Most people who have heard of EMDR know something about the eye movements.
What they may not know is that EMDR therapy is much bigger than the eye movements.
It is an eight-phase psychotherapy approach with a substantial evidence base for post-traumatic stress disorder, and a framework that can be adapted to different ages, presentations and clinical circumstances.
And that is where advanced EMDR training starts to matter.
Basic training teaches the architecture.
Advanced training teaches you how to stay oriented to that architecture when the person sitting in front of you brings something much more complicated than a single traumatic memory.
Complex trauma.
Attachment wounds.
Parts that want opposite things.
Neurodivergence.
OCD.
Addiction.
A child who doesn't communicate like an adult.
A parent whose own history becomes activated by their child's distress.
Or an experience that is still happening, rather than safely belonging to the past.
For me, advanced EMDR training hasn't been about collecting more protocols.
It has been about learning how to adapt without losing the foundations of the work.
What is EMDR therapy?
Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR) was developed by psychologist Dr Francine Shapiro.
EMDR uses an eight-phase treatment framework that includes history taking, preparation, assessment, processing, installation, body scan, closure and reevaluation.
During parts of EMDR processing, bilateral stimulation ~ often eye movements, tapping or tones ~ is used while the client attends to aspects of a distressing experience.
The treatment is informed by Shapiro's Adaptive Information Processing model, which proposes that disturbing experiences can remain insufficiently processed and continue to influence present emotions, beliefs, physical responses and behaviour.
You do not need to accept every proposed mechanism of EMDR as settled neuroscience to recognise that EMDR itself has developed a substantial clinical evidence base.
The World Health Organization includes EMDR among psychological interventions that should be considered for adults with PTSD.
A 2024 systematic review and individual-participant-data meta-analysis examining randomised controlled trials found no significant difference between EMDR and the other psychological treatments studied in PTSD symptom reduction, response, remission or treatment dropout.
So when I talk about going beyond standard EMDR, I don't mean moving beyond something inadequate.
I mean developing greater clinical flexibility within and around a well-established therapeutic framework.
Why does advanced EMDR training matter?
A protocol can tell you what comes next.
It cannot always tell you what this particular person needs from you in this particular moment.
That distinction matters.
A client may understand that they are safe now and still feel terrified.
They may desperately want to process a memory while another part of them does everything possible to stop the work.
They may have no single event to target because the trauma was relational, cumulative or developmental.
They may be neurodivergent and experience imagery, body awareness, communication or bilateral stimulation differently from what a standard script assumes.
Or the experience may not be over yet.
This is where advanced training has changed my practice most.
It has expanded the questions I can ask before deciding what we do next.
What is this response protecting?
Does this client need processing right now, or more preparation?
Are we dealing with a memory, an attachment wound, an obsession, an ongoing stressor, a part, or several of these at once?
Does the protocol need to adapt to the person rather than asking the person to adapt to the protocol?
The more EMDR training I have completed, the less interested I have become in forcing somebody neatly through a technique.
Relational-Integrative EMDR: when the relationship is part of the work
In June 2025, I completed Relational-Integrative EMDR Part 1 with SEVA Training.
This training shifted the lens from how do I apply EMDR correctly? toward a broader question:
What is happening within the client, within me as the therapist, and between us while this work unfolds?
SEVA Training describes Relational-Integrative EMDR as working within the standard EMDR framework while weaving together attachment-informed EMDR, parts work and somatic awareness.
Part 1 particularly deepened my work with relational trauma.
That matters because trauma does not always arrive as one terrible event with a clear beginning and end.
Sometimes it developed through relationship.
Being unseen.
Having to anticipate another person's mood.
Learning that love required compliance.
Becoming useful because useful felt safer than needy.
Discovering that boundaries threatened connection.
Becoming extraordinarily good at looking after everybody else.
When that is the material entering therapy, the therapeutic relationship itself matters.
Not because relationship replaces EMDR.
Because relationship is part of the context in which EMDR happens.
Parts work and EMDR: when one part wants healing and another says no
One of the most valuable things advanced training has given me is a different relationship with resistance.
I am less likely to ask:
Why won't this shift?
And more likely to wonder:
What might be trying to protect you here?
In November 2023, I completed training in IFS-Informed EMDR: Internal Family Systems Interweaves, and my later Relational-Integrative EMDR training further developed parts-informed work.
