Latest / Adult Child of Dysfunction / E 387: EMDR Explained: Can You Heal Trauma Without Reliving It? with Rebecca Malley Fitzgerald

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E 387: EMDR Explained: Can You Heal Trauma Without Reliving It? with Rebecca Malley Fitzgerald · Adult Child of Dysfunction

• 0:00
  hello everybody.
• 0:00
  Welcome back to another episode of Adult Child of Dysfunction.
• 0:03
  Today we have with us Rebecca Malley Fitzgerald.
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  She is an LCPC in the Chicago suburbs.
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  She is the owner of Shift Counseling PC, a small group practice which aims to bring high quality mental health treatment to our diverse community.
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  Rebecca has been practicing EMDR since 2009, and specializes in adjunct short-term EMDR therapy.
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  Welcome, Rebecca.
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  Thank you.
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  Thanks for having me.
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  Yeah, I was laughing, 'cause I was like, being in the mental health field is like being in the military with all the acronyms.
• 0:34
  Oh, yeah.
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  You have EFTR, e- EFT, and NCP and NPD, and, like, all these different things.
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  And I was like, "Oh, good, we're talking about my favorite today."
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  We're talking about EMDR, which a lot of people hear all these things, and I did notice throughout my podcast that I mention them.
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  I'll say NPD or OCD.
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  And you say these things assuming that everybody knows what we're talking about.
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  Oh, yeah.
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  And we don't all know what we're talking about when it comes to those kind of things.
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  So I want you to go in, and today, just for the people listening, we're going to do a deep dive into different kinds or different aspects of EMDR therapy, because we have an expert with us.
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  We have someone here who has been doing it for 17 years, and can really give you the rundown and explain how it works, who it's good for, and why you might wanna dive into it and give it a
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  shot.
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  So again, welcome Rebecca.
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  Thank you.
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  Yeah, so let's...
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  I'm just gonna jump right in.
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  Sure.
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  Talk about, first of all, talk about how you got into the mental health field, or got into doing EMDR at all.
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  Oh, so like getting into the mental health field, like I went into college and I was a undeclared major.
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  I really didn't know like what I wanted to do, and I took my first psychology course and I was like, "Wow, this is so interesting.
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  I will never get bored of this," so yeah I had no...
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  It was a total shocker to my family.
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  They're like, "What are you gonna do with that degree?"
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  It was like...
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  yeah, came from nowhere.
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  Although I was also noticing like when I took the ACT, like my social services like scores were really, or that, that part of the ACT I, I scored really and I was like, "Oh, I think that might be
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  a signal.
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  Like I'm good at this kinda stuff.
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  This is where my talents lie."
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  And so yeah, I graduated with a BA in psychology.
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  Took a couple years and just worked in the field 'cause I wanted to kinda figure some stuff out before I went back into grad school.
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  And then ended up going into grad school.
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  And then also when I was in grad school two minutes in w- one class that I had, somebody-- We were talking about PTSD.
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  We didn't talk about PTSD honestly that much in grad school.
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  But one of the professors who was EMDR certified just talked very generally about it I think for 10 minutes, and I was like, "That sounds really cool."
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  Yeah.
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  So then, you graduate, get your, your provisional license working in the field, and then the sec- the, the second I had my provisional license I was like, "I'm gonna go train in EMDR."
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  And I found this program called the Em- EMDR Humanitarian Assistance Program, 'cause I was working for a nonprofit at the time.
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  And so basically it's like reduced rate training.
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  'Cause EMDR training can be pretty expensive, and so you go and you train in like a, in a different like nonprofit like And so the point is to try to get people in these nonprofits to be able to
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  have access to EMDR training.
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  Okay, perfect.
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  And so it just was fascinating to you?
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  Yeah.
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  It was really interesting.
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  And you go to the training and you're like, whoa, and your brain's like lighting up, and you're like, "This is so interesting."
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  And then like going back and trying to apply it was a struggle because, again, I was working with, it was community mental health, City of Chicago.
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  There was a lot of people, highly traumatized people.
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  But at the same time, those are also the most difficult people to do EMDR with because there's the complex trauma really can make it somewhat unsafe sometimes.
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  So that's, and people have to be ready to want to do the EMDR.
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  Just because you do EMDR and they have trauma doesn't mean that we're doing EMDR together right now.
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  That's not the right way to start.
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  So it took me a long time even.
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  I had to put some feelers out to my coworkers of "Hey, I just trained in EMDR, so if you have anybody that seems like, they might be in a place."
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  And people were like, "What?"
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  And finally I did have somebody come to me that he was looking for EMDR and we started together.
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  And so it was, yeah, it was a really interesting experience.
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  So it is actually interesting too, because 99% of the people that I've asked that said, "How did you get into this?"
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  They're like I had this background of this, and I did it for myself."
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  So many of them say- "I did the training on myself, and I fell in love with it 'cause it was so transformational."
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  So you don't have that story, or you do?
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  No.
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  No?
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  Okay.
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  I just thought it sounded really interesting.
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  Yeah, no, that's amazing.
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  'Cause so many people, like I said, healers heal.
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  Like that's what they do.
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  They find a way to fix themselves, and they go, "Oh, I can share this information."
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  So that's even more interesting that you don't have that trauma background as far as a lived experience, so you literally are looking at it from a factual, this is how I was trained, this is how it works, not
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  lived experience of trying it for yourself.
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  But interesting.
