You’re smart, capable, and outwardly holding it all together - but inside, things feel increasingly unsustainable.
You’ve hit a point where stress, anxiety, or emotional exhaustion are no longer manageable with your usual coping strategies.
This isn’t about needing “more self-care.”
It’s about interrupting deeply ingrained patterns before they take a long-term toll.
I’m Dr Claire Plumbly, a clinical psychologist specialising in intensive trauma and burnout recovery for professionals who need deep, lasting change - delivered with clarity, efficiency, and psychological depth.
You’re smart, capable, and outwardly holding it all together - but inside, things feel increasingly unsustainable.
You’ve hit a point where stress, anxiety, or emotional exhaustion are no longer manageable with your usual coping strategies.
This isn’t about needing “more self-care.”
It’s about interrupting deeply ingrained patterns before they take a long-term toll.
I’m Dr Claire Plumbly, a clinical psychologist specialising in intensive trauma and burnout recovery for professionals who need deep, lasting change - delivered with clarity, efficiency, and psychological depth.
How EMDR Therapy Works
EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing) is a structured, evidence-based therapy used to help people recover from trauma, anxiety, and distressing life experiences. People often imagine it’s simply “following a finger with your eyes,” but that’s only one small part of a carefully paced process.
On this page, I’ll walk you through what EMDR treatment typically looks like, so you know what to expect — from the first appointment through to trauma processing and follow-up.
The EMDR map: what treatment usually includes
Most EMDR therapy has three parts that follows this flow:
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Planning (what we’re targeting and why)
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Preparation (the skills and supports that help you stay regulated)
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Processing (the “reprocessing” of the trauma, using bilateral stimulation)
Some people move quickly into processing; others do more preparation first. The pace is part of the treatment, often the more complex or ingrained the difficulties are, the slower the pace to avoid flooding - being swamped with intense emotions which can happen if you're not ready.
Step 1 — Assessment and choosing a focus
Before any processing starts, your therapist will work with you to get clear on:
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what’s bringing you to therapy now (symptoms and triggers)
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what you want to be different
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which experiences might sit underneath the present-day problem (these are often called “targets”)
This step often includes developing a roadmap of targets (a set of memories/situations) and choosing a logical starting point.
Step 2 — Preparation (resourcing and stabilisation)
EMDR works best when you can stay present while your brain processes. So before we start, your therapist will help you build your “staying steady” toolkit.
This might include:
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grounding strategies (getting out of your head and back into the room)
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calming or anchoring imagery
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ways to slow things down if emotions spike
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planning what you’ll do between sessions if anything feels stirred up
A key message here: you’re not meant to white-knuckle EMDR. The prep phase is what makes EMDR feel contained and workable.
Step 3 — Setting up a target (what we identify before processing)
When you begin processing a memory or situation, your therapist will guide you through a set-up which will light up all the neural networks related to the stuck memory:
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The snapshot: the worst moment / image that captures it
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Negative belief: what your brain took from this moment (e.g., “I’m not safe,” “I’m powerless,” “It was my fault”)
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What you’d like to feel instead (e.g., “I’m safe now,” “I have choices,” “I did the best I could”)
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Emotions: what you feel when you bring it to mind
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Body sensations: where you feel it in your body
Step 4 — Bilateral stimulation (the processing part)
Step 6 — Consolidation and next steps
This is the part most people have heard of: bilateral stimulation (BLS), the stimulation of the left and right hemispheres of your brain. Your therapist may use:
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eye movements (tracking fingers or a light bar)
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tapping (on knees/hands, or self-taps guided by the therapist)
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audio tones (alternating left/right via a headset)
You’ll be asked to hold the memory/snapshot in mind, then you’ll do a short set of BLS. After each set, your therapist will ask something like:
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“What do you notice now?”
Then you repeat this. Different thoughts, emotions, memories and images may arise. This is free-associative - meaning that you don't need to try hard to generate them - you just allow these to arise. Over time, the brain naturally makes new adaptive connections, the trauma memory shifts from feeling present and dangerous to feeling like something that happened in the past.
Important point: EMDR is not hypnosis. You’re aware of where you are, you can speak, you can pause, and you remain in control.
Sometimes you reach a place where the memory feels more adaptive by the end of the session, if not you will continue with this in the following session. But once the distress has reduced, the session moves into consolidation — making sure the gains stick, and that you leave feeling grounded and safe.
All of this usually includes:
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Connecting more clearly to your new adaptive feelings about the situation (e.g., “I’m safe now,” “I can cope,” “I have choices”).
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Body scan: checking whether any distress is still held physically (tight chest, heaviness, nausea, tension). If something remains this gives us a hint that there is another layer to unpick.
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Closure: grounding and stabilising so you’re not leaving activated. Your therapist will use visualisations, breathing and practical grounding resources.
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An invitation to record dreams and a note of any insights that arise after the session.
All of this occurs around a 'formulation' - a roadmap of areas that you and your therapist need to work through in order to improve your wellbeing.
FAQ About EMDR
How long is an EMDR session?
Most EMDR sessions are 50–90 minutes. We also offer EMDR intensives which gives longer processing time over 2 to 4 hour chunks, which allow more processing time with built-in grounding and breaks.
What if I can’t picture the memory clearly?
That’s common. EMDR can still work if the memory is vague, more emotional or physical than visual,. Memories are included in many ways - in beliefs, body sensations and stuck patterns of behaviours so your therapist can help you to process from these symptoms too.
What if I don’t know what the memory is?
That’s really common. Many people come to EMDR with a felt sense (anxiety, panic, shame, numbness, dread) or a specific trigger (e.g., feedback at work, intimacy, driving, conflict) but aren't sure of the “origin memory”.
In that situation, EMDR can still work - EMDR therapists are trained in techniques that to help you figure out where the trauma site is. In this situation we might:
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Start with the present trigger: We target a recent situation where the feeling shows up strongly, then follow the links back to earlier experiences your nervous system associates with that same threat.
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Start with the belief or emotion: If what’s strongest is “I’m not safe” or “I’m not good enough” (or a surge of fear/shame), we can target that and track where it’s been learned over time.
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Start with the body response: Sometimes the clearest “memory” is physical (tight chest, nausea, freezing). We can work from the body sensation and see what it connects to.
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Use a timeline approach: Together you build a gentle map of key periods (school, first job, relationships, health events, losses) and look for moments that match the pattern — without forcing anything.
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Use “floatback” carefully: Once you’re stable enough, your therapist may invite your mind to drift back to an earlier time you remember feeling the same way. Often the brain brings up what’s relevant.
You don’t need to dig or try to manufacture memories. In well-paced EMDR, targets are chosen collaboratively, and sometimes the “root” becomes clearer only after you’ve processed a few present-day triggers first.
How will I know if a memory is ‘fully processed’?
Typically, the memory feels less disturbing (often close to 0 on a 0–10 distress scale), your body response settles, and the preferred belief feels more true. You can still remember what happened — it just doesn’t hit the same way.
What happens between EMDR sessions?
Some people feel lighter quickly; others notice emotions, vivid dreams, or new insights as the brain continues to process. Your therapist should give you a simple between-session plan (grounding, sleep support, what to do if you feel wobbly).