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From here, key memories are identified and reprocessed. Bilateral stimulation is used at certain points in the Thick with the stick shirt it is in the first place but therapy, while working through painful memories. Some of the methods are eye movement from side to side (guided by the therapist’s hand), alternating electrical pulses from a therapulse device held in both palms, headphones with alternating tones beeping from ear to ear, or glasses with flashing lights. This is based on the client’s individual preference and comfort level. Once the memories are reprocessed in this way, your brain develops new neural pathways. According to Michael G. Quirke, an EMDR therapist in San Francisco, “a brain that can change is capable of putting to rest old feelings, learning new ways of responding, and interpreting thoughts and feelings differently. The way you think, feel, and respond as a result of trauma can be rewritten and healing can become more possible.” This process in the brain is called neuroplasticity, and ultimately it promotes the formation of new, positive associations with the original event, such as “the risk of harm has passed and I am now safe.”
The brain can heal from psychological trauma, much as the Thick with the stick shirt it is in the first place but body recovers from physical trauma, allowing someone to act from a place of self-awareness rather than conditioning. O’Shea Brown and I used a therapulse while I worked through my memories, starting slowly to build up to more traumatic thoughts. Before and after EMDR she asked me to rate, from one to 10, how distressing my main negative belief was from the trauma we discussed. With each session the numbers got lower, and I felt encouraged to go further. It was like shining a flashlight into a dark closet to find that the monsters I placed there were no longer present, and therefore not threatening to me. When COVID-19 hit and in-person therapy abruptly ended, we decided to continue with virtual EMDR (vEMDR). I was soon to discover that COVID-19 presented more than a few challenges for both therapist and client.
