Not Sure If Your Experience Counts? What can EMDR Actually Help With?

Written By Samantha Farid

Not sure if your experience counts?

Most people I work with don’t walk in saying “I have trauma.”

They say things like:

In your head

  • Can’t turn your brain off

  • Overthinking everything

  • Constant mental replaying

  • Intrusive thoughts or worst-case scenarios

  • Always analyzing, rarely feeling resolved

In your body

  • Always “on” or slightly on edge

  • Trouble relaxing, even when you try

  • Feeling wired and exhausted at the same time

  • Emotional overwhelm or total shutdown

  • Knowing you’re safe… but not feeling it

In your patterns

  • Repeating the same relationship dynamics

  • Pulling away or shutting down when things get close

  • Over-performing but feeling disconnected

  • Feeling responsible for everything (and everyone)

  • Stuck in cycles you understand but can’t change

Underneath it all

  • “Something feels off, but I can’t explain it”

  • Feeling like you’re too much… or not enough

  • Fear of being rejected, exposed, or abandoned

  • Growing up having to be “the strong one”

  • Experiences that didn’t seem like “trauma” — but stuck with you

How you’ve been coping

  • Scrolling, distracting, staying busy to avoid slowing down

  • Trying to control everything so nothing goes wrong

  • Pushing through exhaustion because stopping feels worse

  • Using food, work, pleasure-seeking behaviors, or substances to take the edge off

The common thread

All of this points to the same thing:

Your brain learned patterns to help you survive —
but it never got the chance to fully process what shaped them.

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing helps your brain update those patterns
so you don’t have to keep managing them.

Same life.
Different internal experience.

Things EMDR has helped my clients with…

  • Phobias

  • Accidents

  • Negative Beliefs

  • Feelings of Not Being Good Enough

  • Painful Childhood Experiences

  • Sexual Trauma

  • Emotional Abuse / Neglect

  • Intimate Partner Violence

  • Shame

  • Addictions

  • ‍ ‍Divorce

  • Medical Illness / Trauma

  • Grief

  • Anxiety

  • Depression

  • Constance Feeling of Being On Edge

  • Recent Traumatic Events (to prevent PTSD from Developing)

  • Upsetting Thoughts / Images

  • Experiences of a Neurodivergent Mind in a Neurotypical World

  • Betrayal Trauma (both sides)

  • Physical Abuse

  • Religious Trauma

  • Immigration / First Generation Challenges of Bridging Two Worlds

  • Identity Challenges

Behavioral Addictions besides Substance Use that DeTUR can help with:

  • Shopping / Spending

  • Infidelity

  • Over-Eating / Food Noise

  • Gambling

  • Desire to be Productive / Challenges Relaxing

  • Seeking Control

  • Scrolling at 2am instead of sleeping to avoid

  • & more

Bottom line

If you’ve done the work, understand your patterns, and still feel stuck in them.

There’s probably something your brain hasn’t fully processed yet.

& that’s exactly what this work is designed to resolve.

Got Questions:

If you’re ready, let’s talk, schedule a free 30 minute zoom consultation to see if an EMDR Intensive in NJ might be a good fit for you. See the FAQ for information on investment.

Samantha Farid
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