Approved for 3 EMDRIA Credits

This workshop will explore how play therapy and EMDR can “play well together” using experiential exercises, cases and discussion of the theoretical and practical integration of EMDR in a prescriptive play therapy setting with children 8 and under. Trauma informed prescriptive play therapists guide play in the avenues which will support establishment of emotional safety, improved regulation and “digestion” of the sensory, somatic and thematic elements of the traumatic experiences of the child. Integrating play therapy with Francine Shapiro’s Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model with a flexible approach to the EMDR protocol holds promise in using play to enter the memory network and promote healing. This integrative workshop will elaborate on the concept that using the core therapeutic powers of play is the preferred avenue to access and reprocess with EMDR the implicit memories involved so often in complex trauma in children.  This session will be practical and experiential and include options for using storytelling, art, and the child’s own post-traumatic play metaphors as the safe space for EMDR processing, as well as how to integrate caregivers into the work. This event will be simultaneously live streamed.

Presenter: Ann Beckley-Forest