Two proven, evidence-based approaches to trauma healing—working together to address both how the mind processes distressing experiences and how trauma lives in the body.
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Our clinicians at Strengthening Families are trained in both EMDR and Accelerated Resolution Therapy and bring these approaches to their work with individuals and families navigating trauma, attachment disruption, and distressing life experiences. Sessions are paced carefully to ensure you feel safe and in control throughout the process.
Some experiences leave a mark that talk therapy alone struggles to reach. Trauma, acute stress, grief, and deeply distressing events can become lodged in the nervous system in ways that continue to affect daily life long after the event itself has passed—showing up as anxiety, hypervigilance, intrusive memories, emotional overwhelm, or a persistent sense that something is wrong even when life looks fine on the surface.
At Strengthening Families, our clinicians are trained in both EMDR and Accelerated Resolution Therapy and bring these approaches to their work with individuals and families navigating trauma, attachment disruption, and distressing life experiences. While these two modalities are complementary and frequently used together, they work in meaningfully different ways, and understanding the difference can help you know what to expect.
EMDR, which stands for Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, targets the way a specific memory is stored in the nervous system. Rather than requiring clients to talk through their experiences in detail, EMDR uses bilateral stimulation—typically guided eye movements—while the client holds a distressing memory in mind. Over the course of treatment, memories that once triggered intense emotional or physical reactions lose their charge, becoming integrated into the past where they belong rather than feeling present and threatening. EMDR focuses on how the mind processes a traumatic event.
Accelerated Resolution Therapy, or ART, approaches trauma from a different angle, focusing specifically on how a traumatic experience has settled in the body. Where EMDR works through the cognitive and emotional processing of a memory, ART uses imagery and voluntary eye movements to help clients change the way distressing images and physical sensations are stored and experienced. ART is particularly well suited to clients who prefer not to verbalize the details of their experience, and often achieves meaningful relief in fewer sessions than traditional approaches. Together, EMDR and ART give families and individuals access to some of the most effective trauma-processing tools available, delivered within a warm, carefully paced therapeutic relationship.
EMDR and ART can sound unfamiliar—even a little mysterious—to people who haven't encountered them before. These answers cover the questions we hear most often, so you can approach your first session with clarity and confidence. Still have questions? Reach out and we'll be happy to talk it through.
EMDR is a well-researched, widely used therapy considered safe and effective by major mental health organizations including the World Health Organization and the American Psychological Association. While the process does involve briefly bringing distressing memories to mind, it is carefully structured so that clients remain grounded and in control throughout. You will not be asked to recount your experience in detail, and sessions are paced according to your readiness and comfort.
Both EMDR and ART are evidence-based trauma therapies that use bilateral eye movements, but they address trauma from different angles. EMDR focuses on how the mind processes a traumatic memory—helping the brain reprocess a stuck event so it loses its emotional charge. ART focuses on how trauma has settled in the body — working with the physical sensations, images, and somatic responses that distressing experiences leave behind. Many clients benefit from both approaches used in combination, and our clinicians draw on whichever modality best fits what a client is experiencing at any given point in treatment.
It varies depending on the nature and complexity of what is being addressed. A single, isolated traumatic event may resolve in as few as three to six sessions. Complex or developmental trauma—particularly trauma that occurred in childhood or over an extended period—typically requires a longer course of treatment. The first phase of EMDR and ART involves history-taking and stabilization before any reprocessing begins, giving both client and therapist a clearer picture of the road ahead.
es. Both approaches have been adapted effectively for use with children and adolescents, and at Strengthening Families our clinicians are specially trained in using these modalities with younger clients. Work with children is typically very play-based, using age-appropriate tools that make bilateral stimulation feel natural and engaging rather than clinical. Examples include sand trays, splat balls, and sword fighting—activities that keep a child regulated and present while the therapeutic work happens through the play itself. Parent involvement is typically encouraged as part of the process, and sessions are adapted to meet each child where they are developmentally.