This matters because people rarely arrive in therapy as one perfectly unified voice.
One part of you may want to send the invoice.
Another may be terrified of being judged.
One part wants to rest.
Another believes that stopping is dangerous.
One part knows the relationship has ended.
Another is still waiting for the person to come back.
Parts-informed EMDR gives us another way of understanding those apparent contradictions.
Rather than treating a protective response as something standing in the way of therapy, we can become curious about why it is there.
Sometimes the part that appears to be blocking the work is the part that most needs to know it will not be overridden again.
Beyond the individual: intergenerational and collective trauma
In July 2026, I completed Relational-Integrative EMDR Part 2 with SEVA Training.
SEVA's Part 2 training extends its relational-integrative framework into intergenerational and collective trauma, including ancestral themes, dreams, introjects and spiritual or symbolic representations within a client's internal system.
This is an area where careful language matters.
There is growing scientific interest in how trauma and adversity can affect families across generations through psychological, relational, social and potentially biological pathways.
That does not mean we can look at an individual symptom and scientifically declare that an ancestor's trauma is stored inside the person's body.
For me, intergenerational work is broader and more curious than that.
What was handed down explicitly?
What was never spoken about?
What did the family learn about safety?
Money?
Gender?
Work?
Rest?
Need?
Belonging?
What role did this person inherit without ever consciously choosing it?
And what images, dreams, beliefs or bodily experiences carry meaning for them now?
The advanced framework gives me ways to explore these experiences without assuming that my interpretation is the correct one.
When trauma is recent or still happening
Trauma treatment becomes particularly complex when there hasn't yet been enough distance to say, it's over.
In January 2024, I completed 15 hours of advanced training in EMDR protocols for early intervention and ongoing traumatic stress.
This matters in work with people who have experienced recent events or whose exposure to distress may be continuing.
Research into early EMDR is promising, but the evidence needs nuance.
A 2024 systematic review and meta-analysis of EMDR following recent traumatic events identified 11 randomised controlled trials. The researchers found beneficial effects for post-traumatic symptoms immediately after treatment and at three-month follow-up, while also noting limitations including small studies and low study quality.
So early intervention is not simply standard EMDR delivered faster.
Timing matters.
Context matters.
Safety matters.
And whether the threat has actually ended matters.
Group EMDR: taking trauma treatment beyond one therapist and one client
In September 2024, I completed a 21-hour intensive EMDR Group Protocol Series, covering:
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G-TEP ~ the Group Traumatic Episode Protocol developed by Elan Shapiro
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C-GTEP ~ Ana Gómez's child adaptation
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the Parenting Wheel
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the Group Parent Empowerment Protocol (G-PEP)
Group EMDR protocols are particularly relevant when many people have been affected by a shared event or when individual therapy for everyone is simply not feasible.
The research here is encouraging.
A systematic review of group EMDR interventions included 22 studies involving 1,739 adults and children. Overall, the results suggested that group EMDR protocols may improve PTSD, depression and anxiety outcomes, although the researchers highlighted methodological limitations in the existing studies.
More recently, a randomised G-TEP study reported significant and sustained reductions in distress and associated impairment.
The protocols also extend beyond trauma processing alone.
Ana Gómez developed the C-GTEP adaptation for children as well as the Parenting Wheel and G-PEP. The Group Parent Empowerment Protocol brings concepts such as co-regulation, mirroring and reflective communication into parent-focused EMDR work.
That changed something important in how I think about treatment.
Sometimes helping a child means helping the system around the child become more resourced too.
Advanced EMDR with children: the protocol has to grow with the child
My advanced training with children has included EMDR for Kids, an EMDR Play Therapy and multimodal approach, C-GTEP, parent-focused protocols and Neurodiversity-Affirming EMDR Therapy for Autistic and ADHD Children through the EMDR Association of Australia.
Children are not simply smaller adults.
Their developmental stage matters.
Language matters.
Play matters.
Attachment matters.
Sensory needs matter.
And expecting a child to sit still, identify an adult-style cognition and participate in bilateral stimulation exactly as an adult might can miss the person sitting in front of you.
EMDR clinician and trainer Ana Gómez has been influential in extending EMDR into developmentally sensitive work with children.
