EMDR FORUM ARCHIVE, 2000
Sensations
Jenca · 10/04/03 at 8:33 PM ET
I'm 31 and have been diagnosed with PTSD, Depression, Anxiety w/o agoraphobia, borderline personality traits (cutting), and Conversion Disorder which manefests as blindness. I have battled racing thoughts, extreme muscle tention, flashbacks, nightmares, and have built fortress like defence mechanisms over the years to protect myself from feeling vulnerable. Depression, and anxiety have been constant struggles as well, with the anxiety recently (over the past 3 years) starting to manifest itself as panic attacks. The Conversion Disorder was diagnosed about 2.5 years ago, during the time prior to the diagnosis of Conversion Disorder, my vision seemed to be blacking out in chunks, which eventually resulted in total blindness which lasted about 2 months. Since then, my vision has returned and I have longer periods of normal vision between what I call "bad eye days" where I see only pitch black (all possible medical causes have been ruled out). My list of battles goes on. Any way, I just started EMDR therapy within the past few weeks and have had 3 sessions so far. I'm noticing some really positive results already. My racing mind has slowed dow to where I'm able to actually think about one thing at a time without having 15 other thoughts interupting me (kinda redfined multi-tasking when it came to my racing thoughts). I've also noticed that my muscles don't feel as tense as they did before starting EMDR, and I'm able to journal more in depth then I could before. I'm also sleeping a little better and feeling rested the next morning which I don't ever recall feeling as far back as I can remember. I'm experiencing emotions that I don't understand, but my therapist and I agree that it is probably because I wasn't "allowed" to experience them as a kid and had learned at an early age to ignore them thus creating a kid of ignorance when it comes to putting the right label on the feeling. One thing I've noticed that sort of concerns me is that when I read text I find that I begin to feel the same physical numbness which my therapist and I believe is probably actually an emotional defence mechanism I developed that manifests itself as a physical symptom, along the same lines as my conversion blindness. I'm also finding that it takes me a couple days to regroup after an EMDR session. Not that I'm a total mess or anything like that, it's more that I'm finding myself to be totally exhaughsted both pysically and mentally that I feel like I need extra sleep for the next couple days. By the 3rd day after a session, I'm back to my normal energy level and am actually feeling more refreshed then usual. Another thing I'm noticing is that during my recovery "phase" after an EMDR session, I've been experiencing an increase in Conversion symptoms (i.e. "flickering" vision where I go from seeing to not seeing for a few seconds and back to seeing). The increase in conversion symptoms doesn't really have me alarmed since I know that it is triggered by stress of any kind, and that during an EMDR session, I find myself re-experiencing some very intense emotions. Is it a normal thing to experience similar sensations as a result of eye movements associated with reading as those experienced during and immediately after an EMDR session? Should this be something I should be concerned about? Also, has there been any research done on the effects of EMDR on Conversion Disorders? Information on Conversion Disorders seems to be as rare as the diagnosis, and I was curious to know if anyone had any comments regarding EMDR and Conversion Disorders. - Jenca
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