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EMDR Therapy

NEW CLIENT CONSULT

How EMDR Helps the Nervous System

“Trauma is not what happens to you. Trauma is what happens inside you, as a result of what happens to you.” – Dr. Gabor Maté

Emotions & Body

  • Feeling on edge or hypervigilant
  • Emotional shutdown or numbness
  • Trouble sleeping or relaxing
  • Panic or sudden waves of anxiety
  • Intense emotional and physical reactions to reminders of the past or when being triggered

Thoughts & Beliefs

  • Negative beliefs about yourself or the world such as “I’m not safe,” “I’m not good enough,”  “It was my fault”
  • Racing thoughts
  • Ruminating, overanalyzing

Behaviour & Daily Life

  • Difficulty trusting others
  • Feeling stuck in survival mode
  • Struggles in your relationship
  • Strong reactions to stressors
  • Zoning out or disconnecting from your thoughts or the world
  • Struggles with addictions

How it Helps

EMDR helps by working with memory, emotion, body sensation, and nervous system activation at the same time — making it especially helpful for people who understand their patterns intellectually but still feel trapped in old reactions.

EMDR is supported by a large body of research and is recognized in major PTSD treatment guidelines, including the World Health Organization, the American Psychological Association, NICE, and the VA/DoD guidelines.

A woman sitting with her feet touching and her fingers interlocked while a tea mug and clock sit nearby

EMDR can help with:

  • Trauma and PTSD
  • Childhood trauma and attachment wounds
  • Anxiety, panic, and phobias
  • Grief and loss
  • Shame, guilt, and negative self-beliefs
  • Emotional triggers and relationship patterns
  • Medical trauma, accidents, and frightening experiences
  • Stress, overwhelm, and nervous system dysregulation
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Treatment for Anxiety, Stress & Overwhelm

What Is EMDR Therapy?

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing is a highly researched psychotherapy approach used to help people recover from trauma, PTSD, anxiety, distressing memories, and negative self-beliefs.

EMDR helps because painful experiences can sometimes remain “stuck” in the brain and nervous system. When this happens, a person may logically know they are safe now, but still feel fear, shame, panic, shutdown, or emotional intensity in the body.

EMDR uses a structured therapy process and bilateral stimulation — such as eye movements, tapping, or sounds — to help the brain reprocess distressing memories so they feel less vivid, less emotionally charged, and less disruptive in daily life.

How EMDR Works

EMDR therapy is based on the brain’s natural ability to heal and adapt. Just as the body works to heal after an injury, the brain also has systems for processing distressing experiences.

During EMDR, your therapist helps you safely focus on a difficult memory, belief, feeling, or body sensation while using bilateral stimulation. This may involve guided eye movements, alternating taps, or auditory tones.

The goal is not to erase the memory. Instead, EMDR helps reduce the emotional charge connected to the memory. Many clients find that after EMDR, they can remember what happened without feeling as overwhelmed, flooded, ashamed, or afraid.

Our EMDR Therapists

Registered Psychotherapist

Bio

Julia Lippert

Rosemary Holt, Registered Psychotherapist at Blue Shores Counselling in Collingwood and Stayner.

Registered Psychotherapist

Bio

Rosemary Holt

Andrea Foster, Registered Psychotherapist at Blue Shores Counselling in Collingwood and Stayner.

Registered Psychotherapist

Bio

Andrea Foster

Christina Malley, Registered Psychotherapist at Blue Shores Counselling in Collingwood and Stayner.

Registered Psychotherapist

Bio

Christina Malley

EMDR for Trauma, Anxiety, and Emotional Triggers

Many people come to EMDR because they are tired of being hijacked by old emotional patterns.

You may know that something is “not a big deal,” but your body reacts as if it is. You may feel suddenly small, unsafe, ashamed, angry, frozen, or overwhelmed. You may notice repeated relationship patterns, fear of abandonment, people-pleasing, self-protection, or difficulty feeling calm even when life is technically okay.

EMDR can help identify and reprocess the memories, beliefs, and nervous system responses underneath those patterns.

Rather than only managing symptoms, EMDR aims to help the brain and body update the old information that keeps those symptoms alive.

What to Expect in EMDR Therapy

EMDR therapy begins with careful assessment, history taking, preparation, and stabilization. Your therapist will help you build grounding skills and make sure the process feels manageable.

EMDR is not about forcing you to relive trauma or tell every detail of what happened. In many cases, EMDR can be effective without describing the memory in depth. The focus is on helping the brain process the experience safely and at a pace that fits your nervous system.

A full EMDR therapy process may include:

  •  Understanding your history and goals
  • Identifying current triggers and symptoms
  • Building grounding and regulation tools
  • Identifying memories, beliefs, emotions, and body sensations connected to distress
  • Using bilateral stimulation to support reprocessing
  • Strengthening more adaptive beliefs, such as “I am safe now,” “I did the best I could,” or “I am worthy”
  • Reviewing progress and integrating changes into daily life

EMDR Therapy in Collingwood, Stayner, and South Georgian Bay

Blue Shores Counselling offers EMDR therapy in Collingwood and Stayner, serving clients from across South Georgian Bay, including Wasaga Beach, Blue Mountain, Thornbury, Meaford, Creemore, Clearview, and surrounding communities.