Her Multimodal Integrative Approach to EMDR Therapy with Children maintains the eight phases of EMDR while incorporating developmental, attachment-informed and systemic principles. Gómez also developed C-GTEP, the Parenting Wheel and G-PEP.
For me, this is what advanced training should do.
Not abandon the model.
Make the model responsive enough to meet the client.
Neurodiversity-affirming EMDR: adaptation is not a failure of fidelity
My training in Neurodiversity-Affirming EMDR Therapy for Autistic and ADHD Children reinforced something I consider essential across all trauma work:
Different nervous systems communicate differently.
An autistic or ADHD client may experience sensory input, eye contact, imagery, interoception, communication, attention and emotional regulation differently.
That does not automatically make them resistant, avoidant or incapable of EMDR.
It may mean the therapy needs to adapt.
That could include changes to pacing, language, sensory demands, bilateral stimulation, preparation or how internal experiences are identified and communicated.
The question becomes less:
Why isn't the client doing EMDR properly?
And more:
What does EMDR need to look like for this person?
EMDR for OCD: when the target isn't simply a traumatic memory
In January 2024, I completed advanced training in The Distancing Technique: EMDR for OCD.
OCD presents a particular challenge because thoughts, sensations, images and urges can themselves become sources of threat.
The published Distancing Approach for OCD integrates EMDR principles with techniques designed to strengthen adaptive distance from obsessive thoughts and combines elements of EMDR with exposure and response prevention.
The research base for EMDR specifically for OCD is considerably less established than its evidence base for PTSD.
That distinction matters.
Advanced training should not encourage therapists to pretend a protocol has stronger evidence than it does.
It should help us understand where an approach may contribute, where established treatments remain important, and how to work responsibly at those edges.
The Flash Technique: another doorway into difficult memories
In 2023, I completed advanced training in the Flash Technique.
Flash was developed as a way of working with highly disturbing memories while requiring less sustained conscious engagement with the traumatic material than traditional trauma processing might involve.
Research is still developing, but there are encouraging findings.
A 2022 randomised controlled trial of the Flash Technique involving people who had experienced traffic accidents found significant improvements in several measures of traumatic stress, anxiety and psychological quality of life compared with a stress-management intervention.
The study was relatively small, and Flash has a much younger evidence base than standard EMDR.
Again, both things can be true.
An approach can be clinically promising without us needing to oversell the science.
EMDR and addiction: looking beneath the behaviour
In August 2023, I completed advanced training in EMDR Therapy: Addiction-Specific Protocols.
Addiction-focused work asks us to look beyond the idea that the problem is simply the substance or behaviour.
Trauma.
Triggers.
Craving.
Relief.
Shame.
Attachment.
Memory networks.
The anticipated feeling associated with using.
The experiences the behaviour helps somebody escape.
All can be relevant.
There is a growing evidence base here too.
A 2023 meta-analysis of EMDR for substance use disorder reviewed ten studies involving 561 participants and reported positive effects across several outcomes, including substance-use severity, treatment engagement and co-occurring post-traumatic and depressive symptoms, although effects on craving were less clear.
A newer 2025 meta-analysis has continued to examine both addiction-related and emotional outcomes.
EMDR for addiction is still a more specialised and developing application than EMDR for PTSD.
But it gives us another way of asking:
What is the behaviour doing for this person, and what experiences sit underneath the need for it?
What all this advanced EMDR training actually changes
Looking back across these trainings, what strikes me is that advanced EMDR has not made my work more complicated for the sake of complexity.
It has made me less rigid.
My EMDR training now spans:
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standard eight-phase EMDR
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complex and relational trauma
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attachment-informed and parts-informed EMDR
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intergenerational themes
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children and adolescents
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neurodivergence
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parent-child work
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group EMDR
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early intervention and ongoing traumatic stress
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OCD
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addiction
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the Flash Technique
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somatic and mindfulness-informed integration
But I don't sit with a client mentally scrolling through that list looking for something impressive to use.
Quite the opposite.
The more training I have completed, the more important one question has become:
What does this person need from me right now?
Sometimes that is processing.
Sometimes preparation, regulation and resourcing.
Sometimes a part needs to be heard before anything moves.
Sometimes we need to slow down.
Sometimes we need to adapt the bilateral stimulation.
Sometimes a parent needs support.
Sometimes the nervous system is saying not yet.
And sometimes what looks like a failure to process is useful clinical information.
