How often does it happen that in appearance a healthy and prosperous person becomes isolated, becomes aggressive or, conversely, falls into a state of absolute indifference to everything that is happening around. And who did not feel the pressure of impending depression? This is digging in oneself, disruptions to others for no particular reason, a feeling of endless loneliness, panic attacks or constant anxiety, loss of interest in life, low self-esteem and much more.
Problems?
But there are more serious psychological problems - the consequences of physical violence, childhood injuries, unhappy love, loss of loved ones, disaster, accident, humiliation, pressure and many other soul wounds. These injuries can not be cured by ointment, gypsum or plaster. It’s somehow not customary to talk about them with relatives and friends. And indeed in our country, it is considered almost indecent to engage in mental health. But if you want to improve your life, find peace and happiness, develop, learn how to achieve your goals and at the same time be in harmony with yourself and the world around you, you should start by solving your personal problems. Today there is a proven and effective psychological technique that can be used even at home alone without health risks and wasting time looking for a personal psychotherapist.
DPDG method (decryption)
F. Shapiro (USA) at the end of the twentieth century almost by accident developed and began to apply in his practice a method that helps people in difficult life situations. She called it "desensitization and eye movement processing." The essence of the method is to reduce the intensity of anxiety from stress due to the concentration of attention on the rhythmic movements of the eyeballs.
Interestingly, this approach to solving many psychological problems was originally built not on scientific assumptions, but rather arises from personal observations. The hard experience experienced by Francine Shapiro (cancer, shattered dreams, the loss of loved ones) and the accidentally found way out of stress led to the discovery of this technique. Assumptions about the reason for the effectiveness of the method appeared much later, after lengthy observations of patients and obtaining numerous positive results.
What is the method
During therapy, the psychiatrist makes movements with his hand (or pointer), which the patient must clearly monitor. When observing movements, it is necessary to immerse yourself in memories or imagine an alarming situation, mentally talk to yourself or a person with whom a conflict has arisen (the doctor controls the course of these thoughts, it all depends on the problem that needs to be solved). At first, the sensations are extremely unpleasant, but after about 30 minutes of the first session, the attacks of panic and fear come to an end and more positive thinking comes in place, everything suddenly falls into place, anger goes away and memories no longer bring such pain. To consolidate the result, the procedure is usually carried out several times.
Why does it work
The main hypothesis confirming why the method works is the idea that there is some kind of an unstudied mechanism for processing any incoming information. Stress, fear, pressure - all this knocks down this mechanism and prevents it from working fully. And the event that caused psychological trauma remains unprocessed or is not completely processed. Repeated eye movements magically improve the functioning of this system and mechanically force the psyche to process old information. After this procedure, the memories gradually fade, becoming neutral in color.
Since a person makes similar rapid eye movements only in a dream (during the REM sleep phase), it is suggested that it is this mechanism that in reality reproduces the DPDG method. Decryption of the reason can be any, the only important thing is that it really works.
Where to apply
Most often, the DPDG method is used for recovery after participating in hostilities, after violence, that is, for the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorders. I also often recommend using this type of psychotherapeutic effect to recover from physical trauma, to combat phobias, anxiety and obsessive states.
Russian doctor of DPD Kovalev recommends literature and video. This allows for mild disorders to conduct sessions at home. However, F. Shapiro herself strongly did not recommend conducting DPDG sessions on her own and considered it necessary to have a professional psychotherapist or psychologist.
Method Advantages
Speed is one of the main advantages. Typically, the number of sessions can be from 1 to 2 (in simple cases) to 6-16 (for severe and neglected situations). It should be noted that for the treatment of PTSD during regular psychotherapy sessions it is necessary to visit a doctor at least 6 times a week for at least 6 months, with possible prescription of medications.
The next plus is the lack of medication. There are no risks. In the worst case, the method simply will not bring results.
No patient resistance. Very often, the doctor has to "dig" the essence of the problem for a long time in ordinary sessions. If you use the method of DPDH, decoding the therapist is practically not required. During the monitoring of eye movements, the client is either silent and only mentally lives in the situation, or answers questions more relaxed and truthful, as part of the consciousness is occupied. Therefore, the patient does not have resistance and fear of a negative assessment by the therapist.
Another plus is the ability to conduct DPDG sessions on your own or with the help of friends and family.
Security
This is not hypnosis, the method does not affect the psyche in any way. Since the client is fully conscious and under the additional supervision of a doctor, something cannot go so easily. A patient can always stop a session if he is not ready to relive events today. And the therapist will definitely notice if the level of anxiety is too high, and will help to work on yourself more efficiently and quickly.
The whole procedure is carried out according to the protocol, it is honed and standardized by leading experts in the field of psychological counseling. This provides additional security and guarantees the result.
DPDG alone
Before you start a session at home without the help of a specialist, you must:
- create an atmosphere - remove everything superfluous and tune in to devote these 30-90 minutes to yourself;
- find a special video for working out eye movements (it’s more convenient if it is just a point moving along a certain amplitude on a dark screen);
- Before starting work, you need to remember in detail or imagine a situation, a person, fear or pain - everything that bothers today.
Then you can turn on the video and throughout the session carefully follow your eyes, without making head movements, for a point on the screen / pointer / pen cap. To think about an exciting situation, mentally ask yourself questions and look for answers, get angry if you want to, try to understand what really happened and that now it doesn’t threaten in any way, determine what goals are today and what needs to be done tomorrow to achieve them.
DPDG on its own is not so difficult. And although this technique is practically not used in our country and is not even included in the standards of treatment for PTSD, the experience of doctors in Israel, the USA, Great Britain, and numerous studies using magnetic resonance imaging prove its effectiveness and safety even for home use.