You can learn about Maggie’s upcoming training at: https://maggierobbins.net/training/8-phases-of-emdr-therapy-adapted-to-a-group-setting/
Multiple people/organizations train in G-TEP, ASSYST, and IGTP and you can easily find upcoming trainings by searching for them. If you are a trainer in these approaches and would like to be interviewed, please reach out: https://ThomasZimmerman.us
Thomas Zimmerman
Hi everyone. Welcome. I’m here with Maggie Robbins. We’re talking about EMDR in a group context. Maggie, I’m wondering if you would introduce yourself sure to everyone.
Maggie Robbins
I’m Maggie Robbins, I’m an LPC. I am in Colorado. I’ve been an EMDRIA Approved Consultant since 2020 and group therapist my entire career. So when I did basic training in 2009 my, you know, group experience and EMDR experience were kind of parallel, and then eventually they just started merging.
Thomas Zimmerman
Excellent, many EMDR therapists listening to this are gonna have no idea what EMDR even looks like in a group context. You kind of sketch that out broadly so that people even know what we’re what we’re talking about.
Maggie Robbins
Yeah, yeah. So what we what people mostly probably know about is providing in a crisis situation. So G-TEP or IGTP or ASSYST, or a lot of those protocols are really designed for a group the therapists who come to talk to me about that really have a trouble imagining what that might look like. So I’ve tried to help sketch that out.
Thomas Zimmerman
Yes, help us. So what… what might that look like in the in the assorted phases, yeah, or at least the way you do you know, the way that you conceptualize it and do it.
Maggie Robbins
Yeah. So my view is that we are all really lonely and isolated as a species in general right now. And COVID really brought that, you know, to our attention, that that was true. And then if we think about our our trauma clients, how much isolation, rejection, shame, almost every single EMDR target I’ve ever reprocessed has some element of that. And so bringing people together to start looking at their own history through this, the lens that this is really a collective experience, not an individual experience, starts to loosen things up right from the start. So, you know, so resourcing, for example, in a group format, that the group really becomes a resource. And so we no longer have to think about like bringing someone in or bringing a resource in. It’s right here in the present moment. The group is the resource, and we can install that in the moment when there’s a moment of connection, or a moment of resonance, or something like that. It’s right here in the here and now. So deepens that exponentially,
Thomas Zimmerman
Excellent. And then play that forward into like Phases Three and Four. What does that look like?
Maggie Robbins
Yeah. So I do use writing or prompts and things like that, since, again, there’s a whole bunch of people doing this at once, I do feel pretty… I like people to be well resourced and understanding their own processes if they’re in a group, because I can’t attend individually. And so if the group is the resource, and then they’re also doing their individual work, it’s like, how do we kind of toggle back and forth between that and so in Phase Three, for example, they’ll be writing prompts where they’re writing down their own experiences. And then when we move into reprocessing, that is more of an individual experience. And typically, there are themes that the group is bringing up together. So for example, I see a lot of HSPs. We all we all do highly sensitive persons, so they might come in with a collective experience of that. And then I think it’s helpful for the targets to come out of that collective experience, versus, again, kind of like randomly selecting targets out of their history, like, what is the group eliciting that we then reprocess
Is that… does that mean that there’s kind of, maybe even a shared energy in the room, kind of a shared resonance in the room? Yeah, okay, good. Can you say a little bit more about what that looks like? So, processing. Writing. I mean, are people sitting around the table tapping themselves, and then you’re doing checking in generally, and then they’re writing it down? Or how does this look like mechanistically?
Right. So I’ve experienced or experimented with G-TEP and IGTP, and as I’ve gone on, neither of those felt quite right to me for ongoing groups. So yes, there still is writing so similar to both of those that they’re using paper. They check in individually and document as we’re going and then at a couple points during the reprocessing I like to check in with the group as a whole and see where we’re at. But yes, in general, they are doing their own individual work at that point. And then at the end, I like to bring them back to the group and back to the collective resourcing, and people can share what’s coming up at that point and then making that a group experience again, that they can kind of ride the wave of each other’s positive adaptive material that’s coming up out of the reprocessing.
