Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)

EMDR, a psychotherapy treatment originally designed to alleviate distress associated with traumatic memories, is now being used with success in the treatment of PTSD, panic disorder and generalized anxiety.

During EMDR the client thinks about emotionally upsetting material in brief sequential doses while focusing on an external stimulus at the same time. Therapist-directed lateral eye movements are the most commonly used external stimulus. Hand-tapping and audio stimulation are often used as well.

EMDR helps clients access their own traumatic memory network, accelerating information processing and enabling them to create new associations between the traumatic memory and more helpful, adaptive information.

These new associations result in “complete information processing, new learning, elimination of emotional distress, and development of cognitive insights.”

EMDR uses a three pronged approach:

(1) Past events leading to dysfunction are processed and new associative links with adaptive information are created.

(2) Current circumstances that provoke distress are targeted and internal and external triggers are desensitized.

(3) Future events are imagined and envisioned as positive scenarios to assist the client in acquiring the skills needed for adaptive functioning.

Dr. Francine Shapiro, developer of EMDR, asserts that the human brain has an inherent information-handling system that processes multiple elements of every experience to an adaptive state where learning takes place. She sees memory as being stored in linked networks organized around the earliest related event and its associated affect. These memory networks contain related thoughts, images, emotions, and sensations.

Shapiro believes that unprocessed experiences become the basis of dysfunctional reactions and are the cause of many mental disorders. She proposes that EMDR successfully alleviates mental disorders by fully processing the components of distressing memories. These effects are thought to occur when the targeted memory is linked with other more adaptive information. When this happens, learning takes place, and the experience is stored with appropriate emotions able to guide the person in the future.

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) contains many of the same elements found in psychodynamic, cognitive behavioral, interpersonal, experiential, and body-centered therapies. “It is an information processing therapy…used to address the experiential contributors of a wide range of pathologies. It attends to the past experiences that have set the groundwork for pathology, the current situations that trigger dysfunctional emotions, beliefs and sensations, and the positive experience needed to enhance future adaptive behaviors and mental health.”

Interestingly, EMDR seems to be the most effective treatment for PTSD in returning veterans. Twelve sessions of EMDR eliminated post-traumatic stress disorder in 77% of the multiply traumatized combat veterans studied. There was 100% retention in the EMDR condition. Effects were maintained at follow-up.

This is some of the best news I’ve heard in a long time, and I hope those in need have access to this quick, effective treatment.

*Information adapted from Dr. Francine Shapiro’s Accelerated Information Processing model to describe and predict EMDR’s effect.

Last week I shared a movie trailer and urged you to see “The Soloist.”

This week I’m doing the same.

And after you see this life-altering film, go to Take Part and become a member of the live, active community that is taking action, taking part and making a difference in the lives of all those affected by serious mental illness or homelessness.

See “The Soloist.”

Learn, love, be prepared to be altered.

Then Take Part.

And share your thoughts with us here.

I urge you.

Most Lovingly,

Do you struggle to get a good night’s sleep?

Do you toss and turn, frequently awaken, or rise in the morning still feeling fatigued?

If so, you have more on the line that just a long, tired day. Your overall happiness may be at stake.

According to a recent Finnish study, people who have difficulty getting a good night’s sleep are three times as likely to be dissatisfied with their lives later on.

While poor sleep and life dissatisfaction each show a strong tendency to be inherited, they do not share the same genetic roots, according to Dr. Tiina Paunio of the National Public Health Institute in Helsinki. This suggests that something about sleeping badly in itself affects “the brain, emotions, and mood.”

Past studies looked at the relationship between life dissatisfaction – as reflected in feelings of well-being and mental functioning — and sleep quality, but none looked at how the two are associated until Dr. Paunio and her colleagues surveyed a group of 18,631 same-sex twins in 1975 and again in 1981.

In 1975, 9 percent of the study participants reported dissatisfaction with life, and were likely to be dissatisfied in 1981. However, their sleep quality did not deteriorate over this period. However, the people who slept “rather poorly or poorly” in 1975 were more than twice as likely to be dissatisfied with life in 1981.

