gather that's the case for me too. Right now is one of those periods: where I need help to stabilize me and work some more on coping-skills and safety during the process. (the memories that are "catching in on me" are so vile and horrible in some ways that they make me want to die.. And it scares me really much! )

Sounds like you have a great and very effective and skilled therapist Zaniara, which should bring you much reassurance

I do! :) I'm so very grateful for that. But he isn't that experienced in EMDR yet; he's still in a learning-process. But I think that makes him a better therapist too: since he is actively changing his approach and always trying out "new stuff" and thus are finding new ways all the time to get me through the process. He is really dedicated and enthusiastic too! :D Sometimes so much that I get angry with him.. (A very irrational reaction!) But he always ends up being right in his positive "expectations".

It's my job to be honest and to communicate as clearly as I can

I do too. I hate people who bullshit me, so I never bullshit him. And I'm so straightforward that he has thanked me for giving him so much more accurate feedback than he is used to get! :D He said again this Monday that he really appreciate me being so very honest. Guess that means I'm doing the right thing.

Thank you again for your very valuable input! :)

 

[zaniara]

Really grateful for all the input. I managed to do something that's big process for me. I managed to express my concerns and fears(of being flooded and not coping with this; being overwhelmed) and he tried out some EMDR with me we haven't tried out before. One that didn't include working on a specific trauma, but rather was like a mindfulness practice. And we tried to get me back to my safe place every time a bad body-memory(being suffocated is one of them) or images surfaced. It helped some, and I'm able to eat, do the dishes and function reasonably well again, but I'm still pretty fragile and have a lot of problems with dissociation right now(triggered by intrusive memories/flashbacks).

I actually called him and asked again for what I need(!! BIG progress for me!!); said that I need more stabilizing work, and he said he thought so too. :) *glad* My "safe-place" has been invaded by my father, so we need to work on finding me a new one. The only problem is that I have a hard time feeling safety at all. The concept is very vague for me. It usually means having my back against the wall in my small bathroom, watching the door, while being locked inside my apartment, and being reasonably certain that no-one is about to break in to my apartment. But.. That doesn't really feel like it's a deep feeling of being secure/safe. I don't think I've ever known that kind of feeling ever in my life. So I don't know how to be able to build a stronger "safe-place". But my therapist said we will work on that.

I'm really grateful for EMDR. I don't dare to think about where I would have been by now if it wasn't for EMDR. I'm not in the best of places, but without it I would be in a much worse state than this.

 

[samson]

Zariana, I am just now understanding what rewriting history means as well. In one of my last sessions we took a memory where I used to feel stupid, dirty and used, but began to see myself, instead as just not knowing what was going to happen. It was a change in script from self hatred to compassion. The history I see thorough the PTSD lens is wrong. The real history is that I was a victim of a sociopath and I made a big mistake and couldn't find my way out quickly. When we first started working on this my therapist said I made a mistake and I nearly came unglued. I said I would NEVER view this as a mistake. I was an idiot for falling for this guy. So, almost two years later with emdr I can see what really happened.

Does that help?

 

[zaniara]

In one of my last sessions we took a memory where I used to feel stupid, dirty and used, but began to see myself, instead as just not knowing what was going to happen. It was a change in script from self hatred to compassion.

Sorry for the late reply! But thank you for yours! And yes, I understand what you are talking about. I've actually experienced it when it comes to some of the memories we have been working with. :) One horrible act done to me by five men made me feel like a stupid, scared and broken women who needed to run and hide for 16 years or so, but after working with that memory I could feel how strong she was to survive it all, and how she was not to blame. I could actually acknowledge her strength in a very hopeless situation.

But this last time something isn't really working.. I have "re-written" parts of this memory. I understand it a bit more. But even after working with it one more time, and ending up at 1 on the SUD-scale and the positive self statement being true, I still don't feel good at all about it. I still feel ashamed, and I still don't feel it's okay to talk about it. I tried to write about in my diary, but I just couldn't. Because I'm still ashamed.. *sigh* But I guess I need to go back and talk with my therapist about it. Just so sick and tired of this right now. I thought we had resolved it.. :( (I'm also so ashamed, since this trauma is so "minor" compared to the others; so that it feels really odd to have such a hard time with this.)

Thank you so for your reply and effort!

 

[Snakedoc702]

I have just completed my 3rd session with EMDR. I had trauma going back to my early childhood and many more since then. I had locked so much of it away that I didn't realize that it was making me sick. I had constant anxiety, closed off completely to people, and blocked out a lot of stuff. Through the EMDR I am recovering many things that are bothering me inside and getting through them. I can already see a big difference in myself from 3 weeks ago. I still have a distance to travel in this, but I have come a long way already. Just a little history, I was abused as a child, lost a lot of friends in high school to accidents and a homicide, went on to law enforcement, ems and fire rescue where I saw many horrible things and fought for my life many times. I have made more progress in the last 3 weeks through EMDR than I ever thought I would make in a lifetime. Hang in there. Your mind takes you where you need to go.

 

[zaniara]

Hang in there. Your mind takes you where you need to go.

Thank you for the support! :) I'm glad it's working for you too! EMDR is pretty amazing and very effective! And yes, my mind is taking me where I need to go.. :O_o: It's just not a place I want to visit right now.. (I know now that the reason the processing of this last memory got so messy is that it's "connected" to others that are much, much worse.. *sigh*) But I know, the only way is "through": there is no way around it I guess. (Or rather I tried all of them before, and they never worked.) Sorry for all the things you had to survive! Crossing my fingers you get through the healing-process in a manageable way!