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  It is important though, r- like, when you're doing the EMDR trainings, of course, they have you break into like dyads and, stuff like that, and you're doing the EMDR on each other, and that was, a little bit, it's,
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  it was a little bit of a hard thing to do.
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  It is very hard, like once you get the training, to actually integrate it.
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  There was another woman that I w- worked at the same agency.
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  She'd also had EMDR training, and so sh- but was at the same place as me, where it's how do you actually s- get started with people?
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  And so she and I did EMDR, and just practiced on each other- Okay to get over like the...
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  And when, and again, like some of it is you have to know what it feels like- to be able to know what does this person need?
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  Like, where are they stuck?
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  What's supposed to happen next?
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  Like that kind of stuff.
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  So let's just jump right into it and talk about what is EMDR therapy?
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  So again, eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, which so what does that even mean?
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  It sounds...
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  I always joke it sounds like some scary sci-fi stuff.
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  I'm thinking, old Clockwork Orange or something, it's like it's not scary.
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  Your eyes are not frozen open.
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  It's nothing, It can be very intense, but sometimes it can be very gentle, too just depending on the person who's doing it and their approach and how you choose your targeting and stuff like that.
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  Which again, so that's, there's the, the, the clinical part of it of like what it is, but really how it's utilized is v- can be very personalized.
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  It can be very different from therapist to therapist.
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  But if I had to give it like in a nutshell, it's basically you're coming in, "I have this problem, I have this block, I have this issue.
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  I wanna get past it.
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  Every time I think about it, I get overwhelmed or I just can't get past it.
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  Please help me," is usually the thing that, you know, that people bring in.
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  And the, the target is usually the block.
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  And sometimes they're simple, and a lot of times they're not.
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  Usually you find out that there's many layers to the actual target.
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  And again, a lot of times it's it feels like it's something recent and then you get into what are the underpinnings of it?
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  And it's oh, the reason why this recent thing bothered you so much is because it's triggering trauma from earlier when you felt you were unlovable or when you felt abandoned or when you felt, "I'm not safe," or...
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  You know what I'm saying?
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  A lot of times the reason why something, an experience for an adult that becomes trauma becomes trauma is because there was another experience where they were a child and they were helpless.
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  And the thing that happened to you as an adult, it feels traumatic.
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  That's what's difference between if it's a, a trauma or a bad experience.
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  Usually.
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  Sometimes it'll be like, "I had a car acc- I was really scared.
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  It was a really bad experience," but it does not become full-on PTSD usually unless there's some sort of, underlying stuff going and feeding into it.
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  Or even just as a child, I like to say if it, w- two kids can experience the exact same thing, and one can get the support and be able to process it when they are a child.
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  And that makes a huge difference, too, as to- whether those, that memory f- kind of frozen in time in your body is going to trigger you with something similar later on.
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  And y- I mean, that's important for people to know because, you just said it before it's not every traumatic experience becomes trauma.
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  It just doesn't.
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  Depending on what happens with that experience and how it's perceived and how it's dealt with and processed.
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  So talk about the, kind of the process.
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  What is actually happening with EMDR?
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  What...
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  Oh, you mean like the mechanism of how it works?
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  Yeah, the mechanism.
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  'Cause I know people are like, "What are you talk..."
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  Like, when people, they hear it explained on YouTube and they just go, "Oh, you're just like looking back and forth," and- Yeah, Like they- I've never really heard or heard a really good, clear explanation of- Yeah, my friends
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  from Community Mental Health, when they found out that I got an EMDR trained, they were like, "Ooh," yeah, exactly.
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  "What is this doing?"
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  Follow the light- Yeah back and forth.
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  So basically somebody...
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  You get somebody to hold an image in their head that kind of encapsulates like a moment in their life that, a moment in their life that, it, was very impactful for them.
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  And so there's probably a lot going on in that moment, and I always have people, imagine if it was like a, like if it was a movie, imagine like a still- from the movie of your life.
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  What's a really...
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  if somebody saw the still of this event, like something that would show, like would ex- describe.
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  The audience would understand what happened.
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  And then, this is what I see in my mind.
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  Okay.
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  And then you figure out, what is the negative belief that they have about themself?
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  You figure out, how would they like to feel about themselves instead?
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  You figure out, what do they feel physically when they think about that image?
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  You figure out, how disturbing is it to them on a scale of 0 to 10?
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  And then you figure out also like what are the emotions that are going on.
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  So like in that one still of image, all of that stuff.
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  There's all of that stuff.
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  And again, usually there's l- even beyond that- there's layers.
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  So that image is just that's the place to...
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  That, that's how you get in.
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  And so then while they're holding the image in their head, you might do tapping.
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  You might do, you can tap on your thighs, you can do the butterfly hug, you can do the light bar.
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  You can do online we have things that like will go on your screen, and so it just has a light that goes back and forth.
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  You can...
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  There's even headsets, like if you're an audio person, you can get like it goes do, do, back and forth.
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  So really you want the bilateral stimulation is making your brain go left left, the theory behind that is, again, a lot of people tend to be very stuck in either fe- feeling, like they're very emotional, or they might
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  be stuck very much in thinking.
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  And so both sides of their brain are not really interacting with this in- with this memory.
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  And so when you do EMDR and you're for- forcing their brain left left it's forcing the brain to think and use different parts of itself.
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  So if it's somebody who's really frozen in feeling but they can't apply logic you're gonna get them out of that.
