EMDR Therapy in Snohomish County, WA
You may understand what happened to you and still feel as though part of you has not moved past it.
A memory may come back unexpectedly. A particular situation, conversation, medical appointment, relationship, or experience may cause your body to react before you have time to think. You may know intellectually that you are safe now, yet still feel anxious, overwhelmed, guarded, disconnected, or stuck in patterns that are difficult to change.
Motherhood Wellness Clinic provides EMDR therapy for women and mothers throughout Snohomish County, Washington. We offer in-person therapy at our Bothell office as well as telehealth therapy throughout Washington State.
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a structured psychotherapy approach that can help people process traumatic and distressing experiences that continue affecting the way they feel, think, respond, and relate to themselves or others.
Our therapists may incorporate EMDR when working with experiences such as birth trauma, difficult pregnancy or postpartum experiences, childhood or relational trauma, distressing memories, anxiety, grief, and other experiences that continue to feel unresolved.
You do not need to have everything figured out before beginning therapy. Together, we can explore what you are experiencing, how your past may still be affecting your present, and whether EMDR may be an appropriate part of your treatment.
What Is EMDR Therapy?
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a structured, trauma-focused psychotherapy approach designed to help people process distressing experiences and memories that may continue to affect them long after the experience itself has ended.
Sometimes an experience can feel as though it is still happening in the present. You may notice strong emotions, physical sensations, intrusive memories, negative beliefs about yourself, or reactions that seem disproportionate to what is happening around you now. Even when you understand intellectually that an experience is over, your emotional or physical response may tell a different story.
EMDR therapy provides a structured way to revisit and process these experiences so that they may become less emotionally overwhelming and less disruptive to your life. Rather than trying to erase a memory, EMDR focuses on helping you relate to the memory differently and reduce the distress connected to it.
EMDR has been extensively studied as a treatment for trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and may also be incorporated into therapy when past experiences continue contributing to current emotional distress.
How Does EMDR Therapy Work?
EMDR therapy uses a process called bilateral stimulation while you briefly focus on aspects of a distressing memory or experience. Bilateral stimulation alternates attention between the two sides of the body and may involve guided eye movements, alternating tapping, or other forms of left-to-right stimulation.
Your therapist may ask you to notice a particular memory, image, emotion, physical sensation, or belief while engaging in bilateral stimulation. Over the course of the process, new thoughts, feelings, memories, or perspectives may emerge.
The goal is not to make you forget what happened. Instead, EMDR is intended to help your mind process experiences that continue to carry significant emotional distress so that memories can begin to feel more like something that happened in the past rather than something you are continuing to experience in the present.
EMDR is a structured therapy and does not mean immediately beginning with your most difficult experience. Treatment typically includes time to understand your history, identify your goals, develop resources for managing distress, and determine together what experiences may be appropriate to address.
What Can EMDR Therapy Help With?
EMDR is most strongly supported as a treatment for trauma and PTSD. At Motherhood Wellness Clinic, we may also consider EMDR when past or distressing experiences appear to be contributing to difficulties you are experiencing today.
These experiences may include:
Birth trauma or a frightening labor and delivery
Difficult pregnancy or postpartum experiences
Distressing or intrusive memories
Childhood trauma or difficult early experiences
Relational trauma
Reproductive trauma, pregnancy loss, or other painful reproductive experiences
Medical trauma or frightening medical experiences
Sexual or physical trauma
Grief connected to traumatic or distressing experiences
Anxiety or fear associated with particular memories or experiences
Strong emotional or physical reactions to specific triggers
Negative beliefs about yourself that developed through painful experiences
Sometimes the connection between your past and present is obvious. Other times, you may simply notice that certain situations produce an intensity of emotion that is difficult to understand.
You might think:
“I know I am safe, but I do not feel safe.”
“I know what happened was not my fault, but part of me still feels responsible.”
“I know this situation is different, but my body reacts as though the same thing is happening again.”
“I understand why I feel this way, but understanding it has not made the feeling go away.”
What Does an EMDR Therapy Session Look Like?
EMDR is a structured therapy, but the process is individualized to you, your experiences, and your readiness.
Beginning EMDR does not mean that you will immediately be asked to revisit the most difficult experience of your life. Before beginning trauma processing, your therapist will spend time getting to know you, understanding what brings you to therapy, and identifying the experiences, memories, beliefs, or patterns that may be contributing to what you are experiencing today.
