EMDR Therapy in Los Angeles
Trauma therapy for the experiences that still feel stuck — including relational trauma, reproductive trauma, and overwhelming life events.
What EMDR Looks Like in Our Practice
At Her Space, we don’t use EMDR as a rigid protocol we simply “do” to you. We use it as part of a collaborative trauma therapy process that helps us understand what’s getting activated, where it comes from, and how to work with it in a way that actually fits you.
Sometimes clients come in with a clear trauma they want help processing, like a traumatic birth, sexual trauma, medical trauma, or another overwhelming event. Other times, the work is more layered. You may not have one obvious memory, but you can feel that something from the past is still shaping how you respond now.
We use EMDR in a relational, attachment-aware way and often integrate it with parts work and somatic therapy. That means we’re not only paying attention to the memory itself. We’re also paying attention to what happens in your body, what younger or protective parts of you show up, and what helps you stay grounded enough to do meaningful trauma work without feeling pushed past your limits.
Most clients don’t come in with just one trauma. Sometimes there is one obvious event. But often there are also years of relational wounds underneath it: emotional neglect, inconsistent caregiving, chronic criticism, early abuse, religious trauma, or simply growing up feeling like your needs were too much or you had to hold everything together on your own.
That matters, because trauma is not only about what happened. It’s also about what was missing, what you had to do to survive, and what younger parts of you may still be carrying now. There’s structure to EMDR, but there’s also an art to using it well. We follow your lead closely, stay collaborative throughout the process, and adapt the work to the person in front of us rather than forcing a one-size-fits-all approach.
Trauma Therapy for What Still Feels Stuck
Sometimes trauma doesn’t show up as a clear memory you think about every day. Sometimes it shows up as anxiety that won’t turn off, a body that reacts before your mind can catch up, perfectionism you can’t relax out of, or a sense that you’re stuck in patterns that don’t match your life now. You may know a situation “shouldn’t” feel this intense, but your body still goes into panic, shutdown, anger, shame, or overwhelm. You may understand where it comes from and still feel unable to change it.
At Her Space, we often work with clients who are functioning on the outside but exhausted on the inside. They’re doing their best to keep up with work, relationships, parenting, and daily life, while privately feeling anxious, reactive, disconnected, or deeply hard on themselves. Often, the issue isn’t that you’re broken. It’s that your nervous system learned something during a painful, overwhelming, or emotionally unmet experience, and part of you is still responding as if that old moment is still happening now.
That’s where EMDR can help. We use EMDR therapy in Los Angeles to help clients process what still feels stuck, so the past has less power over the present.
EMDR May Be a Good Fit If…
You keep getting triggered in ways that feel bigger than the present moment.
You understand your patterns intellectually, but insight hasn’t led to real change.
You’ve been through a distressing experience that still feels unresolved in your body or nervous system.
You want trauma work that goes deeper than coping skills alone and is paced carefully and collaboratively.
What EMDR Sessions Can Feel Like
EMDR is meaningful work, and it can feel intense. A lot can move in a relatively short amount of time. Clients often notice waves of emotion, body sensations, unexpected memories, grief, relief, or insights they didn’t expect.
One of the things we love about EMDR is that it can help something shift beyond insight alone. Clients may have logically known, I wasn’t responsible for that, or I know I’m worthy, for a long time. EMDR can help those truths land more deeply — not just as an idea, but as something they can actually feel in their body.
Clients often say things like:
“I didn’t realize how much that was still affecting me.”
“It doesn’t feel as charged as it used to.”
“I can think about it now without feeling completely taken over.”
EMDR can be tiring, emotional, and vulnerable at times. But you do not have to do that work alone. Our job is to help create enough safety, steadiness, and support for the process to feel meaningful and manageable.
Who EMDR Tends to Help in Our Practice
We use EMDR with clients navigating a range of trauma experiences, including:
Reproductive and perinatal trauma, including birth trauma, fertility challenges, miscarriage, abortion, pregnancy loss, infant loss, and postpartum experiences that felt frightening, overwhelming, or deeply different from what you expected
Childhood, relational, and complex trauma, including emotional neglect, emotionally immature caregivers, perfectionism, people-pleasing, narcissistic abuse, religious trauma, and the impact of growing up without enough safety, attunement, or support
Acute trauma, including sexual trauma, medical trauma, accidents, sudden loss, and other overwhelming experiences that still feel active in the present
No matter what kind of trauma brings someone in, the question is often the same: What is still getting activated now, and what does your system need in order to feel less stuck?
EMDR May Not Be the Right Starting Place If…
You want a therapist to lead the entire process while you stay mostly passive.
You’re looking only for short-term coping tools without exploring the deeper roots of what’s happening.
Your life feels so unstable right now that trauma reprocessing would likely be overwhelming, and you need stabilization and support first.
You’re not open to slowing down enough to notice emotions, body sensations, and the protective patterns that show up around trauma.
Part of our job is helping you figure out whether EMDR is the right fit for where you are right now — not pushing you into a modality before it makes sense.