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  And if it's somebody who's really in the logic and the- but they can't even identify, like, how they feel, it breaks you out of that dichotomy.
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  Also, the m- the middle part of the brain here, this is a cor- corpus callosum.
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  This is the part of your brain that's responsible for learning.
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  So when you're doing all these things across the midline, you're also getting the information, the wh- you're activating the whole brain, but also you're getting this middle part activated, and that's how we learn.
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  That's how we make meaning of things.
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  That's how we...
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  Symbolism and understanding things better.
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  So it just activates much more of the brain instead of this memory being stuck in one part, and isolated from, the whole rest of your brain which also has smart stuff in it.
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  All your coping.
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  And- And again that's a lot of times when people are like the coping skills.
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  You can't access the coping skills when you're triggered 'cause the coping skills are over here and you're triggered over here, exactly.
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  You gotta access the whole brain.
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  You got a lot of good stuff in there.
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  Exactly.
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  And that's why a lot of people do, like, when you're talking about nervous system regulation and stuff, it is the bilateral.
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  It's walking left left, it's the butterfly hug, like you said.
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  Tapping left left, and that makes sense to open it up to a whole bunch of different things.
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  That's...
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  When we started journaling and I was doing inner child work, I remember when my coach told me, "Write with your non-dominant hand."
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  And that was really crazy.
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  I have a different theory on that, but we can talk about that a different time.
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  But yeah, it was just that moving it back and forth from left to right and different sides of the brain.
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  So you've been doing this for 17 years and delved into all kinds of different aspects of it and different experiences with it and everything else.
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  What is adjunct EMDR?
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  Oh, adjunct EMDR means basically it's if you have another therapist, let's say you have a great talk therapist, you've got...
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  And again trauma is a relational, issue, so a lot of times the cure is relational.
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  So you might have a therapist that you've worked with for five years.
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  You're like, "I love this person.
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  They get me.
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  They understand my whole story.
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  I don't wanna stop doing therapy for this- with this person."
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  But then you get to a point where you're like, "Okay, but they don't do EMDR," or, like- Okay the, the treatment has plateaued because I need a little something more.
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  And so I can just work just really on what is the part that you wanna do EMDR with and try to, figure out something that's a little bit more succinct.
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  And then work specifically on the specific goal, and then you can go back to your talk therapist.
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  And again, a lot of times the therapy, it's like a whole new thing has opened up and it's so you're no longer stuck, you're no lover- no longer plateaued.
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  And again, the therapist knows your whole story and can move forward with you once you get unstuck.
• 12:34
  Yeah, and like- So it's like I might not necessarily be your EMDR therapist for five years.
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  And I think that works the same with a lot of the different modalities.
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  In like somatics.
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  You can- Yeah go to a therapist for a while, but it's like finally, like I'm- you get to this point and you're like, "I- I'm just not going anywhere else," and it's because it's all still stuck in your
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  nervous system.
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  Yeah.
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  So when you pull in the somatic aspect of it, that does the same thing as working together.
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  So I always tell people, if you're working with a therapist, don't...
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  And you try something different, it's a good supplementation.
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  Don't just quit your therapist.
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  Yeah.
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  You still need that support in different...
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  And they all, all the different modalities offer support in a different way.
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  Yeah, exactly.
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  And- There's so many different ways to healing.
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  And yeah I'm very open to that.
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  And sometimes it's like people have a spiritual practice, or sometimes people have, really, like a mentor in their life, or...
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  You know what I'm saying?
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  It doesn't always have to be, like therapy is not the only path to healing.
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  But as long as r- you gotta have, like those, those needs met somehow.
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  And then the adjunct again means just like we're working together on a specific goal, and then when you're d- when you're done with this goal then you figure out what's next for you.
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  What's next.
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  Absolutely.
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  So what are you, what are your thoughts on...
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  Because I know there is a lot of if you look on YouTube, there's a lot of stuff that scares me.
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  I'm like, "Don't go looking on YouTube if you want- to experiment with a new..."
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  What are your thoughts on that?
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  Because I know there's literally you can go on YouTube and you can YouTube how to self-do EMDR, how to self-hypnotize, and how to- Oh.
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  What are your thoughts on that?
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  I think sometimes it can be helpful.
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  Again, depending...
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  if the person doesn't have complex trauma and they're just using the the EMDR for self-regulation.
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  So again, you can do the butterfly hug on yourself at home, nothing wrong with that.
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  And if it helps you and you're like, "Oh, I've realized when I'm, like, super, super overwhelmed but I'm alone and I can't gr- talk to my therapist right now," or, "I can't," whatever, "but I do this and it
• 14:24
  regulates me," I think that's a great thing.
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  That's not a bad thing.
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  You're not, desensitizing and pr- and processing targets on your own.
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  Because I think the thing also with EMDR, again, it's a co-regulation of being with another person who can watch are you okay?
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  Are you stuck?
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  Are you...
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  Or if, we do stop with the bilateral and then check in with people, and that kind of lets us hear, like where's their head at?
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  Are they in some really dark, cognitive distortions?
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  Are they beating themselves up in their head?
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  And then that's when we're like, "Okay.
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  Let me pull you out of here," that's where the safety comes in, where it's like, let's pull you out of here," or, "Let's examine some of the stuff," or, helping you get outside of your own thoughts if the
• 15:00
  person's getting stuck in a dark place when they're trying to process.
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  And EMDR, if they're with a therapist, that therapist is part of the safety net.
