Summit County Therapy

What do you think when you first hear "trauma?" Maybe you think of giant, devastating earthquakes, maybe you think of abuse and neglect, or (if your guilty pleasure is Grey's Anatomy like me), maybe you think ERs and doctors. Either way, in the last post we didn't talk about why trauma can have the far-reaching effects that it can. We're going to take today about how trauma affects our minds, emotions and our bodies. When we undergo anything traumatic - whether its a "big t or little t" trauma (see the last blog post ) it is something that typically evokes intense emotions. Usually there is a mix that includes fear and we can go into fight or flight or freeze mode. If you've ever jumped when someone surprised you, you know what it is like to go temporarily into fight/flight/freeze mode. With trauma, we go into fight/flight/freeze mode and can get stuck there. It can stick with us on an on-going basis, or it can blindside us when we encounter some...

Many people in my personal life ask me what EMDR is "all about."  By the way, if you ever find yourself asking me about EMDR, be prepared to learn for the next two hours. I can't contain everything I want to say about EMDR in this post and it's something I am very passionate about.  Today we're going to talk about what EMDR means, what's it like to experience, and how it works. To begin, EMDR is an acronym that stands for Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing. For those of you who have heard of EMDR you probably think "that's the weird therapy when a therapist moves their hand in front of your face." You're not wrong! However, there is so much more to it than the eye movements (referred to a Bilateral Stimulation or BLS). EMDR is the evidence-based therapy modality for treating Post-traumatic Stress Disorder and other trauma-related problems . It is also  used with other disorders including depression, anxiety, bipolar, other mood...