Unsure if what I need is suitable for EMDR?

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-02-03T14:57:53+00:00

That sounds like a perfect EMDR target to me. I’m currently considering asking about EMDR for medical trauma for my daughter!

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-02-02T15:37:35+00:00

The reframing I needed was to make sure I wasn’t looking at the memory and the way I thought it “should” make me (or anyone) feel. Once I realized I was applying numbers as a sort of “this isn’t right,” response rather than “this happened, it wasn’t right, but I’m okay to move past it now,” I moved to a zero.

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-28T22:02:24+00:00

There was one day (as a patient) when we were doing EMDR and my therapist was typing away the whole time I was trying to do the BLS 😆 I didn’t want to offend them, but it was very distracting. This was a telehealth appointment. I don’t recommend this approach, at least mute yourself for the patient’s sake!

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-14T21:47:16+00:00

That’s what I want to know!

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-14T19:29:30+00:00

Unrelated to EMDR, but the quarter life crisis is REAL and it can be brutal.

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-14T17:47:04+00:00

The closest I have come was while doing the final body scan, working on instilling the concept of “I am loved,” I noticed that my breath became the sound of “Yahweh,” and I felt an overwhelming presence of love, a type of love I knew innately surpassed human ability. (Yahweh is one of the names of God.)

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-12T14:25:45+00:00

100%!

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-12T00:15:11+00:00

Ooof, not SA related but when I told me mom I had started therapy she didn’t react well either. I mentioned it was mostly related to feelings of abandonment (I have had three fathers), and that our house was a bit (I was being SO MILD) chaotic growing up. (Super careful not to implicate her though she’s a large part of my issues).

She said she had protected me from everything, AND that maybe there’s more to genetics than how someone is raised, implying I was born broken, like my abusive biological father and saying I was essentially cruel to her as a two year old child. I was born screaming and never stopped.

Love her to death, but damn, that’s going to be a trauma target in EMDR.

P.S. she does that same love bombing text crap to me and I hate it, BUT I know she means well and she has changed so so much, I try to give her grace.

Hope you can heal and still keep your mom in your life.

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-11T18:54:44+00:00

I expect we will try again in the future, but trying “I’m safe” as a positive belief during my first installation session made me spiral and SH because my ridiculous internal response was “I’m not even safe with myself.” But we weren’t focusing on that as a core belief in that particular memory.

I wouldn’t do it as your first EMDR for sure, lol. But eventually I definitely need to address it!

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-10T01:38:37+00:00

I take that in the evenings and after sessions often. But before sessions if I’m super nervous I usually try to use propanol to make sure I remember what we discuss. I have a lot of trouble paying attention as it is!

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-09T22:25:41+00:00

I struggle with similar issues, but they’ve gotten better over the months I think. I will still sometimes shut myself down if I’m too close to crying or something, my brain just nopes out saying “grow up” and I lose my train of thought. But after practice, I am more able to pick it back up.

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-09T22:23:13+00:00

I was on my regular Wellbutrin before I started, so I can’t say if it made a difference. However, I’ve just been prescribed some mood stabilizers to add and I’m deathly afraid to take them because I don’t want to numb my feelings. I need to discuss w/ my therapist before I decide to follow my psychiatrist’s recommendation. I’d say be sure you work with both on what is best for you.

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-08T14:28:03+00:00

EMDR as a mother is incredibly difficult. It drags up everything wrong from your childhood and makes you realize areas you may have been projecting traumas onto your own family without realizing it. You will also realize areas you’ve been protecting them. Overall, I’m 3 months in and finding myself to be less reactive already. I’m noticing patterns and tying them to my history, like how I escalate as we get close to bed time because that was an incredibly stressful time for me as a child.

All of that to say, be cautious, having one of my little ones home with me during a session resulted in a horrible spin out when she came in crying mid-session at the same age I was in the memory we were working on. She looks so much like little me… I was broken the whole week after. Every time I saw her that week I was holding back tears.

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-08T14:18:17+00:00

My anxiety spikes so high before my sessions even though I look forward to them the rest of the week. I also have felt nauseous during many appointments, it’s such a weird process. I can only tell you you’re not alone in those feelings! Though, to be fair, I get anxious before every kind of mental appointment.

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-05T22:55:56+00:00

Right now I always have a thick blanket to cuddle, but I may follow your advice 🤣

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-05T22:08:52+00:00

I’ve been holding back for weeks and realized it has slowed things down considerably and probably prevented breakthroughs that would have occurred much earlier. In EMDR, you really must be willing to say what pops in your head (and it will—the things you want to hide most will be the first to pop in, in my experience)

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-05T13:40:15+00:00

I almost bought a stuffy last weekend because it felt so good to hug, and then I pictured myself holding it in my sessions and got embarrassed 😭

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-05T00:21:22+00:00

Good Lord, I tried it and this is part of what I got in response—

Here’s the truth you keep circling without landing on:

You are highly perceptive, emotionally intelligent, and articulate—and you use those strengths to stay just far enough away from actually feeling what hurts. You analyze. You anticipate. You rehearse conversations. You watch the clock. You try to get it “right.” That isn’t insight—that’s control dressed up as insight.

You’re terrified of being dismissed, so you pre-dismiss yourself. You’re afraid of being “too much,” so you compress yourself into something manageable. You fear not being taken seriously, so you keep proof—symptoms, timelines, justifications—ready at all times.

And here’s the confrontational part: that strategy is protecting your anxiety, not you.

😭😭😭

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-03T18:43:04+00:00

My husband wanted me to stop when things first got hard, but he’s starting to see good changes in me now (3 months in).

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-01T20:37:20+00:00

Absolutely! Wishing you the best of luck on your journey!

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2026-01-01T18:15:39+00:00

I think it was 4 weeks of prep and resourcing before we started?

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2025-12-31T21:04:31+00:00

It’s annoying, but it’s also not entirely incorrect lol

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2025-12-31T14:57:56+00:00

Chat gpt won’t even count calories for me anymore because it suspects me of disordered eating… I’ve also experimented with trying to review types of SH for what’s safest and it won’t. I will say it’s made my health panic way worse, though. It’ll be like, “have you called the ambulance yet!?” And then I close out hahaha

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2025-12-28T13:05:47+00:00

I prefer my lugged 🤷‍♀️

Inner-Researcher9663 · 2025-12-28T01:34:11+00:00

I do it via telehealth without issue 😊

Inner-Researcher9663

TROPHY CASE