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  When you're doing it by yourself, y- yeah, that's why we said, "Don't try this at home."
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  But- as far as if you just wanna do the butterfly hug or, YouTube, and it's the light that goes back and forth, and you came home from work and you're really stressed out and you've got, tension in your
• 15:19
  chest or you're angry or whatever, and then you sit and you do that for 20 minutes and then you feel better- I have no concern about that whatsoever.
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  It's a tool.
• 15:28
  Yep.
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  It just, and like you said, it's just knowing.
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  A lot of people get into these, they're gonna go into these groups of self-hypnosis and- and things can get really dark.
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  And they can.
• 15:39
  Yeah.
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  You h- that's why I say it's always safe to do it with somebody or have s- even if you're gonna try it by yourself, have somebody know that you're doing it that knows- Right how to get you out
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  of that place because- the last thing you wanna do is get someone really deep into a memory or something and not be able, and you can't pull yourself out, or you don't really know what to do with it
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  once you get there.
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  So that's, safety is definitely an issue with any modality, anyone.
• 16:03
  Yeah, and a part, part of being an experienced EMDR therapist is learning to kinda read, 'Cause some people we call it high affect, where they might be cry- they're like bawling, and you're like, "Are you okay?"
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  And they're like, "Yeah, this feels good," and it's like, "This feels like a release, like I'm okay.
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  Like it's really intense, but I'm okay."
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  And then other people might look very calm, but internally, like they are not okay.
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  And some of it, again, the experience is being able to read that, and then also, hopefully knowing the person a little bit ahead of time, but also just having kinda like that instinct of like being able to read
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  like body language and stuff like that, and be able to be like, "Okay, I think maybe you're not okay, and let's talk.
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  And again let's co-regulate.
• 16:37
  Let's not have you get like looping on like the most dark, scary, thoughts," because yeah, it can get dangerous.
• 16:43
  And I think sometimes when you go online and things like, "Oh, I did EMDR, and this like terrible thing happened," it's possible.
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  It's possible.
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  Which the, that's part of it also is the, the assessment ahead of time is figuring out like what are your coping skills?
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  How do you...
• 16:57
  have you ever had issues with self-harm?
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  You know- that kinda stuff of figuring out how does this person cope with extreme emotions?
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  Because if extreme emotions come up, can they stay safe?
• 17:08
  If you can't stay safe, then you do that before you do EMDR.
• 17:13
  Exactly.
• 17:13
  The emotional regulation.
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  Being able to regulate and- yourself.
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  What is...
• 17:17
  So who would you call would be a very good candidate for somebody for EMDR?
• 17:25
  Again, somebody who it can work very well with complex trauma.
• 17:28
  That is gonna be a longer road.
• 17:30
  That's not gonna be the five to 10 sessions.
• 17:32
  Unless it could be combe- complex trauma, but the person has a- again, had exposure to, like you were saying before, like the, the scaffolding of maybe something really intense happened to them when they were a little kid, but
• 17:42
  their grandma was super supportive or, they had a teacher who, really helped them out, or they had an aunt, and I'm saying if they, i- even if something really intense happened but they had a pretty good support system
• 17:52
  that got it through, got them through it, it might not end up being, like, a, a, a severe complex trauma situation.
• 18:01
  I think, but it's, yeah, when there's multiple incidents, which unfortunately a lot of time, that, it happens a lot- Yeah where the most vulnerable people are experiencing the most trauma, the different types of trauma, different layers of trauma,
• 18:14
  all, all kinds of stuff.
• 18:15
  So it can be dangerous in those situations when there's complex trauma.
• 18:19
  That doesn't even mean that it needs to be avoided completely.
• 18:22
  A lot of times with people like that, then you go into what we call resourcing, which I say you can use EMDR to desensitize negative stuff, but you can also use it to enhance positive stuff.
• 18:31
  So with resourcing, a lot of times if we recognize that somebody has complex trauma and they didn't have that scaffolding built in, they didn't have those supports, we start using EMDR to build the supports before we go into
• 18:43
  to processing the difficult stuff, and that's how you can make EMDR safe even for somebody who has a history of some pretty severe stuff.
• 18:50
  But again, that's gonna be a longer process.
• 18:52
  That's not gonna be five to 10 sessions.
• 18:54
  Yeah.
• 18:54
  Absolutely.
• 18:55
  So it really is good for anybody.
• 18:57
  Yeah.
• 18:57
  Anybody that has, just dealing with anybody, anything, has a little block, has something they wanna get over, has something they want to kinda just push through or work through or kinda figure out- Yeah, and sometimes people are like,
• 19:09
  "Oh, like I feel like this isn't like that big of a deal."
• 19:11
  I feel like they have like imposter syndrome or something about- seeking trauma therapy, and it's like I don't know.
• 19:16
  I feel like it's the, trauma...
• 19:19
  You admitting that you have trauma does not take away somebody else's experience of trauma.
• 19:24
  I think it used to be like there was this whole thing where oh, trauma is veterans, and it's people who have gone to war.
• 19:28
  I haven't experienced anything like that.
• 19:30
  And it's almost like you're like denigrating their service or something like that if you call what happened to you trauma.
• 19:35
  And it's like, no, there's you're not taking something away from somebody else.
• 19:38
  If you're bothered by something, if you're stuck, and you have the resources to get yourself unstuck, and that will make your life better, and maybe you'll go on to make other people's lives better, do it.