Advanced EMDR doesn't mean more EMDR
This may be the most important thing I have learned.
Advanced EMDR does not mean doing more processing, going deeper faster or having a clever protocol for everything.
It means having more options and less need to force one.
SEVA Training describes its Relational-Integrative EMDR approach as moving beyond protocol into embodied, relational and whole-person trauma work while remaining within the standard EMDR framework.
That language resonates with how my own practice has developed.
Technique matters.
Training matters.
Evidence matters.
But the person sitting opposite me matters more than my desire to complete a protocol.
Advanced training has given me more ways to recognise complexity, more ways to adapt when something isn't fitting, and more confidence to stay present when the answer isn't immediately obvious.
That is what changes in the therapy room.
Not a more impressive version of EMDR.
A more responsive one.
Frequently asked questions about advanced EMDR therapy
What is Basic EMDR Training?
Basic EMDR Training is the foundational professional training that prepares qualified mental health practitioners to use the standard eight-phase EMDR therapy model in clinical practice.
My Basic Training was completed through the EMDR Institute. Their training pathway requires completion of Part 1 and Part 2 EMDR Institute Training, together with 10 hours of supervision with an EMDR Institute Approved Consultant, within a two-year period.
I completed Part 1 in March 2023, Part 2 in August 2023, and the full Basic Training requirements in October 2023. I subsequently became a Full Member of the EMDR Association of Australia.
The training provides the foundation for understanding EMDR case conceptualisation, preparation, target selection and the eight phases of EMDR treatment. Advanced EMDR training then builds on that foundation, developing additional skills for working with particular populations, presentations and more complex clinical needs.
Advanced EMDR doesn't replace Basic EMDR Training ~ it builds on it.
What is advanced EMDR therapy?
“Advanced EMDR” is not a separate therapy or formal universal level of EMDR treatment.
The phrase generally refers to additional professional training completed after foundational Basic EMDR training, allowing a therapist to develop skills for particular populations, presentations or integrative ways of working.
Is advanced EMDR different from standard EMDR?
The underlying EMDR framework remains important.
Advanced training may teach therapists how to adapt or extend their clinical work for presentations such as complex trauma, children, neurodivergence, OCD, addiction, groups, relational trauma or recent traumatic events.
The exact training and competencies vary between practitioners.
Is EMDR evidence-based?
Yes, particularly for PTSD.
The World Health Organization includes EMDR among recommended psychological interventions for PTSD, and EMDR has been investigated in numerous randomised trials and systematic reviews.
That does not mean every specialised EMDR protocol or integrative adaptation has the same amount of research behind it.
Can EMDR help with complex trauma?
EMDR can be used with people who have complex trauma histories, but treatment may require careful assessment, preparation, pacing and adaptation.
Complex trauma can involve attachment difficulties, dissociation, shame, emotional regulation difficulties and conflicting protective responses, so treatment should be individually planned rather than assuming one standard protocol will suit everybody.
What is Relational-Integrative EMDR?
Relational-Integrative EMDR, or RI-EMDR, is an advanced integrative framework developed by Michele Bowes and Amy English at SEVA Training.
It works within standard EMDR while incorporating relational, attachment-informed, parts-based and somatic perspectives. Its advanced training also explores intergenerational, symbolic and spiritual dimensions of experience.
These integrative elements should not be confused with the established evidence base for standard EMDR treatment of PTSD.
Do I need advanced EMDR rather than regular EMDR?
Not necessarily.
Many people can benefit from appropriately delivered standard EMDR.
Advanced training may become particularly relevant when your presentation involves additional complexity or when adaptations are needed.
What matters is not how many certificates a therapist has collected, but whether they have the competence, judgement and therapeutic relationship to understand what you need.
Wondering whether EMDR might fit your needs?
You do not need to know whether you need EMDR, BSP, parts work, somatic work or something else before you arrive.
That's part of my job.
My advanced training gives me options.
It doesn't require you to fit into them.
If you're a healthcare professional, therapist or practitioner carrying patterns that insight alone hasn't shifted, we can begin by understanding what is happening ~ and what your system may need next.
A 30-minute “Let's Connect” call gives you space to ask questions, share a little of what you're carrying and see whether working together feels right.
No pressure.
No need to arrive knowing the right therapy.
Just somewhere to begin.