Thomas Zimmerman
Excellent. So the group processes may be a place for people to actually grow some of the adaptive information that may be needed. So if I didn’t get enough of something, I’m seeing someone else connect with that adaptive information. It may be enough of a rehearsal for me a few weeks later to be able to, you know, have enough for the difficult stuff to to connect with. Awesome.
Maggie Robbins
Yeah, yeah. So that’s in the earlier phases too, that the group is kind of, you know, resourcing each other.
Thomas Zimmerman
I’m I’m getting the sense, because one of the things that I’ve encountered with groups, just like throwing people together, we assume that people used to heal communally, you know, before, a long time ago. But one of the things I’ve learned, and just like putting like, Zoom groups together is that nobody knows each other, so that may not so it sounds like you’re spending time like growing group dynamic and letting people feel comfortable with the group process as a whole, so that the group can be grounding in a resource.
Maggie Robbins
Yeah. But EMDR phases also model the stages of group development. But in the earlier phases we are, we’re forming, right? Forming and norming and, you know, getting to know each other, sharing history. And then resourcing based on what’s coming up.
Thomas Zimmerman
Okay, excellent, good. What are some advantages in working this way?
Maggie Robbins
I think one of the most profound experiences I’ve had in one of my EMDR groups is that everyone was in resonance, and they’re, you know, all the heads start bobbing, and everyone’s feeling connected to each other. And someone looked around and, like, took it in, and she’s like, this is where shame comes to die.
Thomas Zimmerman
Beautiful.
Maggie Robbins
Right? So, yeah, like, really loosening those things that it can be like the stickiest pieces in individual EMDR therapy, like getting that to loosen up in a collective experience. And to your point that that is how we are meant to heal. My inspiration came after a flood in my area that was like a1000 year flood. So it impacted the entire state, and one city in particular was really collectively damaged, and the the road to them was was destroyed, and so I kept hearing stories from them, and I had this kind of, I don’t know, moment of inspiration where I was picturing the whole town together with story and movement and fire. And, you know, it felt like tribal.
Thomas Zimmerman
If people are interested in learning more about first… more about group processes generally, and then maybe more about what you do specifically, we can put links in the chat. But do you mind just giving a kind of an overview of what it would look like if people were interested in getting trained in group EMDR generally and specifically the way you do it.
Maggie Robbins
I do think I benefited from taking some of the trainings like G-TEP and IGTP and things like that. I think that was beneficial to me to get a kind of a baseline understanding. So those are out there and accessible. And then I have a three credit training on adapting all eight phases to ongoing therapeutic groups. So that’s on my website, which assuming we’ll put in the links.
Thomas Zimmerman
Absolutely, yep.
Maggie Robbins
And then I am working with a colleague to develop more of a general kind of group training, so that my website as well excellent group therapy is a big modality to learn. So, yeah,
Thomas Zimmerman
Absolutely excellent. Is there anything else that that you’d want people to know about group therapy, or in general?
Maggie Robbins
I think when people think of EMDR therapy in a group format, they immediately go to Phase Four, and they’re like, don’t know how I would do that. I can’t picture that the intensity of that. Like, I don’t think so. But that is not where I started, and that’s where,not where I would want people to start. Like, can you think of four clients on your caseload that kind of need each other, and to just start thinking about putting them together and doing some resourcing or some kind of collective experience, that we don’t have to jump to Phase Four, that EMDR is more than that.
Thomas Zimmerman
Yeah. And we also don’t have to jump to a worst case scenario of eight people struggling concurrently in group context exactly when, in fact, that may not be what the actual experience is. When people are well prepared and ready for this process,
Maggie Robbins
Exactly, and it doesn’t tend to happen. They keep each other. That resonance really does keep people stable through it, from what I’ve seen.
Thomas Zimmerman
Okay, excellent. Well, thank you. Thank you for your time, and thank you for being here. And I’ll have in chat ways that people can connect with the resources that we’ve talked about and connect to your to your upcoming training. So thank you for thank you for being here. It’s nice meeting you, and hopefully we can connect soon.
Maggie Robbins
Yeah, and thank you for your platform. You’re doing a lot for the community. Okay, thank you. Bye.
365 Questions About EMDR With Complex Trauma 