• 19:49
  It's okay.
• 19:50
  Yeah.
• 19:50
  Why not?
• 19:51
  I said there is no- Yeah comparison.
• 19:52
  That's why I hate when people- Yeah have these like big T, little T, middle T, like all these different traumas.
• 19:57
  I'm like, if it changed the way you look at the world- Yeah it deserves exploring.
• 20:02
  Because if it changed the way you look at the world, it changes the way you show up in the world, period.
• 20:07
  And if you can show up better for yourself and others, then that's a net positive.
• 20:12
  That's not a negative effect of you getting help, even if like maybe what happened to you wasn't as bad as what happened to somebody else.
• 20:18
  It's- Right and again, as trauma therapists, we're not judging.
• 20:20
  Oh, this guy, like what's he complaining about?
• 20:22
  Like we...
• 20:23
  'Cause there's no point.
• 20:23
  No.
• 20:25
  No.
• 20:25
  There's no point to that.
• 20:26
  How does that make anything better?
• 20:28
  Yeah.
• 20:28
  I use an example all the time of a lady that I had that- Her mom got a new job when she was, like, in first grade, and her mom was late three days in a row to pick her
• 20:37
  up from school.
• 20:38
  And she was at a sleepover a week later or two weeks later or something, and the mom came down and said, "Good night, I love you guys."
• 20:44
  And the little girl turned to her best friend turned to her and said, "Your mom must not love you because she didn't show up to pick you up on time from school."
• 20:50
  Yeah.
• 20:51
  And I said, that had...
• 20:52
  we're h- we're sitting here later, 40 years later, trying to figure out where she has this belief from.
• 20:57
  And when we finally, she finally came up with that, it was like a perfect example, because that had the same effect on her for 40 years.
• 21:04
  Yeah.
• 21:04
  That one comment made by a little seven-year-old girl, as, say, my mom who told me she hated me every day of my life.
• 21:11
  Yeah.
• 21:12
  Same, similar- Planted that little kernel of...
• 21:13
  Yeah.
• 21:14
  Planted that.
• 21:14
  That's all.
• 21:15
  It planted just that seed, and that seed grew, and then she started looking for evidence to prove that seed right.
• 21:20
  Yeah.
• 21:20
  And, oh, my gosh.
• 21:21
  And so I said that, that is...
• 21:23
  If she looked back at it now 40 years later, she's like, "Oh, my God, that was so dumb."
• 21:27
  I'm like, "It wasn't dumb."
• 21:28
  Yeah.
• 21:28
  "Because it affected you."
• 21:30
  Yeah.
• 21:30
  Period.
• 21:31
  So that's awesome.
• 21:33
  So we're gonna, I'm gonna flip the channel here and ask a couple different questions, 'cause I want to ask some different questions actually.
• 21:39
  I wanna know about what the flash technique is.
• 21:41
  Okay, good.
• 21:42
  I'm glad a- I'm glad you wanted to talk about it, because I think it's something that needs a little bit more exposure.
• 21:47
  So the flash technique is something that came out of the EMDR world.
• 21:50
  There's a guy that's been doing EMDR for many years.
• 21:52
  His name is Phil Mansfield.
• 21:54
  And he is just a really interesting, curious...
• 21:58
  he's a funny guy.
• 21:59
  I've taken a lot of his trai- I don't, I've never met him personally, but I've taken a lot of his trainings and watched his YouTubes and stuff like that.
• 22:03
  He's just a very smart, curious, like, fun, funny guy.
• 22:07
  And he's not afraid to innovate, obviously, which is a good thing.
• 22:10
  So he was...
• 22:11
  one of the things with people with trauma is sometimes y- it's like they know that they have PTSD, they know that they're traumatized, and then, that they need relief.
• 22:19
  And it's like, "Okay, let's work on your trauma," and they're like, "No."
• 22:22
  Sometimes it's stuff that's "I don't...
• 22:24
  There's no.
• 22:24
  I cannot.
• 22:25
  I can't even think that.
• 22:26
  If I think about this for one second, I'm so dysregulated.
• 22:30
  The only way I can deal with this is by shutting it down.
• 22:32
  So you want me to come and talk to you about this?
• 22:34
  No."
• 22:35
  Which is valid.
• 22:36
  People go through horrible things.
• 22:38
  So they were trying to figure out a way to, like, how do we help these people that need the pe- that need the EMDR but are so heavily traumatized that they can't even start the process because they get
• 22:48
  so dysregulated that they can't even get through it?
• 22:51
  And so he, I believe he was looking at something like phobia research, and they found this thing where- they could activate somebody's nervous system basically just by, I think it was like they were talking about spiders.
• 23:01
  So like you flash a, a picture of a spider on a screen, and the person's brain and st- they're responding.
• 23:07
  And then they did like an intervention and then there was another group that, they...
• 23:11
  the, the spider stayed on the screen for a while, so it like really got in there, and then they did the same intervention.
• 23:16
  And they recognized that actually the, the group that just saw the spider on the screen for a second got more relief than the people who h- saw the spider for a longer period of time.
• 23:26
  So actually- their nervous system was less activated, but they got more relief.
• 23:31
  And I think, a- and again, I wasn't there, so I apologize to Phil if I'm not telling the story quite right.
• 23:35
  But he started experimenting with this, of can we get people to start processing without getting the, the target fully activated, and they found that they can.
