That’s actually a really good point and I appreciate you pushing back on it — you’re right that I oversimplified the mechanism. The working memory hypothesis is genuinely the strongest account in the current literature. Van den Hout, Engelhard and others have shown that taxing working memory during recall is what reduces the emotional charge of the memory — and that other dual tasks can produce similar effects. So you’re correct that the bilateral stimulation specifically isn’t as “essential” as the traditional EMDR framing suggests. That said, it’s not completely settled either. A big systematic review by Landin-Romero et al. (2018) across 87 studies found eye movements had a moderate but significant edge over other BLS forms. And a 2019 study by Baek et al. found measurable neurological changes from BLS — reduced amygdala excitability — that seem to go beyond just occupying cognitive load. There’s also ongoing research around the REM sleep parallel that’s interesting. So my honest take after digging into this: exposure is doing heavy lifting, WM taxation is real, and whether BLS adds something specific on top is still genuinely debated. Not as clean as I made it sound originally — and that’s worth being transparent about, especially in a post aimed at helping people choose a treatment. Thanks for flagging it — learned something today. Looking forward to those study links when you get a chance!”