The researchers adjusted for all of the variables including health problems, smoking and drinking habits, and physical activity levels, finding that poor sleep independently tripled the likelihood of life dissatisfaction.

They seem to have proven that poor sleep quality may lead to an overall dissatisfaction with life.

So if you’re sleeping poorly, figure out why and make the necessary changes.

Your future happiness may depend on it.

Watch “The Alzheimer’s Project” for a look at the faces behind the disease - and the forces leading us toward a cure.

Starting this Sunday, mark your calendar or set your DVR so as not to miss “The Alzheimer’s Project,” HBO’s multi-platform series examining groundbreaking Alzheimer discoveries made by America’s leading scientists and the effects this debilitating and fatal disease has on those with Alzheimer’s and their families.

Air dates and times:

Sunday, May 10 at 9 p.m. EST

“The Memory Loss Tapes”

“The Memory Loss Tapes” takes an intimate look at seven individuals living with Alzheimer’s, seeking to introduce a new understanding by sharing the devastating experience of memory loss from the point of view of the person with the disease.

Monday, May 11 at 7:30 p.m. and 8 p.m. EST

“Grandpa, Do You Know Who I Am? With Maria Shriver” and “Momentum in Science, Part 1″

“Grandpa, Do You Know Who I Am? With Maria Shriver” is geared toward children and young teens coping with a grandparent’s illness, and presents vignettes that can help a child understand and deal with a relative’s gradual decline into Alzheimer’s.

“Momentum in Science” is a two-part, state-of-science odyssey that takes viewers inside the laboratories and clinics of 25 leading physicians, revealing some of the most cutting-edge Alzheimer research advances.

Tuesday, May 12 at 7 p.m. and 8 p.m. EST

“Caregivers” and “Momentum in Science, Part 2″

“Caregivers” is a collection of five family portraits that illustrate caring for the different stages of Alzheimer’s disease.

The evening concludes with “Momentum in Science, Part 2.”

For updated information about all things Alzheimer’s, visit the Alzheimer’s Reading Room, the “number one blog website on the Internet for advice, information, research, and insight into Alzheimer’s disease.”

Blessings!

‘The Alzheimer’s Project” is a presentation of HBO Documentary Films and the National Institute on Aging at the National Institutes of Health in association with the Alzheimer’s Association, The Fidelity® Charitable Gift Fund and Geoffrey Beene Gives Back® Alzheimer’s Initiative.

Distinguish between basic needs, higher needs and wants or preferences.

Our basic physical needs are air, water, food, protection from the elements and sleep.

Everything else is a higher need or preference.

It’s important for all of us to work toward higher needs. We want good health, satisfying employment, rewarding relationships, a sense of belonging and so on up the pyramid.

But take note: Designer shoes are not on Maslow’s pyramid of human needs. Neither are BMWs, bigger houses, dinners out three times a week, or international vacations. These all are wants or preferences.

Don’t get attached to preferences. Don’t undervalue your life if you cannot afford these luxuries. Enjoy them if you can, release the desire for them if you can’t. Your life is not worse, less significant or less valuable if you don’t accumulate possessions or unusual experiences. In fact, a growing number of philosophers and spiritual leaders say that a focus on the material blinds us to the truly valuable.

Ultimately, the choice is yours.

Choose to be happy. Choose contentedness.

Find the value and joy in the experiences available to you every single day, and embrace them.

This is the most recent installment in an ongoing series elaborating on 52 proven stress relievers identified by researchers at Texas Woman’s University.

Take a Time Out.

Unplug your phone. Turn off your computer. Silence your cell.

Want to take a long bath, meditate, sleep, or read without interruption?

Drum up the courage to temporarily disconnect. (The possibility of there being a terrible emergency in the next hour or so is almost nil.)

If you’re worried, use an answering machine to screen your calls, but give yourself permission to take a “time out” when you need one.

This is the most recent installment in an ongoing series elaborating on 52 proven stress relievers identified by researchers at Texas Woman’s University.