Why I Am Not in an Exclusive Relationship with EMDR
I find that often people are looking for EMDR therapy because they've heard how it's really helped someone they know. I LOVE this! I am a huge fan of EMDR and have experienced its power for myself firsthand in my own therapy. This is also why I invested a lot of time and energy to get EMDR certified.
However, even though I believe in the power of EMDR wholeheartedly, I don't ONLY use EMDR. I know many theories and modalities of therapy. Your therapist needs to have experience in more than one modality of therapy.
Understanding Modalities and Theories
A therapy modality is the tool or the specific type of therapy that is being used. Examples include Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT), Internal Family Systems (IFS), Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), Somatic Experiencing (SE), and Sensorimotor Psychotherapy (SP).
Theory provides therapists with a foundational understanding of how people heal and change. This is crucial because each client brings unique experiences, trauma responses, and ways of processing the world. Without theoretical grounding, a therapist might apply a one-size-fits-all approach that could miss important nuances.
Why Each Person Needs Something Different
EMDR is incredibly effective for PTSD because it helps the brain reprocess traumatic memories through bilateral stimulation. However, sometimes clients hit blocks with EMDR - maybe they can't access the memory, feel too overwhelmed, or their nervous system becomes too activated. This is where other approaches become essential.
Think of therapy theories like different tools in a toolbox. When EMDR gets stuck, I can draw from other modalities. In addition, EMDR might not be appropriate to start with, sometimes we need a secure relational base first. Here are some of the modalities I use in conjunction with EMDR:
SomatoSymbolic Processing: recognizes that trauma lives in the body, not just the mind. When someone can't process through EMDR, working with body sensations, breathing, or movement can help release what's stored in the nervous system. The body has wisdom to share with us.
Internal Family Systems (IFS): understands that we all have different "parts" of ourselves. Sometimes EMDR gets blocked because a protective part doesn't feel safe letting the person access painful memories. IFS helps identify and work with these parts. IFS is the most currently popular version of this but an older version is called “Ego State Therapy.”
Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) focuses on attachment and emotional connection. EFT helps with understanding attachment patterns that can actively playing out between the client and therapist in the therapy room. When a client feels securely connected to their therapist, their nervous system feels safer to access traumatic material during EMDR processing. EFT therapists are especially skilled at recognizing patterns of insecure attachment and helping to facilitate secure attachment.
The Therapeutic Relationship as an Important Healing Component
Psychodynamic Theory and the Intersubjective Space allows a therapist to recognize how a client's particular wounds and way of being in the world affect the work of “together-ness” with the therapist. Someone with anxious attachment might worry about being "too much," while someone with avoidant attachment might intellectualize their trauma. By understanding these dynamics, as well as the therapist’s own natural response, the therapist can use the therapeutic relationship to provide a corrective emotional experience.
This relational attunement creates the safety necessary for deeper trauma processing. The therapeutic relationship becomes the container that holds the trauma work. Without that secure foundation, techniques like EMDR might feel too threatening, but with it, clients can move through processing with an internalized sense of safety.
More Than Just Throwing Tools
Therapy is much more than just throwing tools at something. In my work with clients I weave these approaches together based on what each person needs in the moment. I might start with somatic work to help someone feel grounded, use IFS to understand what parts are activated, then move into EMDR when the system feels ready, while incorporating EFT principles to address the relational aspects of healing. There is a dance that is always happening with these different levels of perspective interplaying together all the time.
This integration allows for a more complete and personalized healing process rather than forcing someone into a single therapeutic approach. More than one theory and more than one treatment is helpful because healing happens differently for each person.
Source: Babette Rothschild "The Body Remembers"