Come Back to What Matters to You
Online EMDR Therapy for Adults in Georgia
EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a specialized therapy designed to help you process the experiences or negative beliefs about yourself underneath your anxiety, perfectionism, masking, or self-doubt, not just cover them up with coping skills.
When the Past Still Shapes How You Feel Today
Knowing you're capable but still feeling like you're falling short.
Replaying conversations or worrying you've done something wrong.
Feeling responsible for other people's emotions.
Struggling to trust your needs, feelings, or perceptions.
You feel chronically misunderstood, invalidated, or struggle with criticism.
Understanding your patterns intellectually but finding them hard to change.
Feeling that old experiences still influence how you relate to yourself and others.
You’ve tried talk therapy and it’s just talking about your problems.
You have coping skills but they don’t address the root of the issue.
What is EMDR?
EMDR uses bilateral stimulation (alternating sensory input, usually guided eye movements), to help your brain process negative experiences in life.
Early sessions focus on safety and support, not deep processing. Once you're ready, we identify the specific experiences and beliefs to work through, like "my needs don't matter" or "I don’t belong." Then we reprocess them, so they stop running quietly in the background of your life.
For many people, it doesn’t help to just talk about things. EMDR helps your brain actually process the experiences underneath it, so the pattern loses its grip.
My EMDR Approach
Somatic-Informed · Parts Work · Attachment · Relational · Client Centered
Maybe you learned to keep the peace, work harder to prove yourself, or put other people's needs ahead of your own. Perhaps you became accustomed to questioning your feelings, hiding parts of yourself, or feeling that you had to get everything right to be accepted.
Over time, these responses can begin to feel like who you are, even though they are actually the way you coped with uncertainty. In EMDR therapy, we explore the experiences connected to these anxious patterns and process memories that continue to carry emotional weight.
My approach is relational and attachment-informed. I want to understand what you needed then, what you need now, and how you can develop a better relationship with yourself and with others.
Is EMDR a Good Fit for You?
While EMDR is a well established treatment for PTSD, research shows it’s effective for treating anxiety, depression, relational trauma or wounds, and other concerns.
In my practice, EMDR may be worth exploring when things that feel familiar from your past still show up in your present life today. Many people find that negative experiences from their past may unconsciously affect how they feel about themselves, navigate relationships, or respond to situations in the present.
EMDR may be beneficial if you’re working through:
Unresolved past experiences and unmet emotional needs
Feelings or patterns that keep showing up, such as anxiety, shame, people-pleasing, perfectionism, or self-doubt
Negative beliefs about yourself (examples include “I’m not good enough” or “My needs don’t matter”)
EMDR isn't the right fit for every concern or every stage of therapy. We'll consider your needs, current circumstances, and readiness together to determine whether it makes sense to begin with EMDR or another part of the therapeutic process.
What to Expect with EMDR Therapy
Getting to know you
We explore your concerns, history, goals, and what you hope will change.
Building a foundation
We develop resources and establish a pace that feels manageable before processing difficult material, as appropriate.
Processing experiences
When you're ready, we process specific experiences and associated negative beliefs, emotions, and body responses.
Integration
We integrate a new, healthy perspective of yourself. We notice what shifts and continue working on present-day patterns, relationships, and needs.
Meet Your Therapist: Lauren Pifer, LPC
A Thoughtful, Relational Approach to EMDR
I believe healing involves more than understanding why you feel or respond a certain way. It's also about making sense of your needs and beginning to relate to yourself in a different way.
As a Licensed Professional Counselor in Georgia, I take a relational, attachment-informed approach to EMDR therapy. I'm especially interested in how our early relationships and emotionally difficult experiences can influence the way we see ourselves, navigate relationships in adulthood, and respond to stress.
I have advanced EMDR training in complex developmental trauma, relational wounds, and generational trauma. As a lifelong learner, I’m continually deepening my knowledge of this work. I am pursuing EMDRIA certification.
I want therapy to be a place where you feel understood rather than judged, your experiences matter, and we work at a pace that feels good to you.
Frequently Asked Questions
About EMDR
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EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) is a therapy approach that helps your brain process experiences that may still feel emotionally “stuck.” It can help reduce the intensity of difficult memories, beliefs, emotions, and body sensations so you can respond to life from the present rather than feeling pulled back into old patterns.
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EMDR uses bilateral stimulation—such as guided eye movements, tapping, or alternating sounds—while you briefly connect with aspects of a difficult experience. This can help your brain process and integrate the experience in a new way. You don't have to talk through every detail of an experience for EMDR to be helpful.
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No. Although EMDR was originally developed to treat PTSD, it is now considered effective for a variety of concerns. EMDR is helpful for anxiety, self-worth, relationship patterns, difficult life experiences, phobias, grief, and other experiences that continue to affect how you feel or respond today.
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It can. When anxiety is connected to past experiences, learned beliefs, or patterns that continue to feel threatening, EMDR can help reduce the emotional charge associated with those experiences. We can also explore what is maintaining your anxiety in the present.
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No. You don't need a complete or perfectly accurate memory of what happened. We can work with what you remember, what you notice emotionally or physically, and what you experience in the present.
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EMDR is a structured and phased type of therapy, and sessions don't necessarily look like what you may imagine from movies or descriptions online. We first spend time talking, building resources, identifying patterns, exploring emotions and body sensations, and use bilateral stimulation. We go at your own pace.
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There's no set number of sessions. The length of therapy depends on what you're hoping to work on, your history, your current circumstances, and how your nervous system responds to the work. Some people notice changes relatively quickly, while deeper or more complex patterns may take longer.
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That's okay. You don't have to come to therapy knowing exactly what's wrong or why you feel the way you do. We can start with what you're experiencing now and gently explore what may be underneath it.
Healing and Freedom Are Possible
Knowing what you want, without needing permission
Expressing yourself openly
Feeling secure in who you are
Authenticity
Setting a boundary without spiraling into guilt
Trusting and following your gut feelings
Choosing yourself
Feeling more like a whole person
Ready to Come Back to Yourself?
You don't have to abandon who you are to stay in relationship with others. There's another way, and you don't have to figure it out alone.