Ever since I was a small child my mother told me to “sleep on it” when I was upset about an event from the day or a decision I needed to make. As a kiddo I am sure many of my “the sky is falling” moments seemed silly to others but to me my little world was upside down. But often I would go to bed and in the morning everything seemed more manageable, less troubling. And I could cope with what needed to be done. As I got older the nature of my upsetting situations changed, but I held onto the idea that if I just “slept on it” I may have a balanced perspective in the morning.
In 2016 I began my EMDR training. There, in a huge conference room with 100 other clinicians, I found out my mother was correct… And there was research to prove it. The mechanics of REM sleep do indeed help process memories and make connections of what has happened in the day, and leave people with a sort of calm. REM sleep is a sort of natural self-healing response when the mind makes connections with the event and similar events from the past. This allows the mind to look at a situation through the lens of a “learning experience” instead of from an emotional perspective. When this happens the event moves into the past and no longer seems to be in the present. Woah! My mother, and lots of mothers around the world I expect, were correct… Something happens when you “sleep on it.”
Robert Stickgold, Ph.D. from Harvard Medical School puts it this way:
“We believe that EMDR induces a fundamental change in brain circuitry similar to what happens in REM sleep — that allows the person undergoing treatment to more effectively process and incorporate traumatic memories into general association networks in the brain. This helps the individual integrate and understand the memories within the larger context of his or her life experience.”
So why do we need therapy? Can’t we all just take a nap? Unfortunately, sometimes the REM stage of sleep doesn’t seem to work. We get stuck without this integration that helps us cope. This is where we start seeing symptoms of PTSD, anxiety, depression, etc. It seems when a traumatic event occurs the mind does not know how to make sense of it and we get “stuck” with the memory in the present. These symptoms are related to PTSD and can include hyperarousal, reexperiencing, withdrawal. Or perhaps or a series of smaller traumas build over time and the mind creates an association network that changes how the person perceives themselves and the world. This can cause a person to suffer from symptoms of anxiety and depression.
EMDR can simulate this natural processing mechanism similar to REM sleep and help us move on when we are stuck! In EMDR therapy we mock the bilateral (back and forth on both sides) movements of REM and can go after the incidents and emotions that are causing unwanted symptoms. Sound like magic? Hocus Pocus? It did to me until I read the mountains for research about the amazing results.
Clinicians around the world have used EMDR to help people relieve symptoms of PTSD, anxiety, and depression. I encourage anyone struggling with these symptoms to reach out to a local therapist for more information on how EMDR can help. If you like to read lots of scientific research from the EMDR Research Foundation click here.
Wishing you much healing. And thanks mom.
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