Emdr Transcript Day 1 Part 2

PESI-EMDR (Day One: Afternoon Session)-(Ai-Live to
(USPESI2610A - Ai-Live Premium)
>> Hey, everybody. We're back. Thank you for coming back after lunch. There's a lot of you. And looks
like most of you are here. That's a good thing. We appreciate you tuning in, and we're in the second
half of the day. Housekeeping issues: The first is to remember to check that important chat feature.
Made is taking care of us today and behind the scenes, trying to make the experience great for you
guys. If you have questions about getting CE credits, when are break time, how do you access
recordings when you're done? I have technical issues. If you go to the chat and scroll around, there's
answers to those in a quick and easy way to access. And then remember to give us a shout out. There
are hashtags. I'm not a hashtag user personally, but # learning with PESI, # EMDR, our social team
would love it if you share with us how your training is going for you. That'll kind of lead us to questions.
Round 2 of questions for Megan. And the first one, I'm maybe going to handle the first one.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah, I wanted you to. But I loved that it was one that was put on there.
>> I absolutely love this. I think we have all been here. So I just wanted to make sure. Can you see
us? Can Megan and I see you? And if so, I will make my bed, which I appreciate that. That made bee
me laugh. We can't see you. If you're in a room where your bed is mess e, go ahead. Leave it messy.
If you have an animal friend hanging out right next to you, nobody can see. Just get comfortable, enjoy
yourselves. Now that I've done my part, I'll go on to the real questions that are EMDR-related for
Megan. May get covered at some point, but a lot of people wanting to know the age range.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah. EMDR has been found to be effective for kids. There's some that
would say as early as some workbooks that are specific, which I'll put a reference on for by adler and
tupea (?). And I'll put a link for that reference. It's really 18 months and on. Obviously, there's
variations and very different approaches that you have to take and modifications to be made. But very
good -- some really good resource s and some exceptional ways that you can utilize EMDR with
integrating sand tray and art therapy. So it has been shown to be effective with children and
adolescents. Another good resource that I'll put a link to as well is Anna Gomez, and she's kind of,
well, known in the EMDR -- well-known in the EMDR realm as a child therapist. But it's effective for
kids and adolescents.
>> Perfect. And next up. Is EMDR a stand alonealone therapy? Does it borrow from other therapies?
On average, how many sessions for trauma?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah. EMDR is really client-centered. And so the amount of sessions really
just depends on the client, our presentation, how well they move through the phases of EMDR that
we're going to see. So it's -- it ranges anywhere. It could be three months of sessions to maybe, you
know, months or a year of pretty continual, repetitive EMDR work. It just depends on the client. And
you know, EMDR, I think, like any kind of modality, I guess, obviously, there are things that it borrows
from that made it -- it made all of our modalities come to fruition. I guess you could see it as a stand
alone. To me, I integrate a lot of other modalities within EMDR, and that tends to make it in my
personal clinical opinion all that more successful. But EMDR kind of has its own trauma focused CBT
kind of framework that you would utilize.
>> Which is maybe a good segment to the next question. EMDR and IFS.
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>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yes, EMDR and IFS you guys are my favorite thing to integrate together.
And you can see me really nerd out about some IFS and EMDR together because when you pair them
together, I think you can do phenomenal work with some really big complex trauma issues. And it's my
favorite way to utilize EMDR and in conjunction with IFS. So yes.
>> And here's another one I know that you deal with a lot. EMDR utilized with alcohol substance use
disorders, active use, people in recovery. This individual says being fearful about triggering relapse.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah, I can tack on a lot about that fear. I'm not going to. Yes, there are
specific protocols and interventions within EMDR that are specific just to addiction and impulsive and
conpulsive behaviors. There's a lot of work that you can utilize and implement that targets urges and
targets the positive associations that might be established with addictive behaviors. I think it's
remarkable with addictive work. I used to have an intensive outpatient clinic with and some of the
integral things I found to really work in that realm or some of the techniques that I pulled from EMDR
and some of the research around addictions -- I know also with PESI, we just did a two-day last week
on EMDR and that addicted and compulsive population. But if you're interested in that more, I'd
recommend that you check it out further.
>> And you were talking a bit about maladaptive ways of coping. And this person was wondering if
they see people who are very rigid or perfectionists, is that kind of maladaptive coping mechanism?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah, and I think kind of going back to that internal family systems view, I
see those things tending to be a protective mechanism. So they have maladaptively learned to use
that to stay safe, not get too close, but ultimately to self-protect and preserve.
>> And a bit more on discussing. When someone is disassociating during a session, they're wondering
kind of what approach is safe to bring them out of that and towards a more grounded state.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: We talked more about this today and that would be some of those poly
vagal exercises that could also be anything that can help kind of trigger or acclimate them more to
being present or using the logical side of their brain to give the example of math problems, this could
also be grounding. Tell me five things use see, four things you hear, going through kind of those
things. You'll find that this happens with trauma work kwiek frequently, but it's to get them to be a little
more regulated. The skills we're going to learn this afternoon are also going to be great things that can
help to get them regulated or back in that window of tolerance.
>> And -- someone asked do you have to inform the client that you are using EMDR?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah, I think that's important just because it is different and I think that that's
just good practice of -- especially with trauma histories, it's so important to know what to expect and to
know what's coming. They deserve a voice and a choice in that. And as conflicts, trauma survivor
myself, I can tell you -- and I've seen this with a lot of my clients -- the importance of I want to know
someone's going to be using and why. So I would caution you against using interventions without
keeping them informed of what's going on because that can trigger a lot of mistrust and feeling like -- a
little bit misled and not having a voice or a say in what's going on.
>> And then last one for now. Does a person has to be able to clearly remember details of a trauma
experience or connect strongly to the associated feelings of that for the EMDR to be effective for

them?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Great question. And honestly, no. That's one of the things that separates
EMDR. So EMDR is not used to, like, access repressed memories or anything like that. But it's to
target what's left there. Even if it's I don't remember this happening, but I've been told this is what
happened to me, you can even target, well, how does it feel knowing you don't have memories to this?
What does that bring up in you not knowing? Or is there any reaction you have in your body when
you're told these things occurred? That's one of the nice things with EMDR that makes it such a user-
friendly approach is that we don't have to get into the details of necessarily what did happen.
>> That's it for now. Keep the questions coming. Www.PESI.com/ask Megan.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Thank you. I know there was one question that we might not have gotten to
that I wanted to speak to for a second because I did think it was a good one and one that maybe some
of you can relate to or had as well. I saw someone had shared that they had been trained in EMDR
since 2017 and had been using it, but found that maybe they just do it about once a month or -- with
maybe one client or whatever and that clients would seem to get bored or lost and asked if I had
experienced that or would be resistant to doing any resourcing activity s and asked if I had any
thoughts on that, which I thought was important, especially with what we're going to move into. We'll
be covering some of this as well. But yes, that can happen. And what that usually tells me is that it tells
me that they need -- either they don't want to do EMDR. It's not a one size fits all approach. Some
people love it, some aren't interested in it. Again, it goes back to client choice. Those, though, that are
maybe not ready to do it or resistant to resourcing, that is telling me they're not feeling safe enough in
their bodies for those resourcing skills. I would probably encourage you to expand your list of
resourcing options which there's tons -- I've had to get creative with some ways we resource when
maybe things like ( ) or container won't work. And typically, I have a lot of clients that love EMDR but
they don't want it every single session. They want maybe two EMDR sessions a month and maybe in
between there we're doing talk therapy. Or maybe we're doing an EMDR session and then a
processing session and then an EMDR session -- when I say processing, I mean talk therapy in
between. So EMDR is a lot, what you're going to find and see. I love EMDR, but me personally, I
wouldn't want to do EMDR every single week with my therapist. I kind of need, like, a moment to
regroup and share what I'm learning and new insights. So I think sometimes it can be used too
frequentlial that way. So I like to use it a little bit more staggered. I think it creates a lot more safety.
But one thing too is that sometimes with clients that maybe appear like they're bored, that to me is
indicative that they are either not ready to do it or that maybe they're needing more directives from
you, which those of you that are trained in EMDR will know what I'm speaking to. That's where I found
internal family systems and some other things that you can integrate together tend to do a lot better for
those kind of clients where there are more barriers or resistance. So those would be some of my kind
of recommendations related to
that.
Okay. So I'm going to pull back up our slides here. Let me get back to where we left off. I know one
person asked if we could see you guys. I wish we can see you guys. I wouldn't feel like I'm just talking

with the screen. It would be nice to see some friendly faces. But I hope we're all staying kind of
connected and engaged. The rest of today will be pretty interactive other than when we do the demo.
That would be useful and fun for you guys and help you stay kind of engaged. Like we learned before
we went to lunch, EMDR is based on what we call the eight-phase model. And there's eight specific
phases that we work through when we're following this true process of EMDR. Now, I will say that
sometimes, the phases to me are a little bit confusing. To some people that are not, I'll say I have had
to learned to conceptualize them a little bit differently. That can get into the later phases. The first two
phases that we're going to talk about are really straight forwardforward. And there's confusion here.
We're going to look at what the eight fagz
s are.
The first phase is really like what we already do in traditional therapy. This is history, treatment
planning. Essentially, this is all through a trauma-based lens. That's why we went over everything that
we went through this morning because those are -- I have to have that lens and that framework,
especially when I'm going to use something like EMDR to be targeting some of these symptoms and
behaviors and other triggers. So everything is just more trauma-informed in this history-taking and
treatment planning. And we're going to go through some different ways that we can do that here in just
a minute. But the same thing, we're looking at goals that they have. We might be screening for
disassociation here. And then phase 2, and tupically I view phase 1 and 2 kind of together. To me, you
can kind of interweave them together with each other. And there's some overlap there. I find that
typically when you're building rapport and you're in this early history taking and treatment planning, as
you're gathering that information or bringing up all the junk, sometimes it's nice to give them skills to
practice and take away. So that could be some of those poly vagal exercises we did. That could be
some of the body scanning or body tuning exercises. And then we're going to learn some more of the
true preparation or resourcing skills in this phase 2 this afternoon. That's what we're going to get into.
So after we've kind of spent an adequate amount of time in phase 1 and phase 2, that's when we
move to phases 3 through 8. Now, I will tell you guys a couple of things that I always find interesting.
So people seem to think that EMDR is just when we're doing like an actual trauma processing session.
And that's what true EMDR is. That's part of eight phase model of EMDR. That is not the only part of
EMDR that makes it EMDR. So even these early phases are a part of the EMDR model. So keep that
in mind. Some clients -- this is another question I get asked a lot. How do you know when they're
ready to move from phase 1 to phase 2 or how do you know if you've done enough in phase 1 or
phase 2? And to me, there's some pretty straight forwardforward giveaways that will let you know that
they're ready to move on. First and foremost that we've developed and established really good rapport,
that there's a level of comfort. There's a level of trust that's being built between myself and the client.
Then the skills -- this is the one that we really want to identify and watch for. So the skills that I teach in
preparation, they're able to do, and they're using them. And we'll get more into what this looks like. If
they're unable to do the skills that I'm teaching in these early kind of phases, then that means that we
need to stay there and do more work until they're ready to, like, utilize those. Maybe we need more just
normal talk therapy. Maybe we need more sematic and poly vagal kind of interventions, whatever that

