Eagle Spirit Therapies

Lori Miller-Freitas

Lori

EMDR Poster Girl Final Entry

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Hey there!

Greetings from Happy Valley! And it is very much Happy Valley for me. Job is going great – love my boss, good people, great work. Getting lots of positive feedback. True homeowner – paid tax bill, water bill and buying a new garage door! I have a four season room that is full of sun.

And I met someone. Of course I would out here where I am home. It’s been just 4 weeks. We’re getting along great. Taking it slow. He’s very, very good at communicating (better than me) in relationships.

So dreams really do come true! But not sometimes without help – you know how grateful I am to you!

Your EMDR Poster Girl

Hypnosis, EMDR, TAT, Gentle Reprocessing What do they have in common?

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I am frequently asked what do all the therapies I use do for people and how are they different.  In this post I would like to talk about how they are similar.  It is very simple: EMDR, hypnosis, TAT and Gentle Reprocessing all work on a min/body level.  Although talk therapy is helpful it frequently does not allow clients to move what is stuck fully.  Humans use our ability to think as a defense for what feels bad.  It is very useful to help us function in the world but can slow the process of psychotherapy.  These therapies allow movement of stuck information without completely destroying all defenses leaving the clint feeling stronger.

EMDR Poster Girl Continued

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PG continued processing old stuck issues from childhood.  Each session we successfully disolved more old stuck messages.  PG began to feel at peace with herself her negative belief system began to crumble and she felt it was safe to feel good about herself.  Her migraine headaches began to decrease in intensity and frequency.  To date she has an occasional head ache.

I see PG a few times per year for tune ups otherwise she is doing much better than the initial session.  She has been able to make more positive changes in her life and continues to grow.

EMDR Poster Girl

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EMDR Poster Girl

The next discussion is about a woman in her fifties that had been suffering from Depression most of her life.  She had tried conventional therapy and medication with only minimal improvement.  Poster girl also suffered from migraine headaches.  She researched different therapies and found EMDR then found me.  We decided it was a good fit and began treatment.  I will call her PG from now on.

 

PG had a history of being put down when she did well in school.  Her parents were dysfunctional and did not know how to praise her for her talents.  She is very bright and talented but felt stuck in her life.  So, at the beginning of treatment I took a thorough history charting incidents that seems to have emotional charge to them to prepare a treatment plan to help move PG out of her depression.

 

At the beginning of treatment, I used some ego strengthening techniques to prepare for processing.  This took a couple of sessions between history and strengthening.  Then we were able to begin dissolving the old stuck negative beliefs by the third session.  PG s issues were from childhood and her treatment is much different from Bob the Core man.  PG had more issues to target that would be considered smaller but the smaller issues that come from childhood are harder to move.  They are like pulling out splinters as opposed to one or two big events.  Next entry I will talk about more on how PG responded to treatment and some of the differences.

Bob…Core man……Continued

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This session Bob was having intrusive thoughts about when his vehicle was hit. No one really made it in his vehicle except Bob and since it is his duty to care for the wounded (medic), Bob had survivor’s guilt. This was one of the worst memories that Bob came in with and when he told me the story of what happen it was very emotional. Since we had dissolved so many layers of the war trauma with TAT in previous sessions I decided to use EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitizing Repossessing). I wanted to make sure that we were clearing all the trauma and not leaving fragments and EMDR can be very powerful and deep and has been proven to work on trauma.

So I set up the standard EMDR protocol which involves focusing on the picture of the event the negative belief, positive belief, emotions and body sensations, while using bilateral stimulation such as eye movement, audio or tactile (more on EMDR at my web site). It also involves using 2 subjective scales to measure progress in treatment. Since Bob had made so much progress it felt like the appropriate time to use EMDR. However, about one minute into the processing it became too much for Bob and he felt like he was back there. I do not believe it is my job to make people feel worse and Bob was definitely flooded by the images and feelings. So, within 2 seconds I switched the processing to Gentle Reprocessing (formerly called gentle EMDR) www.gentlereprocessing.com . Gentle Reprocessing uses imagery to buffer the intensity of the trauma while processing. Within minutes Bob was calmer and able to continue processing the incident. By the end of the session his guilt was gone and Bob felt he did the best he could in the situation, after all this is when Bob received his traumatic brain injury and an injury to his shoulder. He didn’t remember most of the incident.