Part of this process may include developing coping skills and strategies for managing difficult emotions, identifying resources that help you feel grounded, and deciding together what you would like to work toward in therapy.
When you are ready to begin processing a particular experience, your therapist may ask you to bring to mind a specific memory, image, belief, emotion, or physical sensation connected to it. While noticing what comes up, you will engage in bilateral stimulation, often through guided eye movements or alternating tapping.
Your therapist will periodically pause and ask you to notice what you are experiencing. A different memory may come to mind. An emotion or physical sensation may shift. You may notice a new thought or perspective about what happened. There is not one particular response you are supposed to have.
The process continues at a pace that considers your individual needs and ability to remain present with what you are experiencing.
EMDR is not intended to erase memories or change the facts of what happened. Instead, the goal is to help you process experiences that continue to carry significant emotional weight so that they no longer have the same power over how you feel and respond in the present.
For some clients, EMDR takes place as part of traditional ongoing therapy. For clients who would benefit from a longer, more concentrated period of time focused on a particular traumatic experience, Motherhood Wellness Clinic also offers EMDR Intensives.
EMDR for Birth Trauma and Motherhood
Pregnancy, childbirth, and becoming a mother can bring experiences to the surface in ways you may not have expected.
For some women, the traumatic experience is connected directly to pregnancy, labor, delivery, or postpartum recovery. You may have experienced an emergency C-section, unexpected medical intervention, complications during pregnancy or birth, fear for your life or your baby's life, a difficult recovery, or another experience that felt frightening or overwhelming.
For others, what was most difficult may have been feeling unheard, dismissed, powerless, rushed, or disconnected from what was happening. A birth can be considered medically successful and still leave you struggling emotionally with the way you experienced it.
Afterward, particular moments may continue to feel unusually vivid. You may replay parts of the birth in your mind, become anxious during medical appointments, avoid conversations about birth, feel disconnected from your body, or experience strong emotions when thinking about another pregnancy or delivery.
Sometimes you know intellectually that the birth is over and that you are safe now, while your body continues reacting as though part of the experience is still happening.
EMDR may be used to help process specific moments from pregnancy, labor, delivery, postpartum recovery, or other reproductive experiences that continue to feel emotionally unresolved. Therapy may also explore the beliefs, fears, emotions, and physical responses that became connected to those experiences.
Motherhood itself can also bring earlier experiences to the surface. Caring for a child, navigating changes in your relationships, becoming responsible for someone else, or thinking about the kind of mother you want to be can sometimes cause you to see your own childhood or past relationships differently.
You may begin recognizing patterns you had not noticed before. Old memories may feel more significant. Experiences you once minimized may begin affecting you differently.
At Motherhood Wellness Clinic, we look at these experiences within the larger context of your life. EMDR is not used with the assumption that every difficult experience should be processed in exactly the same way. Instead, therapy is individualized according to your history, symptoms, goals, current circumstances, and readiness.
Whether you are processing a traumatic birth, another reproductive experience, an earlier trauma that has resurfaced during motherhood, or a combination of experiences, the goal is not to erase what happened.
It is to help you reach a place where what happened no longer has the same power over your present life.
Is EMDR Therapy Right for Me?
You do not need to know whether EMDR is the right kind of therapy before reaching out.
You may simply know that something still feels unresolved.
Perhaps you understand why you react the way you do, but that understanding has not changed the reaction itself. Certain memories may still feel unusually vivid. Particular situations may create anxiety, fear, shame, anger, or physical tension that feels difficult to control. You may avoid certain conversations, places, medical settings, relationships, or experiences because of what they bring up for you.
Or you may have noticed patterns that are harder to explain.
You might become overwhelmed in situations that do not seem overwhelming to other people. You may struggle to feel safe even when you know intellectually that you are safe. You may find yourself carrying beliefs about yourself—such as feeling inadequate, powerless, responsible, unlovable, or somehow at fault—that you understand logically are not completely true but still feel deeply rooted.
EMDR may be worth exploring when a past or distressing experience continues affecting your emotions, relationships, nervous system, beliefs about yourself, or ability to feel present in your life.
It may also be appropriate when motherhood has brought earlier experiences to the surface or when pregnancy, birth, postpartum recovery, loss, or another reproductive experience has created new distress.
At Motherhood Wellness Clinic, we do not assume that every client needs EMDR or that every difficult experience should be treated in the same way.
