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Eight weeks ago I knew I had to change something. I had been in traditional talk therapy for almost five years, which had been absolutely helpful in managing my life, my unhealthy behaviors and destructive thinking patterns. I wouldn’t have gotten as far as I have with this much baggage without that weekly opportunity to offload, broaden my coping strategies and balance my very eclectic emotional output. But this traditional therapy just wasn’t getting me any results in this new era of life whereby my nervous system had absolutely thrown the towel in.

Following the huge family trauma and loss of our family home, I was faced with over 20 very real and very upsetting physical symptoms that day by day and week by week led to me facing a BMI of under 15, a loss of over 10kg in body weight. In a continual loop of panic about my health, desperately trying to find answers, trying to find treatments that would work and the inability to do any of the things that once brought me joy, It was also soul destroying that my beautiful 12 year old daughter was watching me fade away.

I had heard about EMDR, but had spent too long on reddit forums hearing about people being re traumatized by it, or having lots and seeing no results, so I was very tentative.

Knowing that my historical early life trauma was all around being force-fed and having then lived a life with disordered eating I wanted to find someone who had a background in that area of interest. I set out on google and quite quickly found Nancy. Nancy Southcott is a Psychotherapist based in the Southwest with a huge amount of experience to her name, including disordered eating and interestingly attachment disorders. I got her number and sent over a message asking to have a chat with her about what she did and what she could offer me.

It worth mentioning at this point that I had reached out to lots of different professionals in the three months leading up to this point explaining my current predicament and over half of them had read the message and not responded, this in my shit tinted glasses was ‘not getting involved, she’s a lost cause’ so reaching out to Nancy was a risk that she would also do the same.

I had the initial call with Nancy and we discussed my situation, some of my previous traumas around food, the Emetophobia (fear of vomiting) and the more recent family break down and loss of our home. She mentioned a therapy called Dialectical behavioral therapy and EMDR, both of which she offered. We booked in the first session and I went along nervous but desperate for some relief.

My first few sessions were fact finding, Nancy was getting to know me and we went through life from zero to now and she frantically took notes as I reeled off trauma after trauma. She sent me home with some forms to complete for her and next time I saw her we discussed the neurodivergent and ADHD aspects of my personality from the questionnaires I had completed and sent back. ADHD I wasn’t remotely surprised by the Neurodivergence was an eye opener but on discussion made ALOT of sense.

For the first two or three sessions she kept it light, we didn’t dive in too deep and there wasn’t much EMDR. From researching it, it’s really important that a therapist has confidence in a patient coping with the regression you do when pulling up old traumatic memories, as time went on the sessions got deeper and deeper.

Before we continue, you might be wondering what actually happens in an EMDR session? Basically we talk initially about the week between sessions, whats happened, what has come up (EMDR can stir up memories that pop up randomly between sessions). Then we go to a specific memory and allow all the visceral emotions and physical sensations to come up. Nancy will ask me to grade the feeling I’m having between 0-10 (10 being severe) she will then start to wave her pen from side to side in front of me as I follow it with my eyes. She talks throughout reaffirming that I am safe, nothing was my fault, and some words relating to the memory we have pulled up. This happens for about 30-40 seconds and then she stops and then we re grade the emotion attached to the memory, we repeat this process and discuss between the EMDR sessions until the grading drops down to a level of 0-1. Some memories take longer to work through than others. (Hopefully that gives some context)

The EMDR we did in sessions 3-6 provoked very little physical reaction, but in the 7th Session (which was only three weeks ago) I had my first huge breakthrough. I won’t lie, there was part of me that kept going back but not really knowing if it was helping at all and watching my bank balance decline as this was more than I’d ever spent on treatment before. But nevertheless I had made a commitment to recover so every week I kept going back.

In the 7th Session we revisited a termination I had in my early 20’s and we struck a nerve, this unplanned pregnancy at the age of 21 had been the first time I had ever felt connected to my body, having lived a life up until that point solely in my head very much disconnected from my body.

In my rational mind, in a new relationship, barely even an adult myself and with no resources to support a child, I knew this termination was the right thing to do. But my body clearly didn’t agree. We pulled up a memory I could focus on and the pen started moving. For the first time I started having really visceral reactions, my breathing changed, I was taking huge big sighs and visibly my nervous system was starting to shift something. We worked through the memory as Nancy talked and eventually got the grading down to zero so I wasn’t having any kind of an emotional reaction to it.

I left that day and I was absolutely floored, the kind of exhausted where you’re considering going to bed at 6pm. I messaged Nancy and asked if this was normal and she said yes, get some rest and drink plenty ‘your brain has got a lot to work through’. The following three nights I woke up in the mornings feeling like I had run a marathon overnight. I remained exhausted for about three days so just went on to low power mode and did the essentials, prioritizing rest. I came out the other side of those three days a different person, lighter, less reactive, calmer, and with an appetite (bear in mind here I had been struggling to stomach anything for MONTHS). It was like night and day from the 7th session to the 8th, I had been able to eat, felt regular hunger and my mood was the best It had been in months.

Session 8 we stuck with dialectical behavioral therapy as session 7 had been so big, but today in session 9 we went big again and revisited the primary school lunch hall where I was force-fed over the course of 2 years. I had the biggest visceral reaction I’ve ever had and almost moved in to a panic attack. The physical reaction was enormous and we actually had to stop a few times because I could feel myself tipping over the edge.

As the EMDR continued my body was doing everything it could to release the trapped trauma and emotions, I was yawning, sighing and swallowing on repeat. I came home and I’m writing this at almost 10pm at night and feeling as exhausted as I did after the last big breakthrough.

Basically EMDR has saved my life. I was heading towards an early grave at the age of 40, with years and years of trapped emotions and trauma and EMDR has been the only therapy that has allowed me to start releasing some of this. We still have work to do as we go back and pull up every single trauma from medical procedures to abandonment but having experienced the changes first hand I am beyond confident that I will get to a place where I have emptied the suitcase of baggage I have been adding to and carrying since I was little.

All I can say is that If you are on the fence about EMDR, do it. It has truly changed my life (even part of the way through the process) I will keep updating you as we have more breakthroughs and I can report back on anything interesting or unusual.

Love and Light as Always

Georgie