EMDR - Therapy options

[Azehr]

Hi! I'm a fun loving human being worth a wealth of experiences that make up my person. Unfortunately a few remnants of the bad experiences become crippling for my daily living. I have recently been diagnosed with PTSD, this is something that sounds odd to me as a lot of the symptoms have become extremely normal and in my point of view 'that's life'. However I reached a point between loving my life one minute and hating all existence the next minute where I thought something must give. I sought professional help. My psychologist hat suggest a couple of different forms of therapy. One of them EDMR, I'm curious to find those who have used this therapy or if there are other methods that have been effective? What are your experiences? I realise that this has so blanket answer for everyone, but I would like your perspective.

We are all fighting our own black clouds. I cried at the thought that the cloud doesn't have to be normal. It can be blown away!

[MarkJT]

Hey Azher, welcome to the forums and you are now part of a community that is very supportive and stigma free. Well done on posting your question.

So I was diagnosed with PTSD, depression and anxiety in February 2013. I was suffering horrendous nightmares and flashbacks due to an incident i attended as a member of Victoria Police. One of the treatments I had was exposure therapy which is different to EMDR but exposure worked a treat for me and no longer have nightmares and the flashbacks cause me no grief because the power has been taken out of the images.

I have a couple of mates who have had EMDR and has been successful on them as well. We have compared "notes" on the treatments and the physical reactions are pretty much the same, i.e. you get very emotional, it is very taxing mentally but it is well worth it if the end result is being able to get on with life.

They are certainly not easy to go through but if I was to relapse today, i would be doing exposure tomorrow and wouldn't hesitate to go EMDR either.

Feel free to post back with any questions - more than happy that help out where i can.

Mark.