Meet Our EMDR Therapists
Paulina helps women, parents, and BIPOC clients process trauma, identity stress, and life transitions with warmth, cultural attunement, and deep compassion. Her EMDR work is especially supportive for clients navigating perinatal trauma, anxiety, and the lasting impact of experiences that can leave you feeling disconnected from yourself.
Lyla offers EMDR therapy for women who may look high-functioning on the outside but feel anxious, overwhelmed, or stuck underneath the surface. With a holistic, mind-body approach, she helps clients work through attachment wounds, perfectionism, body image concerns, and trauma so they can feel more grounded, connected, and authentic.
Cyla is a trauma specialist and certified perinatal therapist who uses EMDR to help women and parents heal from overwhelming experiences, painful life transitions, and trauma held in both the mind and body. Her approach is warm, depth-oriented, and affirming, with particular expertise in perinatal trauma, neurodivergence, and complex trauma.
Why We Trust EMDR — and How We Use It
EMDR is a well-established, evidence-based trauma treatment with strong support for trauma-related symptoms, especially PTSD. At Her Space, all of our therapists who offer EMDR have completed formal EMDR training, and our work is informed by ongoing consultation, trauma training, and a relational, attachment-aware lens.
Cyla Fisk, LMFT, PMH-C, founder of Her Space Therapy Los Angeles, was trained in Attachment-Focused EMDR through the Parnell Institute, and that perspective helps shape how EMDR is practiced across the group: with collaboration, pacing, developmental awareness, and respect for the whole person rather than just the symptom in front of us.
If you’re looking for EMDR therapy in Los Angeles and want trauma work that feels intentional, relational, and grounded, we’d be glad to talk with you about whether Her Space is the right fit.
Frequently Asked Questions About EMDR
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EMDR may be a good fit if you keep getting triggered in ways that feel bigger than the present moment, or if you understand your patterns intellectually but still feel stuck in them. Many people we work with are high-functioning on the outside but privately dealing with anxiety, shame, overwhelm, perfectionism, or trauma responses that don’t seem to match their life now. You do not need to have one “big” trauma or a perfect explanation for why something still affects you. Part of our job is helping you figure out whether EMDR makes sense for where you are right now, rather than pushing you into a modality before it feels like the right fit.
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We use EMDR therapy to help clients process experiences that still feel stuck in the present, including relational trauma, reproductive and perinatal trauma, acute trauma, and overwhelming life events. EMDR can be helpful when trauma shows up as anxiety, panic, shame, people-pleasing, perfectionism, emotional reactivity, shutdown, or a body that feels like it is still bracing for something. In our practice, we often use EMDR with clients working through birth trauma, pregnancy loss, childhood emotional neglect, narcissistic abuse, sexual trauma, medical trauma, and other experiences that continue to shape how they feel, relate, or cope. The goal is not just insight, but helping the past feel less charged so you can move through the present with more steadiness and choice.
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No — you do not have to tell the full story of a painful experience in detail for EMDR to be effective. EMDR is a structured therapy process, but we use it in a collaborative and flexible way that starts with getting to know your history, understanding what feels activated now, and building enough safety and grounding before moving into deeper trauma work. During reprocessing, we different forms of bilateral stimulation while helping you notice what comes up emotionally, physically, and internally. We move at a pace that fits you, rather than forcing a one-size-fits-all process.
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Yes — you do not need a perfectly clear memory or a neatly organized trauma story in order for therapy to be helpful. Sometimes trauma shows up more as anxiety, body sensations, emotional overwhelm, self-blame, or patterns in relationships than as one specific memory you can easily describe. In EMDR, we can work with what is showing up now and stay curious about the experiences, beliefs, or protective patterns underneath it. If your trauma feels fuzzy, fragmented, or hard to put into words, that does not mean it “doesn’t count.”
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It depends on what you’re wanting help with, how long the pattern has been there, and whether we’re working with one specific event or more layered trauma over time. Some clients notice meaningful shifts relatively early, while others need more time to build safety, work with protective patterns, and process the deeper roots of what’s happening. EMDR is not something we rush into before your system feels ready enough for the work. In our practice, the goal is not speed for its own sake, but doing trauma work in a way that feels thoughtful, effective, and sustainable.
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EMDR can feel intense at times because it can bring up emotion, body sensations, grief, or memories that have been carrying a lot of charge for a long time. That said, trauma work should not feel like being thrown into the deep end alone. We pay close attention to pacing, grounding, and how much activation your system can handle, and we often integrate relational, attachment-focused, parts-based, and somatic support to help the process feel more manageable. Our job is to help create enough safety and steadiness for meaningful trauma work without pushing you past your limits.
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Yes. We offer in-person EMDR therapy in Los Angeles, and we also provide online therapy for residents of California when telehealth is the better fit. During a consultation, we can talk through whether in-person or online EMDR makes the most sense based on what you’re wanting support with and how you feel most comfortable doing the work. Our practice focuses on individual therapy for adults rather than couples or family therapy.
If you’re wondering whether EMDR could help with what still feels stuck, we’re happy to talk with you about whether it feels like the right fit. You can reach out here to schedule a free consultation and ask any questions about the process, pace, or whether EMDR makes sense for what you’re carrying.