EQUINE ASSISTED EMDR THERAPY
Equine assisted, intensive trauma focused therapy.
Following my passion for both EMDR and clinically driven Animal Assisted Therapies, I travelled to Arizona to train in the EMDRIA accredited Equine Assisted EMDR therapy. Beyond the Clinic Room is the first UK provider of the EA-EMDR model.
This is clinically the same therapy as standard Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR) therapy but is adapted for working alongside horses.
You can find out more here about Equilateral Equine Assisted EMDR.
At Beyond the Clinic Room, Equine Assisted EMDR is offered as an intensive therapy model with different options for working together.
Why Equine Assisted EMDR?
Horses have a lot to teach us about regulating our nervous systems. If you watch horses closely, you will see that they tend to be 'relaxed and ready'. They are calm, they are settled, they are in the moment AND they are ready to respond to threat if needed. They will also settle down back to 'relaxed and ready' very quickly after responding to real or perceived threat.
If you have experienced trauma, you probably struggle to feel calm or connected to the present moment. It can feel like you are 'on alert' all the time. You might find that you have strong emotional and physiological responses in your day to day life - some triggers which you expect, and some which catch you by surprise. It can feel hard to trust others, especially in sharing your most distressing experiences. You might well have a strong sense of why things feel the way they do, but it hasn't helped things to change.
We know that being with outdoors with horses can help us towards a feeling of safety and connection, soothing and regulating our nervous systems. Horses can help us reconnect with our self-belief and confidence, showing us parts of ourselves that we have forgotten. They can help us reconnect with our mind, body and the present.
At Beyond the Clinic Room, we focus on helping you and the horses feel safe together. Together we learn how the horses may be feeling, and what they need from us and others. Relationships are built on mutual trust, compassion and understanding. We know that many people with experiences of trauma have experienced their boundaries and feelings being disregarded - so at Beyond the Clinic Room we hear and respect the horses boundaries and emotional needs, and in turn, feel help you feel safe enough to re-discover and trust your own. Re-writing these experiences of relationships is incredibly powerful.
Beyond the Clinic Room offers Equine Assisted EMDR as an intensive package. This is still very much adherent to the evidence based EMDR model, but working alongside the therapeutic power of horses.
