This site is for EMDR trained therapists who work with clients with complex trauma. This site assumes that you have a working understanding of EMDR Therapy and attempts to provide additional information and context that may be helpful in working with clients with complex presentations.

You can also listen on Spotify.

If you a therapist who has completed your foundational training, you can sign up for low-cost group or individual consultation with Thomas Zimmerman to explore your questions or complex cases. If you have not consulted with me before, you can use coupon code: 2025 to get 50% off your first group consultation.

Expert Interviews

• Dr. Jamie Marich Interview of Their Book, Dissociation Made Simple (2023)
• David Archer and Anti-Racist Psychotherapy and the RAP Technique (Feb. 12, 2024)

Before We Start

• The Clients Who Most Need to Heal May Be Those You Do the Least Reprocessing With
• Understanding Where the Magic Is (And Is Not) in EMDR Therapy
• Normalizing Therapist Anxiety
• Explaining Trauma Memories: What a Reprocessed Memory Looks Like
• Overview: Understanding and Normalizing Dissociation
• Intro To “Dip Your Toe In” Metaphor
• Understanding the AIP Model: The Whale Metaphor and the Mount Everest Metaphor
• Effective Time Management Inside the Standard Clinical Hour in EMDR Therapy with Complex Trauma (video)
• Parts Work is Central to EMDR Therapy (video)
• Intro: Flash-Like Approaches with Severely Complex Trauma (video)
• Are Your Trying to Put Your EMDR/Mindfulness Clients Through a Machine?
• Learn More about Flash-Like Approaches to Rapidly Reprocess Trauma While Preparing Clients for EMDR (FourBlinks.com)

Phase One

• Complex Trauma Modifications Overview: Phases One-Four
• Dip Your Toe In: Phase One
• Problems Finding Individual Memories when Trauma was Daily
• EMDR Phase One: Are You Putting Your Complex Trauma Clients Through a Machine Built for Others (video) NEW

Phase Two

• Clients “Not Ready” vs Clients “Needing Preparation” for Reprocessing
• Clients who Struggle to Visualize (video)
• Introducing Mindfulness/Deep Breathing Using the “Dip Your Toe In” Approach
• Dip Your Toe into Breath: Hand Breathing and Blue Smoke Breathing
• Assessing for Embodiment: A Dip Your Toe In Body Scan (video demonstration)
• A Dip Your Toe in Approach to Sensory Grounding with Complex Trauma (NEW, script included)
• Understanding “Deep Breathing Doesn’t Work For Me” and Other Problems Resourcing
• Understanding Some Reasons Why Clients Need Attachment Figure Resources
• Developing and Using Attachment Figures in Attachment Wounding
• A Simple EMDR Checklist for Moving from Phase Two to Three
• When Good Resources Go Bad

Phases Three and Four

• How to Know When a Client is Prepared Enough to Start Processing Memories in EMDR Therapy? (video) NEW
• Why I Rarely Start with Attachment Would Targets (video) NEW
• When “Letting Things Go Where They Go” Goes Straight Off a Cliff
• Where Clients with Complex Trauma Tend to Get Stuck in Reprocessing and How to Use Interweaves NEW
• Effectively Managing Flashbacks in Sessions and Between Sessions (EMDR and Flash) (video)
• Mastering the Videotape Approach
• Understanding Why the SUDs May Not Be Decreasing
• Blocking Beliefs
• Overheating on the Memory Channel in Complex Trauma
• Why Some Clients Don’t Want to Do EMDR Therapy After Doing EMDR Therapy NEW
• The Problems of Too Much Agenda (video)
• Potential Blocks to Reprocessing: Trying to Figure Out the Trauma
• EMDR and Grief: An Overview (video)