might look like. That just means that they're not ready to move forward. I will never move forward in
doing EMDR if they're unable to do any of these preparation or preparatory skills. It's just kind of like a
golden rule. So this can really vary depending on the client how long we sit in phase 1 and phase 2.
Again, you just do them together. That's just how it feels. And so you might be here maybe with some
clients -- maybe they've done a ton of psychotherapy in the past. Maybe they already have really good
coping skills. They're able to do the resourcing skills that we're going to do in a bit, really quickly and
aptly. And so maybe that's just like a couple sessions that you do these things and then you move into
starting to target some of this specific trama incidents that we'll talk about. In other cases, you might be
here for weeks upon months. And this might just be really teaching them those grounding resourcing
skills, really trying to help them feel safe in their body. Maybe it takes longer to build that repore, create
safety. But I'm never going to move forward until they've been able to adequately do these preparation
skills. So for now, we're just going to look at phases 1 and 2. And we'll come back to the rest of the
phases as we move on because I don't want to give you too much information right now and have you
get lost kind of in
translation.
So remembering that we talked about the model of EMDR being on this eight-phase framework, this
eight-phase model. And also on the three-prong approach. So meaning that in order to really
successfully reprocess when we get into the later phases of EMDR, I have to know that they're going
to be able to tolerate going into the past, dealing with present triggers, and there's anticipated future
things that we need to target as well. So in this early phase of history taking, I really want to see what
some of those -- each of those categories hold. Right? What are the present triggers? What are the
things from the past causing disruption? And what are the fears of the
future?
This I know is going to be fundamental as we move forward in helping them access this adaptive
information processing. That natural adaptive resolution in their brain. So I have to be able to identify
and see kind of the bigger picture and how all the puzzle pieces fit together. Me as the clinician, it'll
help me be more prepared because EMDR feels like a maze. You never know what might come up.
You never know where something will go, as you will see, and kind of get to experience a little bit. So
you kind of have to have some clear picture of what and how everything is, like, interconnected before
you get into true processing. So it's part of why in these early phases really identifying the past,
present, and future kind of scenarios that are causing distress are going to be important because that's
going to help you kind of know to some degree as the clinician what to expect when things come
up.
So there's a couple things with EMDR as we even get into resourcing that I think is important for us to
remember as clinicians. EMDR to me is a very different clinical approach than most other therapies
that we're used to utilizing. And it requires us to take on a different therapeutic kind of role and
response. And so couple things to keep in mind with this is that because EMDR has kind of a free
association experience, which you guys are going to get to kind of experience here in just a moment
as I teach you a couple of these resourcing skills, what we know is that we have to really respect and

accept whatever the client has come up for them. So one of the golden rules with EMDR is this
common phrase or saying that there isn't a right or a wrong way to do EMDR. That's part of the beauty
and freedom within EMDR. There is no right or wrong way to do this. Whatever comes up for someone
during their processing has meaning and has purpose, even if it feel s completely unrelated. That's
okay. And EMDR is not about us overanalyzing and interpreting things as the clinician. That is not
what we do. So it's less about us, and this is all about the client. This is a client-centered approach.
And as the clinician, you have to really learn how to stay out of the way. And this is where I tend to see
clinicians struggle the most when they first get trained in EMDR because our natural tendency is we
want to, like, help them kind of process or explore something and you kind of have to learn to do that
in a little bit different light within EMDR. So we have to learn to accept the client's experience, even if
we don't agree with it or if we think it was related or should be interpreted a different way. You don't do
that within EMDR. You have to really respect what comes up for them. And part of this is about we
don't want to -- we don't want to -- what's the word I'm looking for? We don't want to disrupt their
natural healing process? So all of us have, again, that natural healing adaptive resolution center in our
brains that we're hard-wired for. That's individual and different for each of us. So we need to remember
that as the clinician. I don't want to disrupt their natural adaptive resolution. It's going to look different
than mine. That's okay. I really want the client to make the decisions. So part of what I really
appreciate about EMDR is that it really encourages clients how to trust themselves to trust their own
insight, to trust their own decision-making, to lean on their own understanding again, to really get back
in tetch with listening and, you know, honoring their voice and their choices that they want to make.
This is really critical in any kind of trauma treatment. So I really want them to make the decisions. And
I'm going to avoid interpretations as much as possible during the process. And I'm really going to
validate every attempt that the client makes, which is going to be important. And when I do have to
intervene, I'm always going to be asking questions, kind of like a motivational interviewing standpoint.
So they're always going to be open-ended. And I'm teaching them how to be curious about their
experience, about maybe different parts of themselves or different behaviors that they have and
teaching them how to use curiosity instead of adjustment in order to interact with themselves. So
again, us as the clinician, if we get engaged, we're only going to be utilizing these open' -ended
questions. We're going to look at a couple key things that I like to touch on. So obviously, one, we've
kind of already covered. I'm going to talk to you about this timeline in a minute. This is one of my
favorite activities to do really early on that I've seen create and establish a lot of resources that can
really help those clients that maybe get blocked with creating resources. Also, looking at this
attachment, these early attachment relationships like I talked about is important. What does family
history look like? Maybe a gene ogram. What are some of the earliest memories that they have? And
what I'm looking for here is memory recall. And usually, when there's gaps in memory or missing
information, what that usually tells me is that maybe there's some type of trauma that occurred right
before or during that time period where there are some gaps. And then we talked about these goals.
So some of these questions might look like what was the household composition growing up? Who did
they learn to rely on for practical help. Who did they rely on for emotional help? We talked about some

of those physical health screeningings? Who do they feel safest with? Who are some of their closest
relationships? Who was their closest relationship as a child? And then what were some of those
childhood strengths? What are their current strengths or what have they been told are their strengths?
Any history of addiction or substance use disorder? In their family or personally? Who made the rules
in the home? Who enforced them? What type of discipline was used? How were disagreements
solved? How do they solve disagreements now? Any major traumas? And then again, those patterns
of trauma or any repetitive patterns or behavior s that we see. And how old were they when
maladaptive coping began? So to me, I think that we know that anyone that's experienced trauma, I
always want to know how they coped. If they haven't healed or worked through their trauma. And there
will be maladaptive coping to some degree. That might be avoidance, withdraw, isolation. It could be
drinking. It could be relationships. It could be a myriad of things. But how old were they when they first
started leaning on some of these other ways to cope or escape dealing with their e
motions?
So I'm going to pull up this timeline in just a second. But one thing that we're going to look at, I want to
know -- I'm looking for things that are still triggering them from the past, things they feel like they still
haven't been able to work through. And I'm looking at how much of their time and focus is spent living
in the past versus the present. And sometimes what we'll do is utilize bridge back or float back
technique. What this means is if they start describing kind of triggers for me and symptoms, I might
utilize something where I ask them to bridge back or float back in time. And when was the first time
they remember this being an issue? When was the first time they remember reacting this way, coping
this way? We're trying to identify those early past experiences. So I'm going to pull up this timeline,
and I'm going to show you -- this is one of my favorite things to actually utilize. It has less to do with the
negative and more to do with the positive. I know as clinicians we've all done timelines. But I'm going
to talk about what is different in this regard for me, especially as wn EMDR therapist, what I'm really
more focusing on and honing into. I like to do five-year increments on this. And I kind of just want to
know a timeline of life, like we would do with any other therapy client. Right? And I know some of you
will ask, well, a lot of people don't remember what happened between zero and 5. Well, what have
they been told happened? Who raised them during that time? What kind of family were they born into?
Were their parents divorced? Were they homeless during the first five years? Were they in someone's
care? I'm looking for those things. And then if there's any chunks of time that they don't remember,
same question: What have they been told about that time? So we get all the negative things on there
that we want to work through. Those are those past kind of lipg -- lingering traumas that they feel they
haven't been able to resolve or get passed. And then what I love about this timeline -- and you'll see
why in a minute when we get into the resourcing skills -- and I call this kind of a resiliency timeline.
This is what I'm more interested in. So I'll start with the negative. And then what I do on the top of this
line is I want them to identify anything positive that helped them cope and survafb dur -- survive during
these years when all this stuff was going on. So this could be like did they have a favorite pet? When
they learned to ride their bike. Was there anyone during that time that was kind to them or extended
grace or help? This could be something like a favorite teacher they had. This could be maybe a

favorite friend. And I want anything that was significant or positive that occurred during that time. So
even though the trauma was occurring, I'm going to get really curious and help them really explore
what helped them survive during this time. What were they leaning on or looking forward to? A lot of
times -- and this is where I'll challenge you to get really creative as well. I'm looking for other things.
Who did they look up to at this age? Who was their hero were there favorite comic books or movies or
musicians that they looked up to or athletes? And I'm going to note all of these on the positive kind of
timeline. And these positive events could be anything that gave them hope for the future. So it could
be recognition. Like it says on here for others. Achievements, awards, special time. Maybe a positive
memory, whatever it is. And we're going to make as thorough of a list -- almost more thorough than we
are going to do on the negative because the negative side, I call more of like a working timeline. And
that we're going to be adding to the more we build trust and safety with each other. But this resiliency
timeline is what's going to be really pivotal to me and really help me have some successful resourcing
in phase 2 when we enter into this preparation kind of phase. So this is that timeline of events. And
yes, I will add it to the documents that you get if you didn't already have this
one.
So I'm going to go back over to our slides here. And so not only obviously on the timeline we're looking
for those common themes or identifying the goals, what we're going to target. Usually we'll see the
most traumatic thing that can be maybe the ten most traumatic events. And also I'm going to identify
the beliefs that they've held about themselves because of these things occurring, which we'll look at a
little bit more. Because this event happened, this negative event, what has it led them to think or feel
about themselves now? So that resiliency timeline is going to be
important.
Also, I personally like to utilize when I'm doing kind of attachment work and I'm kind of identifying
maybe some of the barriers that we might run into. I like to use that addicted family system in
identifying who they were in that family of origin. So are they fed golden hero child? Were they the
scapegoat? Were they the lost child? Where do they fit in? Were they the mascot? And this is going to
tell me a lot about how they learned to survive and what they feel safe either discussing but also
behaviors and reactions that have been kind of normalized. And then obviously, that adverse
childhood experiences, the aces is good. Sometimes identifying their attachment style as well is going
to tell me some of the barriers that we're going to run into or protective features that they're going to
have.
So we're going to start with one of my favorite exercises because we just got done talking about that
timeline and that -- those resiliency kind of factors on that timeline. And again, this is going to be an
activity that you will get, so please don't worry about taking notes. You will get a handout with this. It
will give you the directives on what to do. So I just really want to encourage you to let yourself have
this experience and see what comes up for yourself. This is a very great way to see an experience
what our clients go through, but this is going to start to give you a glimpse of what can come up in
EMDR and the free association experience that's associated with
it.