This session reminded me that great therapies that work are not always appropriate for a particular person. Healing is something that is fluid and needs to be flexible for the moment and the person. Bob left the session feeling more empowered and definitely much calmer. I felt enormous gratitude for being witness to his work. With all the work I do I feel I am the facilitator to a process that happens inside my client and I help guide them. We all do have the innate ability to heal. My next entry will be a summary of Bob’s experience and then future entries will be about others who have volunteered to let me tell their story.
Look for my entries on Fridays either weekly or every other week depending on my schedule.
Be Well,
Lori

Bob …Core man …continued

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Over the weeks Bob and I continued working on what was distressing him at the time.  At one point he came in late, after getting lost because the sound of a truck and the weather reminded him of a particularly distressing event during a firefight in Iraq.  Although it was unpleasant for Bob, having been triggered on the way to my office was a fortunate event.  It made working on that particular image much easier because it was right at the surface.  Bob had basically had a full blown flash back (that is when it feels like you are reliving the old traumatic event).  Bob was able to stay in the present enough to get to my office and he was aware of himself enough to know that what was happening.  This is not always the case with people when they experiencing PTSD symptoms.

 

So with very little talking, we immediately began using TAT.  Bob responds extremely well to TAT and within a few minutes he was visibly calmer.  Bob reported that his vision had been foggy (indicating disassociation) and hid body had felt numb.  Now Bob was reporting that he felt centered, clear and grounded in his body.  We checked back on the image of the event that had triggered Bob and although he felt sad that a pregnant woman died in the fire fight, he was no longer haunted by it.  Unfortunately, since the fire fight was at night there was no way to know she was there.  Bob explained that even if they knew she was there she may have been part of the group that had fired on our marines.  When doing trauma work I know that an event is processed when there is the appropriate amount of emotion left and not an eraser of memories or emotions.

 

Be Well,

Lori

Continued Bob… Core man …Iraq Veteran

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When Bob returned the following session the image that we targeted was still clear. He had been sleeping much but continued with some symptoms of PTSD. So we began working on another disturbing memory. As far as planning treatment, it was fairly easy at this point because Bob would come in with what was disturbing him the most and we would work on that so that each step made Bob’s burden a little lighter.
The next target was the MAMs (Military Age Men with dark skin as Bob explained). It was particularly disturbing if they were in as Bob described a man dress. Bob does not hold any bigotry but in Iraq he did not know who to trust or who would be the next person that could cause harm. Remember Iraq’s are fighting Iraq’s. So Bob want to be more comfortable with the MAMs.
After talking for awhile, and defining what we needed to work on we began using TAT again. Bob had encountered a MAM in a man dress recently in a convienence store and that became our starting off point for his distress. We used approximately 4 steps of TAT and Bob was relaxed and feeling more centered. Again Bob got that look on his face (look of focus and calm) and he said good much better. Each session with Bob last 60 minutes and in future sessions we include other therapies beside talking and TAT.
Be well until next week,
Lori

Bob…Core man…Iraq Veteran

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Bob…Core man…Iraq Veteran
Disclaimer: Bob’s true identity is protected and he volunteered to let me tell his story in hopes it would help others. (Thank you Bob)
The first time Bob came to see me was after his first tour in Iraq in 2003. I had treated one of Bob’s relatives and he was referred by that relative. Bob came to see me in early 2008 he had been back from his second tour in Iraq for nearly two years. He presented with symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The symptoms Bob described were nightmares, flash backs & hyper vigilance. Bob also reported having a traumatic brain injury and a physical injury as a result of his duty in Iraq. Bob requested help from me for the PTSD.

Over the next several weeks I will be telling Bob’s story until we are caught up to present day.
The nightmares were preventing Bob from sleeping. Without going into detail you can only imagine the scenes in his nightmares that were distressing him. Since I had seen Bob before and knew his history we were able to begin treatment fairly quickly. So we began treatment by targeting the worst scenes that were intruding into Bob’s sleep and waking thoughts.
The first step was to define and isolate these scenes so we would not overload Bob with his trauma. Since Bob and I worked together before, it was not a difficult process. So treatment began with using Tapas Acupressure Technique (TAT) that I adapted to fit Bob’s needs. TAT is a simple process where the client can focus on the distress and hold a pose with their own hands that puts pressure on points based in the acupuncture meridians. So through a series of steps with the TAT Bob was able to feel some immediate relaxation and relief from the image that we focused on. It always amazes me when I see change in one of my client’s right before my eyes. It reminds me how resilient we are as human beings and that is why I do this work. So in our first step of treatment Bob was able to get relief from one of the most distressing images that were plaguing him.
Bob came back the following week and reported that that image was not as distressing and that he was sleeping better. We were far from finished but were heading in the right direction.
I will be telling more of Bob’s story next week. You can learn more about TAT bye following the web link from my web site http:/eaglespirittherapies.com
Be Well, Lori