EMDR and The Art of Psychotherapy With Children

Book excerpt: "...[This book contains] invaluable material for the child therapist with varied theoretical backgrounds to more confidently apply EMDR to children." -- Frances Klaff, for Journal of EMDR Practice and Research, Volume 3, Number 3, 2009 In this book the authors present an overview of how therapists can get started in conceptualizing psychotherapy with Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) methodology through Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) theory. The focus of the book is to teach therapists to effectively use the entire EMDR protocol with young children. The first chapter provides a comprehensive overview of how to get started with EMDR after completing basic training. The book continues with chapters that detail the basic skills in using EMDR with children and then transitions to more advanced skills in using EMDR with children with specific diagnosis and presenting issues. They follow with a chapter summarizing the published evidence to date supporting the practice of EMDR with children. Data is then incorporated into a chapter summarizing their research on EMDR with young children in order to provide evidence of therapists' ability to adhere to the EMDR protocol with children, and to document their research findings about training therapists to use EMDR with children. Finally, they conclude the book with goals for the future of EMDR with children while encouraging therapists to consider conducting research in order to compel the practice of EMDR with children into the mainstream of child psychotherapy. It is a major task of the book to inspire therapists to begin thinking about conducting research and how important research is to therapists in order to validate and advance the practice of psychotherapy. In the end, the most significant goal of this book is to provide best practice for children who are in need of expert psychotherapy in order to change the trajectory of their lives. The hope is to provide guidance and support to therapists in order to launch them in their practice of EMDR. This is the art of treating children with EMDR.