EMDR

@Black_flame70 Hello there. I actually needed Google to learn what EMDR was. Spiralling into severe trauma! Thankfully ive not experienced that therapy. I have been diagnosed with and suffered what i thought was some sort of psychosis...turned out it was disssociation. Just wondered if you were told that yr EMDR treatment was for a form of psychosis?

I just wanted to stop by and welcome you @Black_flame70

While I don't have experience with EMDR myself though it was recommended to me by my previous psychologist. I do know that there are others who have had experience with this form of therapy and am sure someone will be by to share their experiences.

Did you and your therapist discuss alternative therapies that might be helpful moving forward?

@Dizzy4 Hi there, I have been seeing a psychologist for a long time for my PTSD. Unfortunately last year it was triggered at work so she suggested trying EMDR which I was all up for - anything to help me move past the trigger. EMDR works by you staring at a screen watching a dot go side to side and whilst that happens you have to relive your traumatic experiences, bring them to the surface of your emotional brain to then reprocess as a non-threatening response. But it didn't work for me - I spiralled into a heap on the floor in foetal position and was talking to her from a different identity (myself as a child). It took ages of recovery for me to stop thinking about it and move past it. I felt I couldn't see my psychologist anymore because it became a trigger.

@Ru-bee No we didn't. I went inward and needed the space to try to understand what had been triggered. Which was difficult. It prevented me from going to work - had to take my long service leave to work through it. Went to the ED a couple of times, but meaning no disrespect, they were not helpful. They gave me a care package of phamplets and sent me on my way. The organisations I emailed put me on a waiting list and still to this day I didn't hear back from one. It took me a few months of taking medication [edited by mod] to stop my anxiety and re-establish myself into self worth.

@Black_flame70 hi again. Thanks so much for sharing that. Staring at a dot going from side to side on a screen sounds ok. reliving past traumas..no way. That wld be my undoing as well. I was needing treatment for ptsd (my fear of another panic attack happening-i used to have many daily a few years previous). After weeks of talk therapy, CBT was the final hurdle. Nope, couldnt do it. And that was that. I had to go away and get over it myself.

@Dizzy4 It's a journey isn't it!

@Dizzy4 I wish months ago I knew about this forum. But happy I do now.

I tried it twice, with 2 different practitioners.

Personally, I thought it was...kinda dumb.

I just sat there in a chair in their office with and eye mask on and headphones on listening to metronome beeps whilst holding a cylinder in each hand that vibrated in time to the beeps. Neither psychologists really interacted with me much and definitely didn't ask me any questions whilst I was doing it. For all I knew they were playing on their phones whilst I was just sitting there being beeped at.

At the end of the sessions I didn't notice any change - not better, not worse.

After a few of the sessions though I did begin to feel a bit angry because these were costing me (and Medicare) around $270 a session! And, if they weren't going to talk to me or ask me questions, it truly felt like I could find an app or website an do this from home. So I did. Hell, I even thought I would look into buying a $10 RaspberryPi mini computer and bunch of electronic bits and pieces from Jaycar and building the machine myself, putting the plans up online for people to use for free.

Look, I'm sure the science is pretty solid with some of this stuff, but it's not right to charge someone who is unwell hundreds of dollars for doing so little - ie sitting in a chair whilst in the same room as someone listening to a glorified metronome.

Personally, I've had more success with a homemade Dreammachine (a kind of lamp and rotating shade with holes cut into it that produces a mild flickering light that helps users enter a calming hypnogogic state - which they are looking into doing alongside EMDR anyway). It was very, very calming.

But hey, this is just my opinion/experience.

I hope yours improves if you decide to continue with it.