Emdr....about To Start.

[Panda Bear]

It's time.

In late September/Early October, my T suggested some EMDR. We've been together a long time, foundations built. Skills in place, all is well. We got sidelined dealing with some holiday garbage and never started. Not a bad thing, good actually.

Today, he started in again. He is insisting we try, that it's my best shot at alleviating what's left of my PTSD symptoms. We're really down to some smallish sized issues a little of the CSA and my basic symptoms that have improved, but not gone away consistently. I'm pretty sure he is right, that it'll help. I trust him, he's proven to be capable.

But why am I so afraid??? T feels that if I can put my all into the EMDR, then this could be our end. He feels we can carry EMDR through for the next 6-9m and be able to finally say good bye! Which I'm thrilled about!

But I'm scared of being hurt, that the EMDR won't work, and I'll have to continue with the longer process of talk therapy.

 

[LuckyDuck]

It's understandable. Best of luck to you in your process. It takes bravery to move onto another stage in your life.

LD

 

[Knak]

Basically for me anything but EMDR is a waste.

Talk therapy has never helped me, often making me worse by reviewing painful events I have no power to change right now.

EMDR is the ONLY therapy that helped me grow past many memories that held me back, by getting in touch with the nerves in the brain retaining the events that were too painful for my brain to heal on its own.

EMDR uses bilateral stimulation to take you from the pain on one side of the brain to the safety of the present on the other side of the brain several times a second, so you can process the line of thoughts, memories, and confusion that attach to it. It takes an excellent therapist who keeps up with training and is sensitive enough to relate to the process to guide you through your fantasies and misconceptions, among other means of support.

I am 66 now. I had a pathological breakdown at age 22 stemming from childhood neglect and multiple types of non-stop abuse. Then it took 12 years to reach a hope of healing, which came from a source of love that came from God. Psychiatrists, psychologists, counselors, hospitalizations, and medications did nothing but take my time, money and hope.

I have been going for EMDR weekly for seven years with a two year break. I am taking another break now because the intensity of pain related to holiday expectation of family closeness, the history of painful incidents this time of year, added to shedding false hope of change in abuse I still live in. I am also grieving the losses of family and other toxic people I chose to eliminate from my life.'

If I had stuck to EMDR instead of getting sidetracked by talking about recent painful events I think I would have done much better.

 

[Biz]

@Panda Bear , Reading your post it sounds like a few concepts got tied in to doing the EMDR besides just trying it, and the werid intimidating-ness, at least for me, because there's a machine involved and people insist it works almost magically well.

It sounds like your T guessed at future progress and explained where EMDR fit. If that were explained me, it would bring up two worries. One like, "What if this stuff doesn't work?" This one comes up all the time in my therapy. I think it's a fear of failure, but it's also a worry that if something extreme doesn't happen, like EMDR didn't clear things or an SE release, that I'll be stuck feeling like this forever. And, the other worry would be abandonment/attachment stuff with being told a 9 month timeline. I'd be worrying like, "What if I'm not good by that point and I need to keep doing therapy? Can I stay?"

Personally, EMDR didn't feel like it worked for me. (My therapist insists that it was working too well and I was dissociating). I think you'll have a better idea once you start of how your brain does with it and, at minimum, if it doesn't work you can mark it as a treatment method off your "potential things that might help" list. (If you keep one).

 

[Deleted member 28942]

@Panda Bear doing EMDR felt scary for me too. I had similar concerns and still sometimes do. I wonder when will I be free of everything? What if EMDR doesn't resolve everything? However, it is the best treatment I have had. Little by little, things are getting better. Few weeks ago, we resolved one difficult memory with the positive cognition "I have choices now and I am safe". I can't even explain the amount of joy that it brought to my life. This past few weeks, I felt so overjoyed that it scares the shit out of me. I sometimes lay under the sheets because the joy seems overwhelming. I am reaching levels of feeling alive that I haven't felt in a long time. I am also taking responsibility for my choices. Again, it can be difficult and scary but it is so worth it to give it a shot. Here is one quote that helps me when I start feeling doubt:

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke

This quote helps me to be patient with myself and the process and life when I start doubting and want to have all the answers.