Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, called EMDR, is a form of therapy that enables people to heal from the symptoms and distress they experience due to disturbing life experiences. People suffer from anxiety and other forms of distress when a person’s subconscious mind is trying to deal with and process experience while consciously trying to avoid thinking about or dealing with those experiences.
For some people, some experiences were so traumatic that even the subconscious mind is unable to deal with it, so the memories are repressed and buried. These repressed memories are also a source of internal conflict, anxiety, and emotional distress.
EMDR therapy is designed to facilitate the access and processing of these traumatic memories bringing them to a resolution. With a physical wound, your body immediately begins to attempt to heal the wound. Sometimes a wound is so deep and severe that outside help is needed, such as getting stitches or applying a bandage and medication. Then once the conditions are right, the body’s natural ability to heal takes over, and the wound closes, and your body is healed over time. The human brain is also always working toward mental health. Much like the case where medical intervention is required for the physical wound, sometimes professional intervention is required for the mental and emotional wounds.
EMDR removes the blocks that are preventing your mind from its natural ability to heal itself. If your mind is blocked from healing, the emotional wound lingers and festers. In the case of a physical wound, there might be complications such as infection that sets in blocking the body’s ability to heal. For the human brain, having a traumatic experience that cannot be reconciled is the same as having an infection in an open wound. The symptoms and the pain increase over time until your body cannot take it any longer.
For many transgender kids, this coronavirus pandemic has been exceedingly difficult. Many kids are stuck inside of a home with parents who do not approve of their lifestyle, or worse, are ashamed of them. The abuse these kids receive range from being completely ignored and disregarded to active physical abuse. For a kid or a teenager, abuse at the hands of a parent is a mental and possibly physical trauma they carry with them for their entire lives. Through no fault of their own, they are now living with these open mental wounds that cannot heal due to the blocks our minds put into place.
TransNewYork is actively seeking to reach out to Transgender individuals to help them deal with their trauma and cope with their present situation.
EMDR is just one of the tools at our disposal to help these people who have suffered at the hands of family, teachers, classmates, and even coworkers and bosses.
As with your body’s natural ability to heal, your mind has that same brilliant ability. Sometimes it just takes a little coaxing and removal of those roadblocks to put your mind in the right position to let the healing begin.