Speaker: Roger M. Solomon, Ph.D. 

The heart of EMDR involves the transmutation of these dysfunctionally stored experiences into an adaptive resolution that promotes psychological health. Guided by the Adaptive Information Processing Model (AIP), EMDR therapy is applicable to a wide degree of disorders, including complex trauma. Complex trauma, while rooted in memories of traumatizing events that are maladaptively stored, can be more comprehensively understood and phenomenologically elaborated by the framework of The Structural Dissociation of the Personality (TDSP).

According to TDSP trauma can cause the personality to split into parts: Part(s) that engage in everyday living (called the Apparently Normal Part) and parts which hold the maladaptively stored, “stuck in time” memories (called Emotional Part), each of them having its own first-personperspective and memory networks. Before processing traumatic memories with EMDR, people with more severe trauma may need appropriate stabilization to avoid stimulating other memories and emotional parts that are beyond the client’s window of tolerance. Consequently, phase-oriented treatment is important.  The three phases are a) Stabilization  b) Treatment of traumatic memories, and c) (re)Integration of the personality).

This workshop will integrate EMDR treatment within a Phase Oriented framework, (informed by TDSP) to enable the therapist to effectively treat clients with complex trauma. Teaching points will be illustrated by video tapes of sessions.

Topics covered include:

• Phase-Oriented Treatment and how EMDR therapy phases integrate within this model.  
• Working with parts (including the inner meeting place, and effectively dealing with the different types of parts
• Application of EMDR therapy principles for preparation and stabilization, e.g. treat the phobias that maintain dissociative symptoms enhance co-consciousness, cooperation, and compassion among parts, time orientation of parts; and increasing the client’s overall integrative capacity.  
• Strategies and modifications of the standard EMDR protocol to facilitate memory processing, staying within the patient’s  “window of tolerance”.
• Strategies to promote (re)integration of new life skills and adaptive perspectives.
• Emphasis will be given to presenting and discussion of tapes of EMDR sessions to understand the clinical phenomena and the therapy process.  

Goal: Participants will learn how to utilize EMDR therapy with
clients experiencing complex trauma and dissociative symptoms

• Objectives:
  Participants will learn Phase Oriented Treatment and how EMDR therapy integrates within this model.
  Participants will learn The Theory of Structural Dissociation and how it informs EMDR therapy
• Participants will learn basic theory and techniques about working with parts of the personality
  Participants will learn modifications of the EMDR Standard Protocol and strategies to enable clients stay within their “window of tolerance”.