• 23:44
  And so I always tell people with flash technique basically what we're doing is you describe a target.
• 23:49
  You, we say just give me like a, a thumbnail, or like a, just like a, a real quick touch on it real quick, and then just get out of it.
• 23:56
  We don't want you thinking about all the details.
• 23:58
  We don't want you fully activated.
• 23:59
  We don't want, we don't want all of that.
• 24:00
  Just touch on it, and give me a number.
• 24:02
  And then, a lot of times it's a 10 or it's something very disturbing.
• 24:05
  And then you go right from that to you're, like, tapping so it's bilateral, and then you're, you say flash, and you basically just blink your eyes.
• 24:12
  I always tell people, I'm like, "This is gonna sound like the dumbest thing you've ever heard of in your entire life."
• 24:17
  You're gonna be like, "That's so stupid, there's no way it could actually work."
• 24:21
  And a lot of times it does.
• 24:22
  It's wild the stuff that you can process through with flash.
• 24:25
  And so if it does work, awesome.
• 24:28
  It gets people through something that they thought they could never get through.
• 24:30
  And if it doesn't work, what you've lost maybe an hour of your life.
• 24:34
  And you didn't even get fully dysregulated because y- we're not even getting into the whole the whole thing.
• 24:40
  Yeah it's a really interesting way of just getting people over stuff that's, that feels too overwhelming.
• 24:46
  So people that might be like, "Yeah, I wanna do EMDR, but man the idea of even starting to talk about this is so upsetting I just can't.
• 24:52
  I can't.
• 24:52
  I can't.
• 24:52
  I can't."
• 24:53
  So it's a little bit of exposure therapy- almost.
• 24:55
  Just exposing- it just a little bit, and letting you go, "Okay, this isn't- me."
• 24:58
  And so basically what they're saying, yeah, is like- you think about it, and you get a little bit activated, but then you basically, when you're doing the flash, you're talking to the therapist about something really positive.
• 25:07
  So you're just like, yeah, what's something that you get really excited about?
• 25:09
  You w- you want joy.
• 25:10
  We want my, my cat.
• 25:12
  We want my favorite song.
• 25:14
  We want, some- tell me about something that really lights you up.
• 25:16
  And so basically you're t- you're pendulating between this thing that's really upsetting, and then something that lights your brain up in a positive way.
• 25:22
  And then after a few rounds of that, you take a pause.
• 25:25
  You say, "Go back to the thing that we talked about at the beginning.
• 25:27
  If you had to give it a number what would you give it now?"
• 25:29
  And then a lot of times it's coming down.
• 25:31
  And for most flash sessions, if you can actually engage somebody, 'cause sometimes people just can't get into it or, it doesn't always work.
• 25:38
  If a person can get engaged and then they can get into it, almost always the distress goes down by at least five points.
• 25:46
  Nice.
• 25:47
  That's a- yeah that's huge.
• 25:48
  Yeah.
• 25:49
  So this thing that felt super overwhelming and impossible before, now even if it only gets down to a five sucks, but it's manageable.
• 25:56
  And yeah.
• 25:57
  And I tell people when your baseline is at a 10, and then you get triggered by that thing you're off the charts.
• 26:02
  Whereas if you're- at a five and you get triggered by that thing, now you're to a seven to nine, and you were there to begin with anyway, yeah.
• 26:08
  It sucks, but you'll get to it but it's manageable.
• 26:10
  Yeah.
• 26:11
  Okay, that's, that, that's pretty cool.
• 26:14
  Yeah, so it's, And then, in, in addition to the people using this, they have a a conference, like it's just a Zoom conference every year.
• 26:20
  I've gone to three out of four of them, and people are using this in all kinds of really interesting ways.
• 26:26
  There's a woman who adapted it to use for first responders, like after, like a critical incident.
• 26:31
  So basically they don't talk about...
• 26:33
  They get people together, and so there's like that, that feeling of community and support and togetherness.
• 26:38
  We don't actually talk about what happened because we don't, with legalities and all kinds of stuff, we don't wanna get into talking about what actually happened.
• 26:46
  But everybody's nervous system is at a 10.
• 26:49
  We come together, support, and then also we bring this thing down.
• 26:54
  Nobody has to say anything.
• 26:56
  We don't speak about it, so we're not different narratives or, whatever.
• 27:00
  We just get everybody re-regulated together.
• 27:03
  Okay.
• 27:03
  And so they're using it, yeah, for for first responders.
• 27:05
  There's people that are...
• 27:06
  We're using it with people that have suffered humanitarian disasters all over the world.
• 27:10
  There's people that were using it literally at the border, a few years ago when there was ev- everybody coming over the border and then, all of the, the things that were going on.
• 27:18
  In the camps and stuff like that, people were going in and trying to help people get regulated and things like that.
• 27:23
  They're using it for all kinds of stuff, and it's really fascinating, which again it sounds like it's the dumbest thing in the whole world.
• 27:28
  Like, how does this actually make that much of a difference?
• 27:30
  But people are using it in really creative ways.
• 27:34
  And it's-- I just think it's really powerful, and I think more people need to be aware of it.
• 27:37
  People-- A lot of people are aware of EMDR.
• 27:40
  Most people are like, "What is this flash technique?"
• 27:42
  Not enough laypeople know that it's a possibility to know this is something that could help me, or I have this friend who's really struggling, maybe this could help them.
• 27:51
  And it sounds like it's something that could work in maybe less sessions than EMDR.