So this has been modified. This is what I call -- some people call it team of valets or some other things.
This comes from Laura [name]'s work who is an amazing attachment based EMDR therapist. And I'm
going to kind of walk you through identifying some of these characters. And then after we identify
these, I'm going to teach us just a basic bilateral stimulation technique. We're going to learn some
more here in just a little bit. But just to do this exercise, we're going to kind of try out one form of
bilateral stimulation together. So to start, I'm going to degs -- we see these categories listed here. And
I'm going to give you some directives and I want you to think of whatever comes to mind for yourself
for each of these categories. There's a couple of caveats, too, that make this -- I want you to imagine
being as creative as possible. So one place that I'll see people get stuck with resourcing is they try to
think about things that they have right now. So, like, real, physical people, tangible things. I want you
to be really creative and really try to pull from things that have genuinely provided ooch of these
categories for you. And I'll give you some examples for each category. So the first one, you can wrat
down or think of these as we get started. The first one is I want you to think of -- and these can be
people, objects, animals. It can be people, dead or alive, real or imagined. It could be characters from
books. It can be heroes or icons that you look up to. It can be anything that comes to mind for you.
There's not a right or a wrong thing. I want you to think of first anything or anyone that comes to mind
or would represent strength or protection. Some example said of this might be I've had everything --
our clients tell me everything from, like, just envisioning a shield. I have one client that talks about the
rock, like the actor. I always hear Harry Potter characters and lord of the rings characterings. --
characters. But anything or anyone that would represent strength or protection. When you think of
strength or protection, what do you see or think of? Just kind of make notes on that. And one caveat
with this is I don't want this to be anyone that's caused significant harm or trauma to you. Next
category, I want you to think of, again, anything or anyone that would represent nurturing, love, or
acceptance. So when you thurng of unconditional love, kindness, acceptance, positive regard,
someone or something that would be very nurturing, warm, or loving. What comes tomind?
And then I want you to think of anything or anyone, again, that would represent wisdom or knowledge
or intellect. So when you think of being wise, what comes to mind? And then I want you to think about
spiritual. So when you think of -- and I'll give you a different way to think of this. This would be anything
that remind you that you're connected to something greater or bigger than yourself. So it could be
nature. It could be the universe. It can be our connection to another person, be a higher power.
And then the last category I want you to think about is this ideal self. So you as the -- the best version
of you or who you are striving to become puthose positive, true, unique characteristics that make you,
you. You can list some of those characters out. You might think of, you know, it's best. What is that
imagine that you have in mind? What would you be doing? What would your mood be? How would you
handle struggle? And if I'ming to this with a client, this would be where I then check in. I'd have them
share for me. Everything that they came up with, that they put on this list. Window fwoe through and
tell me who made the cut or came up for each cat fwoir -- category. This is be super creative, like I've
told you guys already. But there can also be times where I felt bad or guilty that my mom wasn't on my
lits of nurtures. That's okay. This isn't their list. Doesn't me that mom hasn't been nurturing at times.

But we want this to be with the first game that put unmind.
I want to make sure they didn't identify something that is negative that I know has caused trauma.
Now, the other kind of part of this, too, is that it might be -- I couldn't really think of anything for the
figures of strength or protection or nothing came to mind when I thought of individuals. That's part of
that resiliency timeline. So if we've already identified some of those positive things, it can be like I
know that you said in teaching you had was so attentive to you. Could she be someone that we put on
that nurturer list? So resiliency factor is going to help you identify those positive resource s that you
can utldz as you're establishing each of those categories. This is also be parts of themselves as well.
So ask them to identify imaginal or actual things that they can identify and then other times, I'll do this
exercise wherever each of the categories they identify, each of these aspects of
themselves.
So you might have to help them with this. But again, if they do choose something or someone that has
caused harm tothem or build a main -- I usually say I don't want this list to contain anyone that's hurt
you. Is it okay if we put this person on the sidelines for a minute? Because I just want this to be people
that have been positive for you, even though that person maybe has provided some positiveivity in
your life, I really don't anyone on this list that's caused harm to you because I want this tofeel 100
percent safe. So after we go through that, we identify that, it's okay if there's overlap to some of the
categories. It's very
common.
Now we're going to add this first element of bilateral stim ules. I'm going to walk you through this.
Again, I'm going to just give you an example of one form that we're going to utilize. We're going to be
learning more about the bilateral stimulation and different forms that you can use. But I want us to
have kind of a sneak peek of the early resourcing still that is kind of from this framework of EMDR. So
what you're seeing me do is I'm crossing my arms and we're going do what I'm calling the butterfly
hub. You can go ahead and do that if you want. If it's unkemptable to cross your hand, you can do hat.
You can place your hands on top of your legs and we're going to add light tapping to -- for movement.
If you're doing the butterfly head, same thing. We're going to just tap. We're not tapping at the same
time. We're rotating. So this will find kind of likegoided medication. The only thing you'll notice is that
we're adding the tapping. You're going to continue with the tapping the entire time that I'm tonging. I'll
prompt you and I want you to stop. And then I'll direct us where to go from then. If you're confused if I
should be doing the tapping or not? If you see me doing it, you should be doing it. I'll tap -- every time I
ask you to do the capping, I like to co-tap with you so we can be somewhat. Just allow yourself to have
this experience. So I'm going to invite us all. We're going to take a deep brelth in. We're going to let
that go. And most people like eyes closed. So with eyes closed, go ahead and you can either start that
butterfly tapping. We're going to continue it from right to left. You're going to do the entire time I'm
talking until I tell you to stop. Go ahead and eyes closed, add in the taps. I want you to start with
notifying anyone or anything that represents those elements of strength and protection. Notice what
protective qualities or representations of strength and protection these images hold. And then I want
you to notice anything or anyone that came to mind for that unconditional love, acceptance, nurturing.

Notice the kindness, the grace that would be given. And you even notice the positive regards or
feelings. She thought about that acceptance and love. And I want you to notice anything or anyone
that came up that represented wisdom, intelligence, intellect, knowledge. Notice the sound mind, the
positive advice they might offer to hum. Their insight. And then notice any of those things that would
represent or remind you that you're connected to something big erer or greater than yourself, the
sporetual moment or attribute s. Just notice what they remind you of and then see yourself in that ideal
place, you at your best, working towards being or becoming that person that you want to bow. Notice
those unique age, the positive characteristics about you that you want to embrace. Go ahead, we're
going to take a deep breath in. We're going to let that go. Go ahead and stop those taps if you haven't
already. And tipchy, if I'm working with a client I'm going to ask them what came up. What did they
notice? What changed? I'm going to walk back through. The imagery came up. Some people will hear
things. I was kind of thinking about these words. I some of them will be images like I saw so and so
there. This can elicit a lot of emotions. If this brought back a lot of emotions for you, know that that's
very norm al. It's common. That's okay. Sometimes as clinicians we think we have to keep everyone at
bay. We have to keep everyone regulated. Sometimes, it's okay if we're safely unregulated. That's a
relief to know we honor those feelings or experiences or emotions. Feel it to heal it. Right?
And then oftentimes, I'm going to ask if anything changed. Were there new people or images or things
that came up that maybe they haven't identified before? Because sometimes, that can happen. So
now we're going to go back into the second part of this exercise. So same thing. You felt like the
tapping was disruptive for you? Feel free to follow up kind of myifiedance. Don't worry about -- if you
were able to go forward with that exercise, add that stimulation again. Everyone take a deep breath in.
And we're going to let that go. Go ahead with eyed closed again. Go ahead and start the taps for me
once more. And we're going to continue with these taps until I prompt you to stop. And once more I
just want you to dry your mind. What came to mind with those elements of strengths and protection?
Notice what represented those. Acceptance, figures of unconditional love, kindness, any of those
nurturers. Notice who came to mind for you for those elements or characters or figures of wisdom and
say -- insight, knowledge. Draw your mind to that place where you think of those things that remind
you that you are connected to something greater or bigger than yourself. And then once more, kind of
just see yourself in that ideal best state, even if you're not there yet. What would that look like or feel
like? What are those innate, unique positive characteristics or qualities that you hold within that you
want to embrace? And this time, I want you to imagine that we're going to ask all of these figures or
objects or images, I want you to imagine them just kind of surrounding you as you are now. So kind of
drawing them closer to you or closer in your mind. If you can imagine them surrounding you, what
would they tell you or remind you of that you often forget about who you are? What do they leave you
with that you often overlook about yourself? And just notice that we can come to them anytime that we
need to, even if it's just in our mind's eye, and we can pull from any of their strengths that we need to.
And just listen and hear what they offer or extend to you. When you're ready, go ahead and take a
dope breath in for me, let that go -- take a deep breath in for me, let that go. Stop those taps if you
haven't already. And again, if I'm working with a client and you guys can all think of this for yourselves,

I want to know what kind of came to mind that time. What did they envision? What tidthey imagine?
What did they -- free association, experience. What did this look like? And what were they left with?
Maybe they were told something, maybe they were given something, offered something. And thatkeep
kind of become apmantra. This is a really great exercise I love for feeling attachment wound, even if
it's just imaginal because we know a lot of trauma survivors struggle to identify or maybe have never
had people that would fit each of these categories. So again, it's not about people that they have. This
is be very imaginal. This can be characters in books, movies, whatever. You can get very creative
here. But even the idea of forming a connection or a secure attachment kb even from the framework of
our mind envisioning that. What the mind sees, the mind believes, can really help repair am of these
early trauma and attachment wounds. These are going to be resources that I'm going to use when we
get stuck in processing when I need to challenge a client to expand their view or their insight of what's
taking place. I'm going to use this a lot. Like, what would your restoration team say to you? What
would those identified protectors -- if you could have a conversation with them, what would they say to
you? This can be a really good way to jump start some blocked processing, and you can make some
really good progress this way. Like I said, this is probably one of my favorite and most-used resources
that I utilize all the time with clients. Clients tend to love this one. And again, it can elicit those
emotions. You might even notice if you have emotions that came up just now, you weren't doing the
exercise wrong or anything like that, but there's always something to learn, even if this doesn't go the
right way. We kind of work from the standpoint that whatever comes up has meaning and purpose.
Even if it doesn't go perfectly, it's telling us something that we can learn from. So I do want to pause
and take just a moment before we kind of move forward and learning some of the next steps of this
process. This would be one of those preparation phases. I really want to know if you guys had any
questions that's just specific to that exercise that we just did. We're going to learn some more. But if
there was anything that kind of came up related to that, I would like to go to Ryan for just a second and
just see if we had any questions related to that.
>> I'm taking a look right now.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Okay.
>> Let's see what's coming through. There's lots of questions but I'll go ahead and throw them in quick.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Putting you right on the spot, you guys.
>> Now their filling so fast. If any sad memories came up, how do you work with that?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: So if sad memraesz come up, oftentimes -- this and this is what you'll learn
about EMDR because I think oftentimes -- and I'm not saying this -- don't take this as a blanket
statement. But know that it's okay to let them sit with the sadness that came up around that. That with
EMDR, we teach them to lean in to the feelings and to sit with those things so that we can notice that
sadness. Is there any positive element that they even want to take away from the sadness that came
up? Oftentimes it can be the sadness that I realized that I didn't have a lot of these people there. We
can haun were that. Sometimes that might be what's acknowledged. And then I'll usually always try to
validate like I love the fact that even though you didn't have any of these people, you still came up with

