On Becoming EMDR Certified

After you become EMDR trained, the next step is to become EMDR Certified.

The EMDRIA guidelines are here:  https://www.emdria.org/emdr-training/emdr-certification-2/ and you can read through that.  Basically, Certification requires an additional 20 hours of consultation, and a 12 hour advanced workshop in any of the EMDRIA approved workshops.  You’ll need a letter of recommendation from your consultant, and another letter or two from mental health professionals that can vouch for you as a therapist.  I think that’s it.

The next step, or maybe first step, is to find an EMDRIA approved consultant.  You can find one on the EMDRIA website in their therapist search function, and we have several on the CompassionWorks website homepage.  It’s probably a good idea to find a consultant that works with a similar client population as yours, and someone you can feel comfortable with getting feedback.   You can also ask in the CompassionWorks EMDR Therapist facebook group for a consultant.  If you had a trainer you liked in a training, then I’d go with that.

I think the most important first step is to learn to do the protocol correctly.  Getting a good picture and NC, effective processing and knowing when to go back to target are important.  That requires having the consultant hear you doing the protocol with a client (recordings) and then giving feedback.  Recordings should be done at the beginning of the 20 hours of consultation, not at the end; however, consultants do it however they do it.

The EMDR Standard protocol is the foundation of EMDR so you want to know that you’re  doing it in a manner that is processing the neural networks effectively.   Everything you’re doing is based on the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model and your consultant should be able to help you understand what you’re doing in those terms.

It’s been my experience, that many clinicians can talk about EMDR and what they’re doing and seem like they  know what they’re talking about, but when I’d hear recordings of what they were doing, their method showed they didn’t really get it.  Sometimes I could help them correct it and improve and sometimes not.  If you have a consultant who isn’t asking for recordings up front, then I’d question the value in working with them, but, then again, many don’t.

You can meet with your consultant once or twice a month, depending on your number of clients and how it goes.  That helps spread out the cost and gives  you a chance to implement what you’re learning.

You can include 10 hours of group consultation if you can find a group and think it will be helpful.  Such groups  can be found on the CompassionWorks EMDR Therapists Facebook group.  I did a group of about five people over a few months for their 10 hours, and then when I worked with some of them individually, I realized they really didn’t understand what they were doing.   From that I’ve decided that groups for certification aren’t of much value.

You can also do 15 or so hours with a Consultant in Training.   Sometimes they charge less.

I don’t do consultations because I turn into a person even I don’t like.  However, I was the consultant for many of our trainers and they survived and are doing great!  The consultee clients who had the most difficult time with me were the ones who assured me they wanted someone who would tell it to them straight.  Turns out they didn’t.

Consultants who stress doing the safe calm place and Resource Development Installation (RDI) are good and that’s important.  However, in my opinion, that comes after learning the standard protocol, although maybe not.