• 27:55
  Yeah.
• 27:55
  At least gets you down to where- you're ready for EMDR or another modality after that.
• 27:59
  Yeah.
• 28:00
  It's just like getting you past that complete and total shutdown overwhelm.
• 28:06
  Yeah.
• 28:06
  Because with anything, EMDR or anything else, you have to be open to it anyway or it's not going to work.
• 28:11
  And yeah, it started out as this thing that people would...
• 28:14
  That was the goal of it, is to get people to be able to tolerate EMDR.
• 28:18
  And then sometimes people make so much progress with it you don't even end up doing EMDR.
• 28:22
  Wow.
• 28:22
  Yeah.
• 28:23
  And so some people, again, are just adapting it in all kinds of really interesting, creative ways, making a lot of difference out there.
• 28:29
  And it's really, to me, again, I'll-- This is the kind of stuff that I just find super exciting, fascinating- really cool.
• 28:35
  Oh, it is fascinating.
• 28:36
  The brain is absolutely amazing, and that's why I say if you can rewi- and you're rewiring...
• 28:41
  it's just so- pliable.
• 28:44
  Yeah Like you can change it, and you can fix it, and you can heal it.
• 28:47
  So if anybody's out there listening and you think, "Oh, no, my story is too big, my story is too bad," there's- Yeah it's not.
• 28:54
  It's not.
• 28:55
  I mean- that's the thing.
• 28:58
  Yeah and I- People suffer too long.
• 28:58
  That's one of the things that you know, for me as a trauma therapist, it's I know s- a lot of people have these like kind of extended personal growth experiences through, working their way through trauma, and those experiences
• 29:06
  can be really beautiful and, m- creating a lot of meaning and stuff like that.
• 29:10
  But there's also a lot of people that are just, they just suffer too long.
• 29:13
  Yeah.
• 29:14
  Oh, yeah.
• 29:15
  Or they avoid their whole lives.
• 29:15
  And I said that, like- Yeah yeah, for 30 years you're on this journey where I'm like, wow, I could give you one tip, one trick, one modality that can literally make seven years worth of progress in three sessions.
• 29:26
  Why not try it?
• 29:27
  Yeah.
• 29:28
  People suffer too long an- and nothing...
• 29:29
  Yeah, not to put down people's personal growth stories or, the those are beautiful.
• 29:33
  I love that as well.
• 29:34
  And you can continue to grow after EMDR or after flash technique.
• 29:37
  You know what I'm saying?
• 29:37
  It's not it takes away from those personal growth stories.
• 29:39
  But yeah, people really suffer for way too long with trauma.
• 29:43
  Absolutely.
• 29:44
  So I wanna talk about one more thing before we go because I love in- internal family systems, and you mentioned something that is similar to it- IFS the developmental need meeting strategy.
• 29:56
  Can you- Yeah talk about that just for a second?
• 29:58
  And then we'll kinda wrap this up, give big picture, tell people where to find you and- And it'll be good.
• 30:03
  Okay.
• 30:04
  So developmental needs meeting strategy is just another kind of like ego state of, you know, figuring out like w- once you start doing EMDR, then you figure out like that probably at least 50% of the people that are
• 30:14
  coming in for EMDR actually have complex trauma.
• 30:16
  And 50 to 75% of them have, childhood trauma, and so again, there's like all of this, this complex trauma, dissociation.
• 30:23
  And so you gotta figure out some way to to conceptualize that, and how do you actually help people with that?
• 30:29
  Because if you...
• 30:30
  That again, when people have like those experiences of "I did EMDR and I had a bad experience," a lot of times it's because they had complex trauma, something got activated, they weren't able to explain it, and the therapist
• 30:41
  didn't catch, didn't pick up on it, and then they got super disregula- Like something happened, and nobody could describe it or contain it, and that can be a bad experience for people.
• 30:50
  If you're gonna do EMDR, eventually you're gonna have to learn about dissociation and ego states and all that kinda stuff.
• 30:55
  So developmental needs meeting strategy is just a it's a different configuration than IFS, but it's basically about recognizing what are the unmet needs of a child.
• 31:04
  Y- you map them before, and then you have the person do like an imaginal exposure with a resource team of people who, like somebody who's strong, somebody who's a protector, somebody who's a nurturer, somebody who could have met
• 31:15
  these needs.
• 31:15
  And of course it's not like rewriting history, but the point is if the person can imagine themselves like getting their needs met, sometimes it does, like there's relief.
• 31:25
  And it's like if you would've gotten this need met, how would your life have been different?
• 31:28
  And then it can take you from internalizing, I'm this way because I didn't deserve love.
• 31:33
  No.
• 31:34
  It takes people out of that internalizing thing of if you could have gotten that need met, how would your life have been different?
• 31:39
  Can you see yourself differently now?
• 31:41
  Like that it wasn't that you were unlovable, it's that you didn't get your needs met.
• 31:44
  Okay.
• 31:45
  And it so can help to break people out of that.
• 31:47
  And then using that in conjunction with the EMDR and also I would think a version of inner child work and re-parenting and all of that.
• 31:55
  Yeah.
• 31:55
  That all works together, I'm assuming.
• 32:00
  Cool.
• 32:01
  Very interesting.
• 32:02
  Yes, I think for the people listening, that gives you a really good breakdown and a really good explanation of EMDR, because we do talk about it a lot on here.
• 32:10
  We mention it, we talk about it.