all these creative ways to take care of yourself and to love yourself. That's an amazing,une -- unique
skill. What else you got?
>> This is a lot of it. There's a lot of sad ness. I don't know if you want to elaborate more but someone
said I started crying almost immediately and I want to know my.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Oh, my gosh, crying is normal. This is what you'll find out about EMDR, too.
EMDR is if you want to make someone cry, do EMDR. EMDR will make anyone get through those
emotional barriers. Restoration team, most of the resourcing team, this is so common to elicit emotion
where they start crying. Sometimes it's over sadness. Sometimes it's just over -- I had forgotten about
some of these people or these things that meant so much to me and getting to sit with them for a
minute, it can be tears of honor and gratitude, too.
>> And someone asked: Do you do this activity with the client periodically over the course of working
with them? Or should you be doing this only during the first phase?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: I use this one all through the EMDR. This is one of my ones that I like to
teach right out of the gate. And I'll give examples of this as we see am of the demos. You'll see in the
demo that I play that I -- one of my therapist sessions you'll see tomorrow, you'll see the way that I
integrate that restoration team. I teach this and I tell them to use this outside of sessions. I'll say things
like okay, we did this restoration team. If you're getting triggered or reactive this week, whatever it is, I
want you to take a moment -- you can add the tapping, but you don't have to. What would the
restoration team help you figure out or discern from whatever experiences that you're going through
this week? And then I also use it as a way to approach working through some of the ongoing trauma,
which you'll get a look at a little bit later.
>> Now we've got a couple about the tapping.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah.
>> I'll throw both of them at you at once. One is what do you say to clients to explain why you're doing
the tapping? If you don't really feel connected to the tapping? And then another was how fast should
you be doing it? How fast do you tap?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: So I let clients pick, especially in a virtual space like this or if they're doing
their own in office, which we'll talk about more when we get into bilateral stimulation in a bit. But I let
them find their own rhythm. Some people might be slower. It's enough to keep them in the here and
now. I know the tapping is weird. I just call it what it is. I know it's odd. But this is going to help you stay
present and grounded. And I do just explain if I've already done psychoeducation on what occurs with
the brain, the tapping is what helps you stay in that grown light region. It's causing neurons to fire in
the left and right hemisphere, which is causing the logical brain to come online but it's always going to
help you -- I always think when you add the tapping, it's like you're securing it into the memory
networks.
>> And then there's a lot of folks looking for kind of reminders on what happens if people can't come
up with something to fill in certain questions? Like if they can't come up with anyone or anything for
wisdom? How should you handle that?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: You might leave one of those categories out. I was doing consultation

yesterday and one of my clinicians in there was funny. Yay kwb I hate the ideal self so I took it off the
list so I don't have my clients come up with that. There may be category. You don't want multiple
categories. But maybe they can only come up with figures of protection. Then maybe you just start
with that. Also that's where we really go back and you have to be creative. I might say so tell me who
you really looked up to as a kid. What were some of your favorite books, movies? And then I might
say, could we use Indiana Jones as a figure of protection if they list that off. You can help them come
up with those characters, and that's what makes EMDR kind of fun.
>> And again, a lot of people having an emotional reaction to this saying, this feels really powerful.
What do I do if this is too emotional for someone and can't proceed? What should we do in that case?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: So again, I would just have them sit with that. When those emotions come
up, if it's too much, a lot of the times, I'll just ask them maybe to even just sit with safe havening where
they're just rubbing arms like this to create that dual awareness, but just to notice it. What does it feel
in their body? Where it's coming from. Maybe prompt them to do some of that difrm diaphragmmatic
breathing. I might go to one of those and get them grounded quickly. But this one, if it comes up it
might be honoring the grief or sadness that's there and just the permission to do that, to sit with those
feelings is sometimes needed because usually, as trauma survivers, we're told how to think, feel, act,
and behave. And being given permission to sit and be sometimes is really more healing than we
recognize.
>> And then we've got -- someone asked: How do you respond from messages from their support
individuals that might become or reflect negative messages.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: I've never had anyone have a negative one. But if I did, I would kick that
person off their restoration team, first of all. They're out. [Chuckling]. And then I would try to find the
one that they had the strongest connection with, the one that was the most powerful. What would they
say to that? So maybe counteract if there was a negative message if that was shared. Or I might do
something -- you'll see a little bit later where I pull up kind of the cognitive -- the positive cognitions and
let them pick something that maybe the restoration team reminds them of instead of having the
restoration team imaginally speak to them. Just seeing the supports and holding a mont rup that they
pick.
>> And a number of people asking this. What can I do? And can I use this? If I don't go on and get 30
or 40 more hours of EMDR, is this something I can use with clients?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yes. I'm going to tell you yes. And some people will be mad at me for saying
that and I'm going it tell you this that these are early coping skills that we should have the freedom to
use as clinicians that are treating trauma. And this something that if you use it in a safe way and you're
a don't clinician, this is a positive skill to use, whether you do EMDR or not. And even with some of my
clients that I don't do EMDR with, I still will do things like this and I'll do kind of like a little bit different of
a version where I use what -- runay Brown calls this her brain trust and she identifies these people that
have had an impact on her. And restoration team to me is similar to that. Even if we don't maybe do
full EMDR, like maybe a client doesn't like it, I'll oftentimes still identify these because it can still be a
really powerful resource for them, whether they want to move on with EMDR or do some other kind of

trauma treatment. I also will tell you guys I love this one and the two other resourcing techniques that I
teach you today. I love them for group modalities. So love them to open and close groups with. Can be
really, really powerful. Can also be powerful to have other group members help them come up with
maybe categories that they were lacking. So I'll have them all kind of sit as a group, and they might
tap. But it can be really powerful that way and a really good resource. So yes, use these skills to help
our clients because clients deserve it have access to resources like this.
>> Somebody asked sometimes they're the -- what if the client wants you to be on the restoration
team? You. Is that okay? How do you respond to that?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Depends on the client. [Chuckling]. Right? We all know that. Yeah. I actually
had -- this is a good -- last week, I had one of my -- in one of my clinical consultation groups with
EMDR, one of my clinician s brought this up. She said okay, one of my clients used me as someone
on their restoration team. Normally I'd be okay with this but I also know that this person has a history of
becoming fixated on people that she looked up to and that I don't want to bow someone that she ends
up fixating on. So we talked about it's okay for now but maybe we're going to look at how to more
creatively add additional supports on there and touching on that, I'm okay with that if it happens and
it's appropriate. So if it's like I know I'm one of their only resources or one of the only people they feel
safe with, yeah, you're going to be on there. That's okay. We don't want it to be where it becomes a
place of idolizetion, where they're idolizing you.
>> Aside from the emotional reaction, some people say they got tired, drowsy, sleepy. They want to
know if it's normal. What happens if that happens with the clients?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Totally normal, you guys. And think about this is a really great way to show
you how activating we can get our nervous systems. So I always think of the bilateral stimulation as
what deactivates the Vegas nerve. So a lot of the times when you do these resourcing activities,
clients will say, oh, my gosh, I'm so relaxed and tired now. That tells me they were probably somewhat
a little bit elevated and now that they've come down, that's common. I just validate that for them.
Maybe we need to stop and do movement if that occurs. But it's totally common.
>> This is another one that I think you deal with a bit. But this is a person who works predominantly
with men. They often struggle to verbalize their feelings. You're doing the exercise. They're not maybe
great at verbalalizing. They're finding it uncomfortable to verbalize. Any guidance for that type of
client?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Elements of themselves usually work well. What are ways that they protect
themselves? What are ways they offered love and support even to others? What are the ways that
they use insight and knowledge? And men work wonderfully with sports figures or whatever their
interest is. If you know they're die hardp football fans, who are their football players? What about
favorite actors? Whoever that might be. Usually that will work really well. Keep in mind with EMDR
they can share as much or as little as they want. You might have a client that say I had people come
up but I just want to keep it to myself, if that's okay. That's okay, they can do that. As long as they feel
like it was positive, that's all I'm going to check in about. But they don't have to maybe necessarily tell
us every single detail. That's part of what makes EMDR a little bit more unique.

>> And then what do you do if you have somebody and they can't think of a real person that they
know. And they're kind of like yeah, this is great, but is it real? And they're struggling with that. What
do you tell a client who says something like that?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: I say yeah, it isn't real. And usually I will validate that with them. If I'm being
honest with you guys, my initial restoration team had one real person on it, and it was a person I had
like a five minute interaction with when I was, like, a kid. And I say yeah, that's a real thing. And I can
honor the grief of that. It sucks that there aren't a lot of people that wekeep identify with that. But also,
again, I'm going to restress this. I am impressed or amazed by the way that you were so able to
creatively come up with characters or object s for each of these characters when you haven't had that.
What an amazing attribute or trait that you are able to do that. Clients need to know that. Or this also
can give us an idea of what we want to look for and people that we form relationships with. And then I
talk about how we can working on repairing some of those early attachment bonds that we've had that
were broken that we deserve to have.
>> We've got a lot, so I might end with this one because I think we can go a long -- we'll visit more of
them later.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: No problem. After the break, we can take more, too. So give me one more.
>> You guys are doing great. There were a lot of questions about the tapping about posture,
positioning. Do they have to sit? Can they lay down and tap? Those kind of things. Any guidance
there?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Oh, man, guys. Don't you love us as clinicians? That's such a clinical
answer where we want to make sure we get it right and we want to know all the biomechanisms
behind it. Don't overthink it. That's what I'm going it tell you. If you can keep in mind do what is
comfortable for the client. We're going to learn different forms of bilateral stimulation later on today. If
you want to lay down, lay down and tap. Don't fall asleep. But if they want to tap their feet. Don't worry
about -- you don't have to cross the medial section. I always get asked that question. It's more about
we want that stimulation from the right and left sides. That's what's forcing the neurons to fire and
pulling that logic and emotional side of the brain online. Don't overthink the tapping. This is just one
piece of it.
>> And we'll stop there and I'll pop back on when it's the next round.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Thanks. Great questions, you guys. I love the questions. And again, I wish
we were in person because then I can ask and have all this feedback and normally get to see the way
that you all respond to this. And thank you for those of you that actually allowed yourself to have this
experience. Thank you for doing that. We never get usually the time to do this in trainings, right inso I
think that's one of the nice things about EMDR as well. Also, part of the reasoning that we do some of
these skills and I ask you to do them and you can relate to what came up for you with clients. If you're
like yeah, I struggled to come up with anyone that was a wise figure, use that as a way to relate to a
client or give them examples maybe from what have come up from you or if you saw other things that
people shared in the chat, that can be useful as well. So one thing that I want to talk about with EMDR
-- because you just got your first taste of whoa, the mind can go wherever it goes or there's barriers

that a mind can run into. Some of you were like I wasn't expecting what came up. Some of you found
that I couldn't go there for some reason. I was blocked. Just be curious about that, whatever came up.
Again, that's normal. That's part of this free association experience. One way that can kind of
sometimes help us navigate the intensity of what comes up within EMDR is I want you to keep in mind
that with EMDR, we're not asking them to do -- it's not exposure theiry. So that the not what EMDR is
about. That's not the goal of EMDR. So what we use is we use a couple different metaphors to create
a nice, safe distance when you're doing processing, which processing I'm going to refer to anytime I
ask you to internally go inside and think of something. That's what processing means in EMDR. So
anytime I ask you to internally go in and allow yourself to have that free association and you add
tapping or whatever form of bilateral stimulation, that I refer to as processing. So there's a couple ways
that we can create some safety and distance as a way to kind of help keep clients within the window of
tolerance to help them maybe tolerate the overwhelming feelings that come up. There's a couple
different ways we can do this. You might come up with your own distancing strategy which you totally
can. That's one of the things that I like about EMDR. It's a creative, fun experience. And I know that
the imaginal piece isn't for some people. That's one of the things that I like about it with trauma
because if you think about when we come up with trauma and we're trying to come up with, you know,
who are your supports? It's like they don't have anyone on there. I'd rather have them think of at least
an imaginal person than have a list where they don't have anyone to identify. And I like that
component. I just appreciate the creativity and really believe that creativity leads to a better capacity of
resilience and healing. But one way we can expand or increase this or their ability to maybe safely kind
of step inside is we want to stress to clients when we get -- before we get into actual trauma
processing where we're targeting real traumas within EMDR or even within some of these resourcing
exercises. So I'm never asking them to relive any of these experiences. I'm not asking them to, like, go
back in time and pretend like it's happening. Anytime I ask them to do any work, I want it to be from a
safe distance. So they're just observing this. So I'm not asking them to ever relive any of these
experiencing -- any of these experiences or things that we ask them to kind of think on. So fran seen
shapeero came up with this train metaphor. She said this is the safe distancing strategy where you can
tell a client to just imagine that you're on a train. You're riding a train. And the train's passing the
country side or whatever. And you're watching the scenery go by outside the window. And every so
often if you feel like it, we can stop the train. We can get off the train. We can explore, maybe gather
new information. Maybe we need to look at something a little bit closer. Obe maybe we need to let
something off the train that got on the train with us that we don't want to be riding with us or carrying
with us. We can speed up the train. We can slow the train down. We can stop the train. We can
change directions. But they're in charge of the train and how fast or slow or where the train's going.
And we just want them to notice like those images or the thoughts, kind of like they're the scenery
going outside the train window. And then when we kind of stop at each break, just kind of like you guys
got a little taste there where I had you adthat bilateral stimulation. I would say tell me what you're
noticing or what's coming up for you now. Those are common EMDR phrases that we utilize a lot. And
I let them know that they can share as much or as little as they want. But that's just me making sure

