The fifth phase of EMDR is installation, which strengthens the preferred positive cognition. Body Scan

The sixth phase of EMDR is the body scan, in which clients are asked to observe their physical response while thinking of the incident and the positive cognition, and identify any residual somatic distress. If the client reports any disturbance, standardized procedures involving the BLS are used to process it. Closure Burke Harris, N. (2019). The deepest well: Healing the long-term effect of childhood adversity. London: Pan McMillan. Over 15 years of important advances in therapy and research, including findings from clinical and neurophysiological studies. What's intriguing about EMDR is both how well it works and the question is how it works and that got me into this dream stuff that I talked about earlier, and how it does not work through figuring things out and understanding things. But it activates some natural processes in the brain that's helped you to integrate these past memories.” Marich, J. (2011). EMDR Made Simple: Four Approaches to Using EMDR with Every Client. Eau Claire, WI: PESI Publishing (Premiere)Schwartz, A. (2017). The complex PTSD workbook: A mind-body approach to regaining emotional control and becoming whole. Berkeley, CA: Althea Press. EMDR revolutionized the treatment of PTSD and has emerged as a front-line therapy for multiple forms of psychological trauma. The third edition of this foundational work underscores EMDR's integrative nature, research support, and sensitive adaptations to diverse populations. The clinical aids, client transcripts, and fidelity scales will prove a boon to practitioners and researchers alike."--John C. Norcross, PhD, ABPP, Distinguished Professor of Psychology, University of Scranton

Marich, J. & Dansiger, S. (2018). EMDR Therapy and Mindfulness for Trauma-focused Care. New York: Springer Publishing Company Mark C. Russell, PhD, ABPP, is a core faculty member at Antioch University, Seattle, and the establishing director of the Institute of War Stress Injury, Recovery, and Social Justice. As a graduate student, Dr. Russell became Francine Shapiro's research assistant and was primarily responsible for developing the theory underlying EMDR. Shapiro, F., & Forrest, M. (1997). EMDR: The Breakthrough “Eye Movement” Therapy for Overcoming Stress, Anxiety, and Trauma. New York: Basic Books. Appendices with session transcripts, clinical aids, and tools for assessing treatment fidelity and outcomes. In addition to getting a full history and conducting appropriate assessment, the therapist and client work together to identify targets for treatment. Targets include past memories, current triggers and future goals. PreparationThe therapist offers an explanation for the treatment, and introduces the client to the procedures, practicing the eye movement and/or other BLS components. The therapist ensures that the client has adequate resources for affect management, leading the client through the Safe/Calm Place exercise. Assessment Archer, D. (2021). Anti-racist psychotherapy: Confronting systemic racism and healing racial trauma. Montreal: Each One Teach One Publications. And because of some experiences, both with myself, but even more with the patients of mine who told me about their experiences, I took a training in it. It turned out to be incredibly helpful. Then I did what's probably the largest NIH-funded study on EMDR. And we found that, of people with adult-onset traumas, a one-time trauma as an adult, that it had the best outcome of any treatment that has been published. EMDR is a bizarre and wondrous treatment and anybody who first hears about it, myself included, thinks this is pretty hokey and strange. It's something invented by Francine Shapiro who found that, if you move your eyes from side to side as you think about distressing memories, that the memories lose their power.

In this book, Dr. Shapiro, the originator of this approach, and Dr. Russell, her longtime colleague and collaborator, describe their work and the significant controversy that attended its rise due to EMDR's challenging of traditional cognitive behavioral approaches to psychotherapy and mechanisms of change. Discusses additional applications, including the treatment of complex trauma, addictions, pain, depression, and moral injury, as well as post-disaster response. Dworkin, M. (2005). EMDR and the Relational Imperative: The Therapeutic Relationship in EMDR Treatment. New York: Brunner-Routledge. Unlike other treatments that focus on directly altering the emotions, thoughts and responses resulting from traumatic experiences, EMDR therapy focuses directly on the memory, and is intended to change the way that the memory is stored in the brain, thus reducing and eliminating the problematic symptoms.Menakem, R. (2017). My grandmother’s hands: Racialized trauma and the path to mending our hearts and bodies. Las Vegas: Central Recovery Press. Dr. Russell is a retired Navy commander and military psychologist, who became the first certified military EMDR trainer in the Department of Defense, and organized a series of just-in-time EMDR trainings for more than 265 mental health providers in response to a growing military mental health crisis.

EMDR therapy emphasizes working with imagery, cognitions, emotions, somatic sensations, and behavior linked to a disturbing memory, as well as attending to past, current, and future-oriented experiential contributors. Unlike many psychotherapeutic treatments, EMDR does not require prolonged exposure, the direct challenging of beliefs, or numerous sessions to achieve results.Baldwin, M. & Korn, D. (2021). Every memory deserves respect: EMDR, the proven trauma therapy with the power to heal. New York: Workman Publishing Company.