• 32:12
  People say, "Oh, I had such a great transformation," and never really broke it down and explained exactly really what it was.
• 32:18
  So thank you for that.
• 32:19
  Yeah.
• 32:20
  And Rebecca, if people want to find you, work with you, tell me how you work.
• 32:24
  Tell us about what you do.
• 32:27
  So I have a small group practice in the Chicago suburbs shiftcounselingpc.com.
• 32:30
  And if you go to who we are, I'm on there.
• 32:32
  I'm the last name on the list, 'cause I also have some, some people that are working with me.
• 32:36
  But my page is there, and then that's how you can find me.
• 32:38
  And if you want to schedule a a consult with me or something like that, and talk about "Here's what I want to work on.
• 32:42
  Do you think that you could help, or do you think this would be appropriate?"
• 32:45
  I can only work with people in the state of Illinois, 'cause I'm only licensed in Illinois.
• 32:47
  Okay.
• 32:48
  But that's where people can find me.
• 32:50
  And if you are in a different state and you're like, "Wow, this Flash technique thing sounds interesting, but I'm not in Illinois," there is...
• 32:57
  I think the website is just Flash Technique F-L-A-S-H-T-E-C-H-N-I-Q-U-E.com.
• 33:04
  And there's a whole list, of course, of therapists that are trained in it.
• 33:07
  And there's a lot, there's a lot of therapists that have trained in it.
• 33:10
  I think the problem is, again, it's like there's not enough demand.
• 33:13
  People aren't requesting it, because lay people don't know what it is.
• 33:16
  They don't even know that it's a possibility.
• 33:18
  Part of the reason why I like to, I want to raise awareness about it, because I think...
• 33:21
  people go and get trained, but if you don't get a chance to- to practice it, you might get a little rusty.
• 33:26
  It just becomes like, "Oh, I went to that training.
• 33:27
  It was cool, but I don't really use it."
• 33:28
  We should be using this much more often.
• 33:31
  Yeah.
• 33:32
  Absolutely, and I think that not awareness is the key.
• 33:34
  Because I have a lot of people that have said to me, "Oh, I don't want to do Em- EMDR because I don't want to get..."
• 33:39
  Then they...
• 33:39
  That's exactly what I've heard, is, "I don't want to get into the deep, dark stuff."
• 33:43
  Yeah.
• 33:44
  "I don't want to deal with that," or, "I don't...
• 33:46
  That's...
• 33:46
  I don't want to remember that.
• 33:47
  I don't want to do this."
• 33:48
  And if they knew there was an interim- and something a little more gentle that could scratch the surface just to get your baseline down a little bit, they might be more intrigued and more open to it.
• 34:00
  Yeah.
• 34:00
  I mean- To me, how I conceptualize the difference does somebody need EMDR or do they need Flash technique, is I think about is there anything to be learned- Right from going...
• 34:08
  'cause sometimes, again, like the layers of all the different processing and...
• 34:11
  You know what I'm saying?
• 34:12
  With EMDR, even if it's one target, it might be 10 sessions.
• 34:14
  But there's...
• 34:15
  If there's really a lot of learning and- and growth that comes out of it, and that's a positive experience, then I would say, yeah, EMDR is great.
• 34:22
  And sometimes the lesson is just you were at the wrong place at the wrong time.
• 34:25
  Yeah.
• 34:26
  And there's nothing to be learned from it.
• 34:27
  There's no...
• 34:28
  it's just something- It's happened really bad happened to you.
• 34:30
  And th- that, that's...
• 34:32
  there's no need to hash through all of the details and- and remember everything.
• 34:37
  But if you're dealing with the complex trauma from being a child that was a com- over and over again abandoned, neglected, and abused, then yeah, you're gonna have...
• 34:45
  You're gonna unravel a new layer every- Yeah single session or whatever.
• 34:49
  There's gonna be a lot of unlayering.
• 34:50
  Yeah.
• 34:50
  This has been very fascinating.
• 34:52
  So we know where to find you.
• 34:53
  I'm gonna put that in the show notes.
• 34:55
  And before you leave- if you could give the mes- the listeners one last message, piece of advice, maybe a tip or trick they could take with them today, what would it be?
• 35:06
  I think it would be, yeah, just that if you've suffered for too long, start looking into o- other resources.
• 35:11
  And again, like trauma treatment does not have to be scary.
• 35:15
  It does not have to take a, a very long time.
• 35:18
  Especially, again, if you've already done good work through spiritual practice or a coach or a, a great therapist or a mentor or, just being able to have like loving people.
• 35:27
  If you're well-supported, this thing that you think might be like really scary and overwhelming and you're just like, "Ugh, I don't wanna go on that journey," it might not be that, that bad.
• 35:36
  Okay.
• 35:37
  Sounds good.
• 35:38
  Thank you again, Rebecca.
• 35:39
  I appreciate you coming on so much.
• 35:41
  Yeah.
• 35:41
  Thank you.
• 35:42
  You are very welcome.
• 35:43
  For everybody else out there listening, you heard it.
• 35:45
  It's so worth every step you make every single day, every single move forward to just have a happier, healthier, more hopeful you.
• 35:54
  So you deserve it.
• 35:55
  Go out and get it, for sure.
• 35:57
  Absolutely.
• 35:58
  Yes, absolutely.
• 35:59
  And we will see you all back next week.
• 36:02
  Thank you so much.
• 36:02
  You all have a blessed day.