that things are progressing. It's giving me an idea of where we're going. And this distancing strategy is
going to help create a safe distance between the client and the experience. And it's also giving them
the notion -- we're letting them know that they're in charge of this, that they're in charnel of the
process. We're not going to keep them somewhere they don't want to be. They are in charge. They
have control over this. That's important. That's
the train.
I like to utilize the movie screen a lot. It's similar to this. I say I want use to imagine you're sitting in a
theater and you can even use this one with restoration team if this is to emotional. Notice who would
come up on the screen that would represent protection for you. There's a distance there. It's creating
some safety and a sense of control and tolerance. If they're watching this movie, this might be we can
rewind in time. We can slow things down. We can fast forward through certain parts. We can pause or
stop at certain parts. We can even turn it off or change the channel. But I just want to know, again,
when we pause or stop, I'm just going to ask what's coming up just to make sure that things are
moving forward and they're not getting stuck anywhere. If they get stuck, I let them know I'm going to
help them. I'm not going to leave them in that kind of stuck place. And I'll tell you one thing I do with
this which will make more sense later with the restoration activity we just did. Sometimes when we get
into where we're going to work on and revisit maybe a traumatic experience that we want to reprocess,
which you'll see what that looks like with EMDR in a bit, I might say to them, okay, we want to work
through this memory and why it's still bothering us. I want you to imagine you're sitting in the movie
theater, and we're going to be playing it on the screen. But this time I want you to imagine that those
figures or elements from your restoration team, they're sitting in that theater with you and you're not
having to watch that alone, that they're with you. And they're going to help you maybe see different
perspectives. They're going to help you figure this out, but that intrinsic -- even if it's imaginal support
is a huge element of reprocessing that works really nice in
EMDR.
Okay. So what we just did was obviously a preparation skill or what we call a resourcing skill in EMDR.
That restoration team. And in this restoration -- in this preparation phase -- sorry -- one of the things
we're doing is this is where if we haven't already we're providing psychoeducation on what EMDR is.
Then we're going to educate and familiarize clients with bilateral stimulation, and we're going to, again,
go through that distancing strategies that we can work to create some sense of safety and control. And
then I'm never going to move forward with doing anything else in EMDR until they've been able to
successfully do these skills and this preparation phase and use them adequately and successfully for
a period of time. Preparation phase to me is one of the most essential, important parts of trauma work.
But also, really important for EMDR work as well.
So I'm just going to cover a couple of things before we go to break. So keep in mind that the client's
job during any of these resourcing activities -- so like you saw with restoration team with the skills that
we're going to learn after break is their main job is to just notice what's coming up and just letting me
kind of know what they want me to know. They can tell me as much or as little as they want to share.
But I always tell them to just let your brain go where it naturally goes, even if it feels completely

unrelated or random. There's a meaning and a purpose there. But I want them to know that they're in
control of the treatment process. And I explained to them I'm not in charge. I'm just here as a
compassionate companion. I'm your guide -- your co-guide on this journey. I'll help you when we get
stuck, but we're companions on this. I'm not leading or taking over. I am just there to help you if you
get
stuck.
So my main goal as the clinician is to make sure that I have resourced my clients well enough and not
taking them any further in this process or any type of trauma treatment until they are ready for that and
until they have used and developed, you know, multiple resourcing. Remember, fancy word for coping
skills. And my main job is then checking in, helping them if they get stuck, which we'll talk about, how
to delineate if they are stuck. And really to just trust the process. So just trust the process, that the
process is going to work. And this requires us to really trust the client as well. And again, I know that I
just said the opposite of this, but to me, I really try to stay out of the guide role. I'm there if they need
me to guide and direct. But really kind of co-guides on this process. We're there to work together. This
is a client-centered approach. And again, my role with this, too, is going to be make sure that I educate
them on the risks associated with EMDR and especially if I'm doing EMDR in a telehealth space, there
better be a backup plan if we lose connection. How am I going to check in with them, the normal safety
planning for any trauma treatment and just knowing that EMDR can bring up strong emotions. And
then really enlicating and practicing and using these bilateral stimulation techniques and letting the
client pick what works for them and really practice and review those coping skills and those resourcing
skills and safety planning. So when we come back, we're going to learn about bilateral stimulation and
the different forms of bilateral stimulation. And then we will go from there. I'll take a few questions
when we come back to you. We'll come back in 15 minutes. So kind of close to 10 'til the top of the
hour. Maybe just a couple minutes before that. Thanks, you
guys.
Session on break]. .
>> We're back. I was waiting for the very cool music that made found for us. People always comment
how great that music is. They always want to know what that music is. Just giving it a second to wrap
up. It is question time again. I'll read it again with housekeeping stuff. Things you guys are asking
outside of this training and EMDR, yes, you can access these recordings after the event. Again, go to
that chat and it gives you a little more detail. And yes, you can still get CE if you check out that chat,
and it'll tell you how to do these things. Keep in mind, the chat is a one way street. You can't type
anything in there. It is just kind of a display to give you information for those kind of things that you're
asking that aren't EMDR-related questions. With that in mind, we'll move on to the actual questions
about the training. And Megan, this is one folks have asked a couple different times, kind of about the
speed here. Can EMDR be done brief ly and show effective results?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Uh-huh. We show it being effective anywhere -- and depending on what the
trauma is, especially if you're working with maybe a single incident event. You can see really good
resolution in four to six sessions. I mean, it's really individualized. But yes, you can see kind of that

target. Complex trauma, if that stuff hasn't been resolved, obviously need more. But yeah, it can be
effective and shorter periods of time like that and still make an impact.
>> And here's one that I've heard from time to time. Clients who maybe want to do EMDR therapy
when they come to you, but they've actually done it in the past and had a bad experience. So thaer
maybe up for it again. But special consideration for someone like that.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah. So most of the time -- and this is a common one as well. They just
weren't in a place where EMDR was something that they were open to. Oftentimes, I want to know
what they're experience was like. So didn't they like about it? What did they feel like it didn't help with.
And yulsy I tell them what is a little bit different about my style or my approach. Maybe they've never
done restoration team or other things. I might say, here's what I know EMDR can do. There's different
skills that can be implemented. So I might share those things. I also might say, you know, we can try it
again, and if it doesn't -- if you don't like it, then we can find other things that will be helpful. But
usually, it's just about seeing what they felt like were the barriers when they did it. And unfortunately,
there are some clinicians that maybe just don't use EMDR enough or were trained ineffectively where
they're just missing some things that would have been helpful for them.
>> And then there's a lot of questions about I work with this type of population. So I don't know the
best way -- but I can rattle through some of them. Can I use EMDR with this? We talked age and
young people. What about older people? I work with a lot of older ones.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yes, love it with older as well. I used to do a lot of kids stuff. I do primarily
adults now. I did see one of those questions about what about the older what we call maybe geriatric
population. Absolutely. Again, ruling out other factors. But yeah, I think that EMDR is effective. And
mostly effective for adult populations. I mean, that's where most of it was studied.
>> And so the list kind of goes on. But things about domestic violence abuse issues. Is it something
you would use there? With clients who have experienced psychotic features like people looking for the
specifics of who can use --
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: So let me talk about -- yeah, with domestic violence -- I think I saw another
one with betrayal trauma and stuff. Yes, I think it can be really effective. One of the things I like about it
-- and if you think back to what we learned earlier today, EMDR works on strengthening that positive
self-regard, learning to trust yourself again, increasing your self-worth. And I think it really can help
sometimes. Clients in situations where there's been some betrayal trauma or domestic violence, if they
can learn and build up kind of themselves a little more, they have the strength to leave -- maybe cope
or break some of those negative relationshipers -- relationships that are occurring. So I love it a lot.
Psychosis wise, I'll tell you I am not personally comfortable using EMDR with psychosis or kind of
those extreme delusions or schizophrenia or big psychotic episodes. I know there's some EMDR
clinicians that will use that. That's just not my focus area. I think that there's a lot more risk there. I do
know studies did show that it can reduce some of those symptoms of psychosis in a controlled study.
But I would just advise you to seek out maybe someone that specializes in that that way because
that's not my emphasis.
>> And maybe one of the other client types that's getting asked about a lot, people on the spectrum.

>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah.

>> People with ADHD. Is this something you can use with those populations?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah. So autism, sherry pullson -- yeah, I think I said that right. I did. I had
to think about it. But she has a lot on autism. She has autism prompts and protocols. Sometimes, I
actually really like it with that population. They process a little bit different, but sometimes it's really
great that getting them to maybe expand some of their rigid thinking. So I actually like it that way.
There is evidence around that. There's some good interventions that are supportive of autism
spectrum disorder and the way that EMDR can be utilized. The other one, too -- what was it other one
that you mentioned?
>> ADHD.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Oh, ADHD, yes. You see a lot of great work with ADHD. One thing that I
always find hands down is people with ADHD, like when we get into the first resourcing activities,
they'll say oh, I've never been able to doguided meditation. My mind wanders and goes wherever.
There's something about the bilateral stimulation that they'll actually come back and say that's the first
time I've been able to focus on something. It actually made me tick is with what we were doing. And I
like that dual awareness seeps to work really, really well for them.
>> This has come up in a couple of different ways, but is it possible that your client has a memory
come up that was not remembered or blocked before doing EMDR and now it's come up? And how do
you handle it when that situation happens.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah. Yup, that happens. And yvn had that happen, you know, multiple
times. And again, I'll give you kind of classic example. I had a client that I worked with for years doing
EMDR. She loves EMDR. And a lot of complex trauma. We've been working together for a couple of
years. She ended up having an incident that she had never prmed -- remembered come up in the
middle of a session of being sexually assaulted as a kid. And as the clinician, I was like, oh, crap. But I
probably said other words, right? What am I going to do? And so anyways, we did a safety plan. We
put it in the contrainer which we're going to learn. What are weeg going to do with this? I got her back
in that same woke, which I would recommend. That was part of it. So she came in a few days later and
I said, okay, what are we going to do? Do you want to process this on its own? And she said that yeah,
she wanted to process it. So we set up this protocol which you're all going to see around going in to
kind of do some work on that. And she ended up coming to the realization that she's like I don't really
want to know the details of what happened. I can see that this occurred, but it's not important for me
anymore to explore. But going back to that question, it could be different for every client. You might
have to do your own trauma work that gets added to the timeline. We may have to target that
individually. But it is important to safety plan like you do with anyone. That's why the resourcing
element is so important. And keep in mind that, like, our memories, we have a max capacity for what
we can store. So typically, it's common when you start doing EMDR and things are getting moved or
reprocessed, maybe some new things will come up that maybe you haven't thought of for a while or
maybe it was a repressed memory. It gives the client a choice of what they want to do with that and try
to get them back in, keep a point of contact with them.

