Parnell at last officially legit in the UK…

At last, some rather good and very-long-awaited news, from the EMDR UK-and-Ireland’s annual Consultants Day in London on November 16 2019.

Laurel Parnell, her Modified Protocol, and Attachment-Focused EMDR are now, officially and publicly, accepted as legitimate, mainstream EMDR.

No need for a long exposition here. Most of those in our network know the history.

Suffice it to say that, when asked at the Consultants Day for thoughts on the position now of Laurel Parnell and Attachment-Focused EMDR and her Modified Protocol, Marian Tobin on behalf of the Association’s Accreditation Committee observed simply that Laurel does have official Association CPD points, (which I might note here that, briefly at the height of our difficulties, was not always the case...), so there's no issue.

EMDR in Romania – A Personal Story

As an enthusiast for Attachment-Focused EMDR, and after a spell on the very AF-EMDR-friendly Steering Group of the EMDR Association’s East-Anglia Regional Group, I was asked by EMDR Focus to summarise some EMDR-related findings in Romania, where I’ve just spent several months.

For background, I was for a time married to a Romanian, and we have a son whose departure to University last October meant there was time for a sabbatical, and a retracing of my steps back to Romania.

Intergenerational Trauma: Healing the Past to Heal the Present

Half-way through a demonstration session at an Attachment-Focused
EMDR (AF-EMDR) workshop in London last year, it was becoming clear that my volunteer client and I were getting worryingly stuck.

We’d identified where George was being triggered in his present life – a row with his partner – and we’d bridged efficiently to him
sitting alone and forlorn on the kitchen floor at the age of four or so, as his mother, her back turned, busied herself at the sink.

As she had always done.

Attachment-Focused EMDR for Addiction, a two-day practical workshop with Dr Laurel Parnell

London Mon-Tue Sept 16-17 2019 - Healing Relational Trauma and Rewiring the Addicted Brain with EMDR. £295 – CPD points applied for.

Very last minute (see below…), we’re delighted to welcome Dr Parnell for her first workshop in Europe focusing on the ideas in her her new book for EMDR with addictions Rewiring the Addicted Brain.

We’re not yet settled on a venue, but it will be in central London, and this will be of interest not just to colleagues already trained in Laurel’s Attachment-Focused approach to EMDR, but newbies too.

Through lecture, slides, and videos of live client sessions, and LOTS of discussion and As, you’ll learn how to integrate an attachment-focused, brain-wise approach into treating clients with addictions and dysfunctional behaviours, as well as practical tools you will be able to use immediately with your clients.

Trauma, Psychotherapy, EMDR – and being a Mum

Forget books on parenting, I get the best mummying advice in the world from my patients.

Because almost all of them are healing wounds from their mothers.

I had my first child before I worked on myself and before I trained in this line of work. I suffered from post natal depression, felt like my world had imploded - I remember driving home from the hospital - terrified of going home with this little baby, and wanting to scream out of the window at people walking in the street “how can you be getting on with your lives like nothing has happened, can’t you see the world has changed???!”

Such a difficult time. My husband at the time was working and hardly ever home, my family lived miles away, and I felt so ashamed of the fact that I found this new baby stuff so hard, I simply felt I couldn’t reach out to any friends. I felt isolated, alone, and very, very, low.

Tartan Patterns and Porcelain Ducks: Intuitive EMDR in action

Thanks to Rachael Ward for sharing the following touching client story, inspired by training in September with Laurel Parnell in London in the Attachment-Focused approach to EMDR. (Names and identifying details have been changed.)

I loved the AF approach and one of the reasons is that it has validated some of the things I was instinctively doing, but feeling 'bad' for doing them as it was against standard protocol.

One such case was a young woman I saw seven years ago as a client of a Mental Health Service.

She had a diagnosis of NEAD (non epileptic attack disorder) and was suicidal due to the impact it was having in her life.

The Neurologist had done all he could for her and she had received CBT, Psychodynamic therapy and a raft of other interventions that had been unsuccessful at helping reduce the 20+ seizures a day.

Parnell in London Sept 2018

t's been a bit of a journey getting here, but with three annual London (and York) events with Laurel Parnell behind us now, and the first successful outings this year of Mark Brayne's Unleash your EMDR: Release the Magic weekend courses, we now have in place a rich supporting array of trainings to get your advanced EMDR practice truly up and running.

At the top of this post a cheerful picture of our EMDR Focus Facilitator team, with Laurel at the heart and positioned in front of the Mary Ward House Conference Centre where 45 plucky trainees enjoyed three autumn days being inspired by Laurel's approach to Attachment-Focused EMDR, with daily live demos and a lot of learning.

And, the enthusiasm for this training is now particularly reassuring, with as many colleagues on the waiting list as were able to attend, highlighting how Laurel's approach is being increasingly accepted as mainstream EMDR, entirely in accordance with the Standard Protocol as we call it, and turbo-charging work especially with more complex clients.

Some thoughts on Francine Shapiro’s new, 3rd edition EMDR manual.

I’m curious how the EMDR Europe and UK communities will respond to Francine Shapiro’s new, third edition manual of EMDR.

I’ve just finished reading it, on Kindle, and as someone interested especially in the Attachment-Focused approach to EMDR, have a number of points it would be good to see discussed:

First, most importantly, I wonder what status this book has in the practice, training, supervision and research of EMDR?

Francine Shapiro is the originator of EMDR, and directs the EMDR Institute in the US, a commercial training operation alongside others under the accrediting umbrella of EMDRIA. But to what extent are we in Europe as accredited Consultants, Practitioners (and Trainers) bound by its recommendations, or instructions if that is what they are?

To what extent are the revised recommendations in this important handbook based on new (or old) research?

Facilitator Training in preparation for September 2018

Gearing up for Laurel Parnell's September trainings in the UK in her attachment-focused EMDR model, we've had a first-class day in London in partnership with Laurel's West Coast colleague Alison Teal preparing our team of AF-EMDR facilitators for the trainings in York and London.

(Photo: AF-EMDR Trainee Facilitator team, London April 9 2017 - from l to r: Iram Shah, Mel Temple, Alison Teal, Jutta Brayne, Annabel McGoldrick, Mark Brayne, Jayne Averill-Smith, James Thomas, Joe Kearney, Gerry Virgo, Shawn Katz.)

With commercial EMDR trainers in the UK focusing their efforts and marketing largely on basic training, and with other senior EMDR folk and regional groups offering only sporadic weekends of CPD, there's a real need in the UK for post-basic training that equips therapists to use EMDR with more complex client presentations.

And that's the gap we at EMDR Focus are aiming at least to begin to address, in partnership with the Parnell Institute in the US.

Unleashing the Magic of EMDR – London, CCPE, April 7/8 2018

With a small but select cohort of Attachment-Focused EMDR enthusiasts, a rich and rewarding time was had by all as on the first post-Easter weekend we launched the first of EMDR Focus's new two-day workshops delivering intense and practical skills training in using EMDR with the most complex clients.

As far as we know, practical and supervised coaching sessions, in the UK at least, are offered only during Parts 1 to 3 of EMDR basic training.

So, drawing generously on the inspiration of Dr Laurel Parnell in the US, our workshop gave experienced EMDR therapists a unique (literally!) opportunity to try out new skills on themselves and each other - for real and with full-length sessions supervised and coached by our new EMDR Focus facilitator support team.

The feedback has been most gratifying - and here are a few quotes to illustrate.