Specialized Training: EMDR and the Developmental Needs-Meeting Strategy

With my advanced education in several proven, leading-edge mind-body approaches, I am able to customize treatment to meet the specific needs of each individual. My role is active, facilitative and solution-oriented, not passive, controlling or directive.

My approach ventures beyond conventional psychotherapy in many ways. For one, it is less talk oriented, and more geared toward the right hemisphere of the brain, the seat of past experiences that dictate our present-day perceptions, feelings and behaviors. My approach is also more holistic in that it works not with symptoms but with the roots of old learning. I am able to assist you without having you do homework that requires a lifetime of self-management; instead, you change from the inside out.


EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing)

The most effective techniques that I practice are in the family of a newer approach known as EMDR.
EMDR allows for more efficient healing of emotional wounds, undesirable behaviors, emotional symptoms and psychological limitations. Over the past fifteen years, thousands of therapists across the USA have used EMDR with successful results in patients with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), depression, panic attacks and other conditions. EMDR has been approved as an effective treatment for PTSD by the American Psychological Association, American Psychiatric Association, The Department of Defense and the Veteran's Administration.

During EMDR, the therapist begins by helping the client to identify his or her strengths and inner resources. Then an issue is selected to target. The therapist obtains information about key components of that issue including the negative belief, emotions and body sensations that it elicits. The therapist then assists the client to identify earlier experiences in his or her life that shaped this reaction. The client then focuses on the experiences in a new way, allowing repressed thoughts and feelings about it to emerge, in the new context of their current inner strengths and resources.

The therapist facilitates this process using a tool that may be visual, auditory or kinesthetic, one that introduces a novel stimulus to the client's attention that shifts attention back and forth between the left and right sides of the body. This enables the brain to access information held in both hemispheres that is not easily accessible just by talking about past experiences. The dual awareness on the alternating external stimulus and on the client's internal experience accelerates the processing, relaxes the emotions, and reinforce the positive outcome. It produces a rapid shift in perspective, where new insights emerge and old stuck feelings and patterns are released.

In classical EMDR, the stimulus is continued until a memory is no longer disturbing and is associated with positive thoughts and beliefs about one's self; for example, "I'm a good-enough person." During the process, the client may experience intense emotions, but by the end of the session, most people report a great reduction in their level of disturbance.


DNMS (Developmental Needs-Meeting Strategy)

The Developmental Needs-Meeting Strategy (DNMS) is one variation that has developed out of EMDR. The DNMS integrates proven methods in an innovative manner and adds additional unique elements that make this approach far more effective than the vast majority of psychotherapeutic techniques. It is revolutionary to the field of psychotherapy. At this time, I am the only psychotherapist within the city of Los Angeles that offers this superbly effective therapy.

While EMDR desensitizes past wounds and traumas, the DNMS is more comprehensive. It fills in the gaps in childhood development to establish a strong inner core and foundation.

The process of true growth and healing does not require us to dwell in painful memories, just refer to them for key pieces of information. The Developmental Needs-Meeting Strategy method uses that information to construct new corrective healing experiences. In the process, your coping abilities strengthen, difficult emotions become easier to handle, and you enter into a more naturally capable, healthy, empowered state of being.

The DNMS also works at a deeper level of the mind than any other approach. The effect is to erase negative conditioning to a point as if it never occurred, and allow full integration of conflicting parts of self into one's higher essence. Unlike other therapies, the DNMS releases negative beliefs and reactions to the point that they can never reappear, even in another form. The DNMS offers the opportunity for you to transform into the most mature, capable, satisfied and peaceful person you have the potential to be, able to meet life's challenges with strength, stability and inner peace. To watch a 25-minute introductory slide presentation about the DNMS, click here.

Additional methods I may employ include Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT), Interactive Guided Imagery (IGI), communication training, Law of Attraction-based therapy, psychoeducation, supportive and cognitive-behavioral (CBT) therapies.