>> And this is another one that's been asked by a few people. But what do you do if you're looking to
provide EMDR to a client who's an ongoing traumatic environment where emotional safety just isn't
available to them?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Uh-huh, yeah. I mean, so common, unfortunately, for those of us who have
worked with adolescents and kids, too, or even in those domestic violence experiences. Right? And
one thing that I think is important is don't discount the work that we do in a session. So I always want
to make sure, like, those resourcing skills can be huge. Those might end up becoming the survival
skills they hold on to that allows them to get through that. And maybe those are skills they turn to
instead of turning to substances or whatever else that can be. Sometimes you can help process some
of those things and it can still show them that even though their environment's not changing, that at
some point, they still have hope for the future. So I'm still a proponent of moving forward as long as
that's safe.
>> And probably the last one for this round. It is a book recommendation question, so get your pens
out quick. They want to know what book, Megan, would you recommend for someone who is entirely
new to EMDR and they want to learn more. What are the great books that are available to them?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: There's a couple that I like. Obviously -- so if you can handle textbook and
you want tojust nerd out like me, I love fran seen shapeero's Eye Movement Desensitization and
Reprocessing. I think it's honestly wonderful. I think it's great. And yeah, that one's probably my
favorite. If you're like, umm I don't really like those kind of books, then I would recommend -- this is
one of my favorites by her. Getting past your past by fran seen shapeero. And it's made for people that
are maybe going to be clients and want to understand EMDR. It has some good -- kind of for the lay
person or the lay reader for what EMDR is, what trauma is, and then some of those resourcing skills. I
love anything by Laura parnel, the clinician's guide by EMDR is one of my favorites. And anything else
by her, I would highly recommend as well.
>> Okay. We'll end this session with that. Megan, if you want to take more questions before the day
wraps, let me know.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: I'll maybe to that before we wrap up today. Thanks, Ryan. Good news, you
guys. We have one more hour left. So thanks for staying on, those of you that have been tuned in all
day, really appreciate it. We've got an hour left of this. I'm going to teach you a couple good resourcing
skills. We're going to go through some of the bilateral components. And tomorrow we'll see what an
actual EMDR processing session looks like when we're really targeting a specific trauma and how
we're going to utilize that. And don't worry, I will not forget to create resources for you fwies to put in
that Google drive. I will add those book recommendations on there, too, just in case you miss them in
the chat. So let's talk about these different methods of bilateral stimulation and what we can use and
what this looks like. So obviously, we know that EMDR was initially centered around eye movements.
And there's a couple things to keep in mind. The demo we're going to see tomorrow morning, the first
one, is going to be of a really good EMDR session that's done by another clinician. And it's a really
good, straight forward look at what basic EMDR is, and you're going to see the use of eye movements
in that. I always think it's important to show this so that you can see what that set up looks like. You're

going to so that traditional style of EMDR using eye movements. Now, if you do choos to use eye
movements, a couple things to keep in mind is if you're doing these in person -- so with clients in the
office, we want to set up what we call this ships in the night kind of orientation. We never sit directly in
front of the client. I might be sitting here and my client would be kind of parallel to me so you're like
ships in the night that can pass each other, and they would be maybe directly in front of me a safe
distance that they feel comfortable with. And we can use eye movements old school way with fingers
where we're just moving them back and forth. And what we're looking for is we want the eyes to track
my fingers. And so in resourcing skills like restoration team, we want these to be just a little bit slower.
Not too slow like this. But we want just a nice cadence and a nice rhythm. And I want them to just fogo
my fingers and watching for eye movements to be able to track my fingers. And if I notice that my eyes
-- if my fingers are here and their eyes are jumping ahead that means I need to speed up those
movements. You've also seen an office I'm sure -- some of you are familiar with this, what they call the
light bar or the light board. To me, it looks like a music stand typically or it's on a music stand. You can
put them on there. It's kind of a board. It reminds me of a light bright where you can see different kind
of colors that would move, like dots across the screen. You can do different designs. It'll have a figure
8. It can go diagonal. And you're having them watch that. And again, you're watching the eyes. And
again, I usually will set that off to the side of them if we're going to be using that. And then if we're
going to be using eye movements virtually, I'm going to show you a couple different options for that.
I'm going to show you the most easy one to probably go to. So just for user friendly sake, we're going
to start here. This is called bilateral stimulation.io. It's free. There's an upgraded one that you can
utilize. I am going to drop this in the chat and Maddie can share it with you guys because as we
practice maybe some of these other resourcing activities that we're going to close the day out with
today, you might want to try maybe the eye movements or the sound. So going back to this one, what
this looks like is if you go here and let's say -- so obviously, we're the therapist. I might put my name in
or maybe the first name of the client. And then what we'll see is it'll pull up this screen for us. And like I
said, there's upgrades that you can do. And you can invite a client. So if you do that, you click on this.
It'll give you a link. You can send it to the client. And they can utilize this. Sometimes what I'll do -- and
I'm going to show you this really quickly. So this is what the client will see. So if you wanted to test this
out when we're learning some of these resourcing skills, the last couple that we're going to learn today,
just come to this, set it up as the therapist, put your name in. And then click down on the bottom --
you're going to click preview down here what the client sees. And you can use this for yourself as a
way to gauge maybe how you would use eye movements here. And this might -- okay. So this is what
the client would see, just this on their end. They wouldn't see the rest. And we'll click on start BLS. And
obviously it's lagging with my internet but if you follow on your own, you can see it. You can speed it up
down here, and then you can stop it. You can change the color of this as well. So you can use this if
you want to try this during the next couple exercises instead of the tapping. Some people really like the
eye movement, so go ahead and try that. Find a speed that you're easily able to track for the
resourcing activities that we're doing. We want it to be enough that it's not too disruptive but it's
providing that external stimulation. So that is what I will tell you about the eye movements. One thing

to keep in mind with eye movements that you need to be cautious of and screen for is keep in mind
that if if they have any history of seizures, any history of sometimes migraines as well is one I've been
seeing, epilepsy or anything like that or epileptic seizures, don't do eye movements. It has been found
to trigger that. So a different form of bilateral stimulation. Keep that in mind. One thing I see a lot with
eye movement is sometimes what will happen is clients will, like, kind of disassociate when they do
eye movements. And this is something that can happen. So it'll be like they're just tracking the eye
movements, but there's mow thought progression happening. They're kind of spaced out. So if that
occurs, then we likely either need to speed up the eye movements or we need to try a different form of
bilateral stimulation. One thing I will say that I like about the eye movements as well is if you get
someone that's a talker because EMDR you have to process -- you process quietly. So there isn't
verbalization taking place. Just like what you guys experienced, how I asked you to think on those
things, that's exactly what I would do in the office. I want the client to be silent during that time. So
when they're adding the bilateral stimulation, they're not talking out loud. That actually slows the
processing down. So if you get someone that wants to overly talk, switch the eye movements. It'll be
harder for them to talk. It'll fort them to kind of track and think. So sometimes, that can be good for
more kind of logical, over analytical people. Sometimes that can help with their processing as well.
Those are kind of the caveats I'll tell you and limitations for eye movements to keep in mind. And
you're going to see a demonstration of that tomorrow. Kind of first thing, we'll see a demonstration with
eye movements in person. That'll be helpful for you guys. Another thing I'd like to show you on this
website as well is you can change the position on here of where things might be move. So center --
and if you do, I think, sign up for the extended versions you can move it on these angles. There's a
couple other online platforms for on that are similar to this that you can use as well. They also have an
auditory feature. If you turn on the auditory because that's the one we're going to look at next, one of
the ones I like is the heart beat. So maybe they just want to do sound and not eye movements. I might
not even share this with them and ask them to just listen to this. I have to turn mine up. I don't know if
you guys can hear that. Mine is being quiet on my end. Normally, you can hear it. So it will be a heart
beat sound. I'm not sure if that's coming through on your end. But for some reason, it's not on mine. So
those are some of our -- just the eye movements to keep in mind. You'll see what that looks like. Like I
said, tomorrow, we're going to look at some other ways that you can utilize sound for bilateral
stimulation. So on here, it gives you some different ones. I'll say just play around with this. The heart
beats are one of my favorites on here. There's finger snapping, soft bell. And some people actually
really like more sound with it. And what we're looking for with auditory is I want to make sure that we
have headphones that they can utilize. And I want a clear delineation from right to left. So I want to
make sure that they aren't headphones that are going to just play sound on one side. I want to make
sure there is some rotation. And I'll see if this will play on here for us.
[Music playing].
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: This is one that a lot of my clients like as well. But again, and I -- I want this
with headphones. And I'll send a link for each of the ones I like. This is another one that I like as well.
Oh, sorry. Wrong one. This is the other one that some people use. There's too much going on in this

one for me. But some people like this a little bit more. I'm going to show you one other one that is quite
good. This last one I show you is great because if you go to their actual channel, they have different
speeds of sound on there. This would be one of the really slow ones. So the higher the Bpm, the
quicker it will be. So this one will be 50. I'll show you. I'll show you this one that's faster. So this
channel's great for just keeping it really -- for different pulses if you're finding something if they like
sound. Recommend this as well. And also, I'm going to put a couple links -- there's a couple different
playlists that have bilateral sound for EMDR on Spotify that I also like quite a bit that I'll recommend for
you that I'll put in that resources document for you all. And I'll talk about a couple of these. So sound,
same thing. We just want that rotation from ear to ear with headphones, if you can. These are some
other ones that I recommend that you can look at as well. And then we get back into the actual tapping
that we tried. So we have the butterfly hug. Tapping on your legs. You can do this safe havening if you
want. And if you're in an office, you can use the theira tappers. I don't know if anyone has seen those,
but they're just like little square nodes. My favorites are what they call bitaps. And bitaps, they're
Bluetooth enabled. And most of the -- if you end up getting the light board, they'll usually have an
additive to have the Thera tappers. All they do is vibrate or pulse. And you can set how strong the
pulse is, how quick the pulse is. You have it in their hand and rotate from side to side. Kids love the
tappers that way. And the bitaps are my favorite. They are Bluetooth enabled and you can hook it up
to your phone. That's another tactile stimulation one you can use. With kids, there's obviously different
bilateral techniques you can use like patty cake, marching. You can do things like drumming. I use a
magic wand sometimes, skrubling. You can be really creative. Anna gomezuses the guerilla. You can
beat your chest like a guerilla. The butterfly. You can be creative with what you can use for that
bilateral stimulation. I'll tell you what I use a lot in my office is I will put a TV tray between myself and
the client, and those that I'm comfortable with, I have them lay their hand flat and I tap on top of their
hands while their hands lay there. The tray creates a barrier between us, creating kind of that distance.
I think that that physical touch component is a huge healing process. And actually, most clients that
have tried other mechanisms youlgsy come back to that as it really creates an external stimulation that
sometimes they're not in charge of which helps. Again, I use that with clients -- with clients that you
feel comfortable with. If you feel like there's some that obviously don't do it. But I think it creates a
really -- it's amazing for what it does with hely and safe -- healthy and safe attachment and touch. If
you watch some of the well-known therapist s like parnel, they'll go knee to knee and tap on the
outside of the knees or top of the legs. So that physical touch component can also work as well. And
most of the time if we're in a virtual space like this, a client 's going to use tapping, then I always will
co-tap because I want them to feel like there's a sense of presence. But these will givia some other
options that you can check out on this slide. And then I really practice congruent breathing with this.
So we're always going to use a set of bilateral stimulation. Weir -- we're going to broeth in, breathe out
and I'm going to mimic the breath of the client. That congruent breathing is important. That dual
awareness, that bilateral stimulation is really being enhanced when we add that congruent breathing or
when I do kind of that congruent tapping with them. And so what most of the resourcing activities are
going to look like are going to be similar with what we saw with restoration team where we might talk