If you are looking for EMDR therapy for trauma, PTSD, anxiety, emotional triggers, childhood trauma, grief, or nervous system regulation, our team can help you explore whether EMDR may be a good fit.

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Couple Therapy

Emotion Focused Therapy (EFT)

Emotion-focused therapy can help you understand and transform the emotional patterns that shape your experiences and relationships. Rather than avoiding emotions, EFT helps you safely explore them so they can become a source of insight and healing.

Research shows that working through emotions in this way can lead to powerful shifts in self-understanding and connection with others.

EFT is particularly helpful for relationship challenges, as well as anxiety, depression, and trauma recovery.

Gottman Couples Therapy

Gottman Couples Therapy is based on over four decades of research into what makes relationships succeed or struggle. This approach can help you strengthen friendship, improve communication, and learn practical tools for navigating conflict in healthy ways in your relationship. You and your partner can learn how to understand each other more deeply and rebuild trust and emotional connection. Many couples find that this work helps them move from feeling stuck or disconnected toward a more supportive and fulfilling partnership.

Polyvagal & Somatic Therapies

Polyvagal theory allows you to understand how your body’s threat and safety systems operate and why certain reactions, such as anxiety, shutdown, or hyper vigilance, can occur.

Understanding the biology of your nervous system patterns can be incredibly empowering.
Through gentle awareness and regulation techniques, clients learn how to release stored stress and restore a sense of safety and balance in the body.

Somatic work can be especially helpful for trauma, chronic stress, anxiety, and emotional overwhelm, helping you feel more grounded, regulated, and connected to yourself. In turn, you can experience more connected, present, and joyfully engaged in life and in your relationships.

You can move out of survival mode and toward greater calm, resilience, and emotional freedom.

Internal Family Systems Therapy (IFS)

Internal Family Systems (IFS) views the mind as made up of different “parts”: your protective parts, your wounded parts, and your inner wisdom.

Rather than fighting against difficult emotions, IFS helps you understand and heal the parts of you that carry pain, fear, or shame. Through this process, many people

Equine Assisted Psychotherapy

Equine-assisted psychotherapy involves working alongside horses in a therapeutic setting to support emotional growth and healing.

Horses are highly sensitive to human emotions and can provide immediate, honest feedback about how we relate and communicate. This experience can help clients develop self-awareness, confidence, emotional regulation, and trust.

At Blue Shores, we offer highly specialized Equine Assisted Psychotherapy that integrates trauma therapies, including EMDR and DBR in the presence of our horse friends. Many people find that working with horses in this way creates powerful breakthroughs that complement traditional talk therapy.

Play & Sand Tray Therapy

Play and sandtray therapy provides children with ways to express feelings and experiences that may be difficult to put into words.

Through creative play, storytelling, and symbolic expression, children can process emotions, build confidence, and develop healthier coping skills.

These approaches are widely used in child psychology and supported by research in emotional development and trauma treatment. Parents are often included in the process so children feel supported both in and outside of therapy.

Neurofeedback Therapy

Neurofeedback is a brain-based therapy that helps regulate how the brain functions by providing real-time feedback about brainwave activity.

Using specialized technology, you can learn to strengthen healthier brain patterns associated with focus, calmness, and emotional regulation. Research shows neurofeedback can support concerns such as ADHD, anxiety, trauma symptoms, sleep difficulties, and mood regulation.

Over time, this training helps the brain become more balanced and resilient.

Deep Brain Reorienting (DBR) Trauma Therapy

Deep Brain Reorienting (DBR) is a neuroscience-based therapy that works with the trauma responses that live in the deep areas of the brain.

DBR is both innovative and well-researched, with promising results for relief from PTSD symptoms. It focuses on subtle physiological reactions that occur before conscious emotions and thoughts arise.

DBR therapists help their clients’ nervous system process deeply held trauma and attachment wounds through this gentle therapy and can help clients heal from traumatic injuries (including complex trauma and attachment wounding).

Mindfulness Based Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (MCBT)

Mindfulness-based therapy combines psychological science with mindfulness practices that help you become more present and aware of your inner experience.

Instead of being overwhelmed by thoughts or emotions, you learn how to observe them with curiosity and calm.

Research shows mindfulness can reduce anxiety, stress, depression, and emotional reactivity while increasing resilience and well-being. Through guided exercises and reflection, clients develop the ability to respond to life’s challenges with greater steadiness and clarity.

EMDR Trauma Therapy

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a highly researched trauma therapy that helps the brain process and resolve distressing memories.

When difficult experiences are not fully processed, they can remain “stuck,” continuing to affect emotions, beliefs, and relationships.

EMDR uses structured techniques and bilateral stimulation to help the brain reprocess these memories so they lose their emotional intensity. Many clients find that EMDR helps them move beyond trauma, anxiety, and negative self-beliefs toward a greater sense of safety, freedom and enjoyment of life.