Chartered Counselling Psychologist
EMDR Consultant | IFS & Sensorimotor Psychotherapist
Deep Healing, Self-Discovery and Meaningful Transformation
A compassionate space for healing trauma, reconnecting with yourself, and discovering a more authentic way of living.
Kristina Sandström
Chartered Counselling Psychologist
EMDR Consultant | IFS & Sensorimotor Psychotherapist
Deep Healing, Self-Discovery and Meaningful Transformation
A compassionate space for healing trauma, reconnecting with yourself, and discovering a more authentic way of living.
What Is Attachment-Informed EMDR?
Standard EMDR is a highly effective therapy for helping the brain process traumatic memories.
However, many people do not have one clearly identifiable traumatic event. Instead, their difficulties have developed through repeated experiences over time – such as emotional neglect, inconsistent caregiving, criticism, feeling unseen, or growing up in an environment where they had to adapt in order to feel safe, accepted, or loved.
Attachment-Informed EMDR builds upon the standard EMDR approach by recognising the lasting impact of these early developmental experiences. Rather than focusing only on individual memories, it helps us understand how those experiences continue to influence the way we relate to ourselves, others, and the world today.
Rather than beginning with a specific memory, we begin with what is challenging in your life right now.
Rather than seeing these reactions as signs that something is wrong with you, we see them as valuable clues.
Often, it is the ordinary moments of everyday life that feel the most confusing or distressing. A disagreement with your partner, receiving feedback at work, someone not replying to a message, or feeling left out may trigger emotions that seem overwhelming or difficult to understand. You may notice intense anxiety, shame, anger, or fear, together with physical sensations such as a tight chest, a knot in your stomach, or an urge to withdraw, please others, or defend yourself.
Many people begin to wonder whether something is wrong with them, or why they react so strongly to situations that seem relatively minor. In reality, these reactions are often triggered because something in the present has activated an earlier memory network. It can be as though an everyday experience acts like a password, unlocking old emotions, beliefs, and bodily responses that were formed much earlier in life.
Rather than seeing these reactions as signs that something is wrong with you, we see them as valuable clues. Together, we use these present-day emotional and bodily responses to trace back to the earlier experiences that lie at the root of your current distress. Once these root memories have been identified, we use Attachment-Informed EMDR to process and integrate them. As these experiences are healed, the present-day triggers gradually lose their emotional intensity, allowing you to respond to life with greater freedom, flexibility, and ease.