and come up with something. And then we'll add the bilateral stimulation and then we'll stop and check
in where there's no bilateral stimulation. So anytime we're talking to the client and the client's sharing
with us, there's no bilateral stimulation. So I'd encourage you all, especially those who haven't used
EMDR before or ever experienced it as a client yourself, try out a couple different forms of the BLS
options and see which one kind of works best for you. Everyone processes or like s things -- likes to
process in a different way with a different form of external stimulation so use what works best for you.
You might have to do this with clients, just to see what they have a tendency to respond the best to.
So keep that in mind as we practice am of these different -- some of these different forms of bilateral
stimulation. Try that and see what works best. Also, remind them that this will help keep them
grounded and present in the moment. The goal of adding this bilateral stimulation is to keep them here
in the present moment and not getting kind of carried away too far into whatever they're experiencing.
It adds that dual awareness. But it also is going to help pull those logical pieces of the brain into
perspective so that they can either enhance something like a positive resource, or they can filter
through something that they need to let go
of.
Okay. So we're going to go into learning our next resourcing activity. This one's, like, the hall mark
resourcing skill of EMDR. And calm place is very common. This is, like, one of the have-to's within
EMDR treatment in this preparation phase. So we're still in the phase 2 of preparation. And usually, my
go-to resourcing skills are I like calm place, container, and restoration team. We're going to do all three
of those. I have a couple others that I like as well that I'll sometimes integrate. But these are some of
the go-tos, and I feel like these are necessary for clients to do. And if they're unable to do these, I do
not move forward with EMDR until they're able to successfully do these skills. So this one will feel
similar to restoration team. They'll be a little bit of a difference but it'll feel like a guided medmeditation
a little bit. The only difference is you're adding some form of bilateral stimulation. So I'm going to ask
you all to kind of just again, you will get a handout with this that walks you through what to do step by
step. And I want to just encourage you to find the form of bilateral stimulation that's going to work best
for you. So if you want to try one of the other ones, you can. You'll just see me kind of co-tapping. So
whatever form of bilateral stimulation you're using, you're going to dethat until I tell you to stop. And I'll
prompt you when to start
that.
So with Complace, the goal of this activity is to think of a place, real or imagined, a place you've been
or haven't been, that would just kind of tranquility, calmness. They used to call this safe place. I, like a
lot of others, hate the word safe place because a lot of clients that are, like, there isn't a place that felt
safe. So think of a calm, tranquil place, a happy place, whatever they want to call it. But something that
represents feelings of positivity. I don't want it to be a place where something negative's happened. If
you picked childhood bedroom but there was a lot of chaos going on in the home, I would gently say I
want to pick a place that is free of anything negative or bad that happened. I don't want it to be
associated. It could be a place that they always wanted to go but haven't been. It's common to be the
beach or something like that. Scenic, but it can be anything. Again, doesn't have to be a place that

they've really been. Just what -- a place they wanted to, a place that would feel calm. So kind of think
for yourselves what comes up when you think of a calm, peaceful, tranquil place
.
And I usually will check in if I'm doing wis with a client and say, what's coming up? Just to screen that
ytnot an inappropriate place that has something negative associated with it. And this is where we're
going to start. I'm going to walk you through this guided -- it'll feel like guided meditation where we're
going to enhance the sensation of this place. So I'm going to ask you to add your bilateral stimulation.
While we do this, I'll prompt you when I want you to stop. So I'm going to invite us all to go ahead and
find that bilateral stimulation. Go ahead, take a deep breath in with me. We'll let that go. Go ahead,
start those taps, whatever form of bilateral stimulation you're using and you're going to continue with
this until I tell you tostop. And with eyes open or closed, whatever you prefer, continuing that bilateral
stimulation, I just want you to bring up this place, this calm, tranquil, peaceful, or happy place that you
thought of. I want you to notice everything that you can see in this place. So notice the colors, the
objects, the details of the scenery. Even notice if anyone's with you. You might even notice the time of
day, if it's night, morning, midafternoon. And then I want you to notice everything you can smell in this
place. So notice for there's any of those specific cents cents that you notice. Do you notice anything
you can hear? What sounds come to mind as you imagine being in this place? Notice if you're eating
or drinking anything in this place. And then notice what you're physically doing in this place. Are you
walking? Sitting? Standing? Notice the temperature of this place, if it's warm or cool, if there's a
breeze. And just notice the way that you feel emotionally and physically as you imagine being in this
place. Go ahead. We're going to take a deep breath in. We're going to let that go. Go ahead and stop
that bilateral stimulation if you haven't already. And typically, if I'm working with a client, this is where
I'd ask them, I want you to tell me what came up. What did you notice? Describe what you envisioned
or what you imagined. So I'm looking for them to kind of tell me about their place. I'm also screening as
I ask this for any intrusions that might have come up. Were there any barriers that came up? So for
example, it might have been, like, yeah, I was thinking of a calm place. It was on the beach, it was
thies. And then all of a sudden I felt this dark shadow or something show up. So I'm going to have to
deal with those intrusions if that occurs. So if that did occur for anyone, this time, I want you tothink
about maybe removing that from your place. So you can either put it somewhere else and then come
back to your place. You can also think of creating a protective bubble or wall around your place if you
had any of those intrusions come up. Or you can imagine a new place that would maybe be free of any
of those lingering things or you can just notice. Total y up to you. We will go back to the second part of
this in just a second. Before we do, I want you to think of kind of a mantra or a statement or a word
that would represent this place for you. So it can be something like -- and typically, I want this to be an
I am statement. I can be calm and safe. I can handle this, whatever is kind of positive that you want to
remember that maybe this place remind you of or could be associated with. You can come up with one
word like peace. That's fine, too. So go ahead. We're going to take another deep breath in. We're
going to let that go. Go ahead, close those eyes and start that bilateral stimulation again, and we're
going to continue with this once more until I tell you to stop. And bring up that calm place again. I want

you to bring in the details of your surroundings, everything that you can see. Notice what stand s out.
Notice the vivid colors, the objects. Notice the sounds and everything that you can hear in this place.
Notice any of those distinct smells or different centscent s. Notice if you're eating or drinking anything.
And notice what it physically feels like in this place. The temperature. Notice what you're physically
doing. You bring up all these sensory details. Imagine what it feels like just being in this place, even if
it's just imaginal. And as you do, I want you to hold whatever that mantra is that you want to be
associated with this place. Just kind of hold that mantra with the image and the feelings of this place
and I want you to start with just imagining the feelings and sensations of this place if you can imagine
them starting and running through the top of your head, flowing down into your neck and shoulders,
down into your arms, hand, and fingers, back up into your chest, down into your gut and stomach, into
your hips, legs, and into your feet and toes. And just hold coincide of the paetfulness and the calmness
of this place along with that mantra. Go ahead and take a deep breath in when you're ready. Let that
go. Go ahead and stop those taps if you haven't already. And then just kind of notice what came up for
you. It's okay if you got distracted. It's okay if your mind wandered. These are all things that are normal
and can happen. Just be observant of them. Again, if you had intrusions come up, I might encourage
you to pick a different place. Those of you that maybe struggle with visualizing things, keep in mind
that a way that an additive to this that can be helpful or a modification, you can pull up like an actual
picture. Sometimes I might ask them to pull up a picture on their phone and I'll have them look at it
while they add their bilateral stimulation and think about each of those sensory details. You can even
do this with a picture of a place they want to be. That works very nicely as well. And if there were
maybe further intrusions that came in while working with a client, there was a shadow, I was doing
good but I had these intrusive thoughts or images pop in, I would work with them on what those were,
finding a place we can put those, finding out what they want to do with those. If this place was related
to anything disruptive. So this is calm place. This is one of the hallmark EMDR resourcing skills. I
never ever move forward unless they can do this skill. And to me, I want this one and restoration team
and container before I ever move forward. So keep that in mind. But we want apcalm, grounded,
regulated place. This is a place we're going to use if processing gets overwhelming when we start to
target trauma. We're going to go back to the calm place for a moment, get them grounded, recentered,
and go back tathe trauma work. We can open and close sessions with this. I also love this one in
groups as a mindfulness activity. And then the last one that we're going to learn today, we're going to
go right into this one is what we call contrain -- container. I personally like container more than calm
place. I just think it's more useful, and I really like it and the creativity with
it.
So kind of same context, but this time, we're going to be coming up with a container or object that we
could safely and easily store things into. It can be extremely imaginal. I'll give you a lot of different
options for this. Doesn't have to be something you have that can be -- it can be if you want. And you
can be really creative with this. So examples of a container could be like a mason jar. Maybe it's
multiple mason jars. It could be a Tupperware container. It could be a gun safe. It could be a chest.
We've had people do everything from coffins to the bottom of the ocean in a treasure chest. So you

can be very creative with this. Just has to have some way to open and close and stay somewhat
concealed. Same thing, we're going to add some bilateral stimulation with this one. So I'm going to
invite you all again to find kind of that form of bilateral stimulation that you're going to
do.
And first, we're going to start by just bringing up this image of this container. We're going to get it more
vivid in my mind. And I'm going to lead you through what we're going to do with it from there. So
everyone, use whatever form of bilateral stimulation you want to use. Go ahead, we're going to take a
deep breath in. We're going to let that go. Go ahead, eyes closed. If you prefer, go ahead and start
that bilateral stimulation once more. And I want to start by envisioning or bringing to mind whatever
container or object comes up for you. It can be something that you can easily put things into. But it just
needs to have a way that you can secure it and keep it closed to some degree. Once you bring up that
object or you have something in mind, I want you to just notice what it's made out of. What is the size
of this object? You might even notice if it's expandable. Maybe you would need multiple of these
containers. You might even notice if it's sound proof once things are inside. Notice the texture that it
would have. Then notice the way that you'd open it and close it. And how would you keep it secure?
So maybe there's a lock with it or a key or a pass code. Or maybe it's kept in a place or room with a
lock. Just notice how you'll kind of keep that contained and secure. Go ahead. Take a deep breath in
for me. Let that go. Go ahead. Stop those tap s, the bilateral stimulation for a moment. Now we're
going to switch gears for a moment. Now I want you to think about a recent kind of annoyance,
frustration, or stressor that's been taking place in your life recently. So don't pick major big traumas
right now. Just pick something like -- that's been recently kind of coming up, causing some stress,
frustration, tension. And we're going to bring this up in a minute as we add our bilateral stimulation.
And then we're going to envision putting this inside the container. Okay? So everyone, go ahead, take
a deep breath in. We'll let that go. Go ahead, start that bilateral stimulation for me and continue with it.
Eyes open or closed, whatever you prefer. And bring up that container, that object once more. Just
kind of notice it. I want you to just imagine if you could kind of opening this container, this object. And
after you open it, I want you to envision putting any of those stressors, annoyances, frustrations that
you were just thinking of, I want you to imagine that you get to place them in the container. Does it feel
too big for the container? You can expand it, come up with a new container. You can shrink it down to
fit in the container. But I want you to come up with a few of those stressors or annoyances and just
imagine kind of placing them inside that container. You might notice if there's anything that's kind of
hard to get inside the container or things that maybe you're struggling to put inside the container. And
if anything like that comes up, maybe you just see if there's anyone from that restoration team that
could maybe help you put these thingps or these objects inside this container. And once you've
envisioned kind of putting those stressers in the container, I want you to imagine closing the container,
sealing it, securing it, locking it. Maybe it's even placing it on a shelf or putting it somewhere. And just
know these are things that are going to be safely stored until we're ready to come back to them and
give them the time and attention that they deserve. For now, we're moving them out of our mind's eye
until we address them. But they're safely stored here. We can even imagine just walking away from the

