Pedro Molteni

LPC

I work with an IFS-informed approach to EMDR. In plain terms that means two things happen together. EMDR is a structured way of helping the brain reprocess memories that still feel raw, so they stop hijacking the present. Internal Family Systems starts from the idea that you are not one single voice. Part of you may want to talk about what happened. Another part may be doing everything it can to keep you away from it. Both of those make sense, and both are trying to help. Most trauma work stalls when that second part gets overridden. So we get to know the protective, wary parts first, and we move at a pace they agree to. I am certified in EMDR by EMDRIA and trained in Internal Family Systems at the IFS Institute. I also draw on DBT when someone wants concrete skills for riding out intense emotion or for repairing communication with the people close to them. In the room I am fairly direct. I ask a lot of questions, and I will tell you what I am noticing rather than nodding quietly and letting you guess.

Mostly listening and asking questions. I want to understand what brought you here now rather than a year ago, what you have already tried, and what you are hoping looks different a year from now. That last question tells me more than a diagnosis does. You will not be asked to tell your whole trauma history on day one. People often arrive braced for exactly that, and it is not how I work. We go as far as you want to go and no further. I would rather spend the first hour understanding the shape of the problem than pushing into details you are not ready to hand over to someone you just met. By the end I will tell you honestly whether I think I am the right fit. If I am not, I will say so and try to point you somewhere better. There is also a free 20-minute consultation before any of this, if you would rather get a sense of me first.

That you do not have to relive it to heal it. The most common reason people avoid trauma therapy is the belief that getting better means going back and narrating the worst thing that ever happened, in detail, out loud, to a stranger. That fear is completely reasonable. It also keeps a lot of people out of a room that could genuinely help them. EMDR does not work that way. A great deal of the processing happens internally, and you control how much you say out loud. I have worked with people who told me relatively little about the specifics and still got substantially better, because the work is about how the memory is stored, not about performing it for my benefit. And if avoidance is the thing keeping you out, that is not a character flaw or a lack of willpower. It is a protective part of you doing its job, and it deserves to be taken seriously rather than steamrolled.