Therapy begins by understanding you.
Together, we can look at what you are experiencing, what may be contributing to it, what you hope will be different, and which therapeutic approaches may best support those goals. EMDR may become one part of that work when it is appropriate for your needs and readiness.
EMDR Therapy in Snohomish County and Across Washington State
Motherhood Wellness Clinic provides EMDR therapy for women and mothers throughout Snohomish County, Washington.
We currently offer in-person appointments at our Bothell office as well as telehealth therapy for clients throughout Washington State.
Our therapists work with women experiencing trauma, birth trauma, difficult pregnancy or postpartum experiences, anxiety, distressing memories, childhood and relational wounds, reproductive trauma, grief, and other experiences that may continue affecting emotional wellbeing and everyday life.
Our approach looks beyond symptoms alone.
Past experiences, relationships, physical health, stress, caregiving responsibilities, reproductive experiences, and your current environment can all influence the way you feel and respond. Therapy gives us space to slow down, understand those connections, and determine what may help you move forward.
Depending on your individual needs and treatment goals, EMDR may be used on its own or incorporated alongside other trauma-informed and evidence-based approaches.
Whether you are seeking EMDR because of one specific experience or because you have begun recognizing patterns from the past that continue affecting your present, you do not have to have everything figured out before beginning.
Frequently Asked Questions About EMDR Therapy
Do I need to have PTSD to benefit from EMDR?
No. EMDR is commonly associated with trauma and PTSD, but you do not need to arrive in therapy with a particular diagnosis or even be certain that what you experienced was “traumatic enough.”
Sometimes clients seek EMDR because of a clearly identifiable traumatic experience. Other times, they notice distressing memories, emotional triggers, negative beliefs about themselves, anxiety, or patterns that seem connected to earlier experiences.
Part of therapy is understanding what you are experiencing and determining whether EMDR may be an appropriate approach for you.
Do I have to talk about every detail of what happened?
EMDR does not require you to provide a detailed verbal account of every part of a traumatic or distressing experience.
Your therapist will need enough information to understand what you are experiencing and help identify appropriate areas to work on, but EMDR differs from approaches that rely primarily on repeatedly talking through an experience in detail.
Throughout the process, you remain in communication with your therapist and work at a pace that considers your individual needs and readiness.
Will I start processing trauma during my first EMDR session?
Not necessarily.
EMDR is a structured process. Before beginning trauma processing, your therapist will spend time understanding your history, current concerns, treatment goals, coping strategies, and the experiences you may want to address.
Preparation is an important part of the process.
For some clients, this may happen relatively quickly. For others, spending more time developing resources, strengthening emotional regulation, or addressing other concerns first may be important.
There is not one timeline that is right for everyone.
Can EMDR therapy be done through telehealth?
For some clients, EMDR can be incorporated effectively into telehealth therapy.
Whether in-person or online EMDR is appropriate will depend on your individual circumstances, clinical needs, comfort, and treatment goals. Your therapist can talk with you about what the process would look like and help determine which format makes the most sense for you.
Motherhood Wellness Clinic offers in-person therapy at our Bothell office and telehealth therapy throughout Washington State.
How long does EMDR therapy take?
There is no set number of sessions that applies to everyone.
The length of treatment can depend on what brings you to therapy, the number and complexity of experiences you want to address, your current circumstances, your treatment goals, and how you respond to the process.
Some clients use EMDR to focus on a particular experience, while others incorporate it into longer-term therapy addressing multiple experiences or patterns.
For clients who would benefit from a longer period of uninterrupted processing focused on a specific experience, Motherhood Wellness Clinic also offers EMDR Intensives.
Ready to Get Started?
You may know that something has been affecting you for a long time without knowing exactly what to call it.
Maybe you have tried to understand what happened.
Maybe you have talked about it before.
Maybe part of you feels as though you should have moved past it by now.
And yet the memories, emotions, physical reactions, fears, or beliefs connected to the experience are still showing up in your life.
You do not need to decide on your own whether EMDR is the right treatment or know exactly where therapy should begin.
At Motherhood Wellness Clinic, we provide a compassionate, trauma-informed space to help women understand the experiences and patterns that may be keeping them stuck and determine what healing may look like moving forward.
You can begin with a free 20-minute consultation to ask questions, learn more about our approach, and determine whether one of our therapists may be a good fit.