container if if you're leaving it in a room, maybe closing the door. Just distance yourself from that a
little bit. Notice how that feels to leave some of those things there. Go ahead, take a deep breath in for
me. Let that go. Go ahead, stop that bilateral stimulation if you haven't already. And then kind of just
notice what came up. So I know I'm going to get probably a ton of questions around this. That's okay.
Very common. So notice, was it easy to put things in? Was it difficult? I always get asked about this.
Isn't this kind of disassociative? And the goal is that I'm always going to make a list as the clinician of
what we've put in the container. Now, small menial things, maybe we don't need to go back to, but
those bigger things that need, like I said, that time and attention to be addressed, I am going to always
make sure that I go back to those and then we would kind of go through the same steps. Imagine
opening up that container, taking out the issue that we're going to be dealing with today and putting
that lid back on and then we can focus on that issue. It's a nice way to get separation but also work on
things one at a time. It also creates a sense of safety that those triggers or traumas aren't just floating
around that they're in a secure, safe place. So I always want to know what clients put in the container.
This is used a lot if we're working on trauma processing and some new trauma comes up. They
remember something in the middle of processing like we talked about. This may be where I say, okay,
we're going to pause for a moment. And I want us -- can we take this and put this in the container so
that we can come back to it and give it the time and attention that it truly deserves because I don't
want it abandon whatever tram a we were working on to address this. But I want to make sure there's
compassion with the things that come up. It's useful that way, having the client imagine putting it in a
safe place. Again, I want to check with what the clients have put in the container. And this is also a
really great way to end and complete sessions, to envision putting disruptive things in there as
needed. So these are kind of those three hallmark resourcing skills that we're going to use at this
stage in EMDR, in this preparation phase. And you're going to see why this is really important when
you watch some of the demos or we get into kind of the trauma processing piece of EMDR tomorrow.
So I'm going to stop for a moment because I'm sure that there's a lot of questions and I know that
we've only got just a little bit of time left. So I want to make sure that I go and answer as many
questions as I can for you guys. So I'll bring Ryan back in.
>> Here I am. Question 1. It's just about you're going to have an additional birch of resources. And
folks just need to hang for tomorrow. And you'll either have a link. We're upload them into the portal.
So for those of you waiting on kind of that set of additional references and exercises, it's coming.
Incentivize be back with us tomorrow. So tune back in, and you'll get those. And we'll try to get through
lots of end of the day-the-day questions. So we're going to go right into them. Megan can we do these
resourcing activities in any kind of order? Is the an order to do these?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: No. Do the ones that you feel like they're going to have the most success at
first-right? For me, it's trial and error. See what comes for them. So no, I'm okay with you just testing --
trusting that gut level instinct as a clinician.
>> Okay, good. I think some folks maybe need the Megan advice of keep it simple but there's lots of
tapping questions again. Does have to be the butterfly hug? Can it be elsewhere? Do they have to do
it a certain way?

>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: And again, feel free, you guys. You can be creative. Just like we are with
kids with bilateral stimulation. I talked about the marching or the scribbling or whatever it is. Aerial
shorts talk about using the safe havening a lot. You can tab on your legs. I have people who will tap
fingers like this or tap their feet. Do what works for you and what you feel is best. You can be creative
with that piece. We're looking for that stimulation from right to left side.
>> And there were a couple people who asked this. But do clients ever put people in the container.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Oh, yeah. I'm, like, every day, you guys, I put people in my container. Just
kidding. Yeah, oftentimes, you can put people in the container. You'll have that come up. Sometimes
that can be honestly more helpful. I had someone a couple of weeks ago that they had, like, a whole
bunch of Tupperware containers and they decided to make a padded cell for someone. I don't want to
put them in the Tupperware. That's mean. I'll make a comfortable space for them but I can't hear them.
Totally okay there.
>> Someone's talking about attachment focused EMDR. Just curious how is this different than just
EMDR.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Well, really, I think all EMDR is really attachment focused EMDR. It's just
how we call it. But honestly, really good fundamental, like, good EMDR work incorporates attachment-
based notions with it. So restoration team, totally attachment based kind of theory. A lot of the parts
work that you do with internal family systems. It's very similar. What you'll see tomorrow in the first
demonstration will be here is generic EMDR that doesn't look at attachment based theory. And then
you'll see in my demo the difference because I use a big attachment based background with EMDR
and I think it's more effective.
>> Perfect. More on that tomorrow. Question on the train or the movie activity. How long do you let
them watch the movie or ride the train? And are you prompting them as they're doing this?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah. And all this we'll talk about tomorrow because this is kind of what
we're doing when we get into the actual trauma processing. So that part will kind of make sense. So
hang on to that question because you'll see we do kind of these sets. And that's when we're kind of
prompting them to watch the movie and then we give them breaks. And you'll see what that looks like
tomorrow. But I'll touch back on that for you guys then.
>> Someone wanted to know EMDR ever used in couple' therapy, trauma or attachment wounds from
relationships that brought them to therapy?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Actually, one of my very favorite EMDR resourcing activities comes from a
framework attachment resourcing skills they used with parents and kids. And I use it a ton with
couples. And it's amazing at restoring secure attachment. And it's just a really cool intervention to use.
It's something I use with couples a lot. And I can talk about that tomorrow more, too, if you guys are
curious what that looks like because it's honestly a good skill to me that doesn't require, like, knowing
the whole logistics of EMDR but can be a really safe way to create some secure safe attachment with
a parent and child or with partners.
>> And then a lot of folks who work with kids. Kind of a focus for you in the past. But folks are
wondering, when you're working with elementary-aged kids, how do you ensure that they're the ones

taking the lead in EMDR therapy?

>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Kids like to be -- they like the freedom to explore. A lot of times, you give
them options for integrating sand tray. So when they have -- they get to create the place in the
container. Maybe make your own container. Right? So you canint integrate all those different artistic,
creative ways where they get to be in the lead without having to use as much verbal language as
sometimes we require them to. So that's one thing that I like. Kids will typically need maybe more
prompting, but they will do well with it. And you'll spend a lot of time resourcing with kids, using a lot of
these resourcing skills to teach early emotional regulation.
>> And somebody just looking for what you do in therapy outside of EMDR. So I know IFS was a big
one. But what modalities do Megan love?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Love IFS. IFS is probably close to EMDR for me as a big love. Level out of
poly vagal stuff, somatic work. Attachment focused therapy. Those are probably my top ones.
>> [No audio].
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: You're muted.
>> It was going to happen at some point.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: That's okay. [Chuckling].
>> This one came up a number of times. People who were working with individuals with traumatic
brain injury. You know, what do you do there? Is this -- concerns with EMDR with that population?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Great question. Always consult with the neurologist on them. Let them know
you are doing EMDR. You want to get information -- and if the neurologist is comfortable with it. Most
neurologists are familiar with what EMDR is. I think a lot of it is you have to have considerations of
where the TBI occurred. So you know what kind of limitations and barriers you're going to run into. And
it's also going to tell you a lot of ways they're going to process. So for example, if maybe there was
impairment to a lot of the right hemisphere, maybe you're going to have to have more, like, logical or
abstract kind of things. And it'll be less emotional. Just depends. But you want to consult with the
neurologist on that. And to me, it depends on the severity of the TBI. But still am of the resourcing
activities can be helpful and beneficial if used with caution.
>> And we had a number of people who work with first responders. So not something specific but just
tips. I work with first responders. Using EMDR. Give me tips.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Love first responder work with EMDR. I actually think it's one of the ways
you get them to process. A lot of first responders a taught to live and kind of have to be in a
hyperarousal state in order to be on guard and respond the way that they need to. EMDR can do great
work with this. I mean, a lot of where we've seen EMDR come in strongly is after things like 9-11,
sandy hook. These big mass instances, even the Vegas shooting. We'll pull in crisis responders that
do EMDR that work specifically with not just the victims but first responders that are there. And a lot of
the times, first responders like the freedom of not having to talk about things, but just getting to have
control over what they experience. And there's some really good articles and resources that are
specific to first responders were taining to EMDR.
>> And then maybe two more as we're getting close to the end.

>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Okay.

>> Bilateral stimulation outside of session. Folks asking about the benefits of this outside of the
therapy room. Something they can use on their own?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah, I like them to use it on their own, especially with any of those ones we
learned today. So maybe it's like you have them practice calm place in bed, they're doing their tapping
or tapping their fingers under their desk or whatever it is. It can be a good grounding technique for
them to utilize. And a lot of people will say just the tapping alone is really beneficial.
>> And the last one for today. The question is -- this is an introductory thing. People want to know
more. How long should someone train before they start practicing EMDR with the clients? Are there
any kind of factor s they should consider in term of a clinician's level of readiness to go and actually
use this tool.
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Good question. If you guys are curious about that, I would recommend
going over to ever green certifications and checking out, like, just the training and certification process
within EMDR. And you can look at ( ) as well. We have similar standards. But what you're going to find
is that typical training as I mentioned is about five full days of training and then -- and during that time,
you're being required to practice the skills. You're being observed practicing those skills. You're being
taught a lot of the specifics of EMDR and the limitations and risks. And then you're required to do
ongoing kind of consultation. You have about ten hours of that that you do. And so to me, you have to
practice it to use it. EMDR is a skill that you can't just be taught. You have to be willing to experience it
yourself and to practice it and to also have that client experience. And if you're not willing to do that,
EMDR is probably not the right tool for you to use. But typically, it's about five days. We encourage you
to start practicing those early resourcing skills after the first three days of training and consulting with
you on those. And then you slowly integrate using the other skills.
>> Great first day, you guys. We made it. It's the end of the day. You did Day 1. I hope you got some
useful things. And hopefully, you guys have been kind to Maddie and Ryan as they filtered through all
the questions. And I hope to see everyone tomorrow for another good second day. And just to wrap up
what Ryan said earlier, I promise we will have a Google drive link that will have all the resource list of
all the videos and books I referenced so it's in one place. And you'll have those exercises on there as
well. Those three that we did today. So no worries.
>> I think that's it. Is class dismissed?
>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Class is dismissed. Have a good night. And I will see you tomorrow
morning. Thank you so much. I look -- not seeing you but you guys will be here toorp. So have a good
night.
[End of event. Thank you for using human realtime captioning.]. morrow. So have a good night.
[End of event. Thank you for using human realtime

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PESI-EMDR (Day One: Afternoon Session)-(Ai-Live to

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>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Yeah.

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taking the lead in EMDR therapy?

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>> MEGAN BOARDMAN: Okay.

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