Online Cognitive Behavioural Psychotherapy & EMDR in North Berwick, East Lothian
Welcome to Rebecca Muller CBT & EMDR online integrative Psychotherapy
Helping Women Heal and Grow after Trauma and Loss
A safe space to explore the challenges in your life
From time to time, we all face trauma or loss in our lives which prevent us from living the life we want to live. It’s perfectly normal and natural to feel stuck, lost, or overwhelmed by your emotions. Whether you are a survivor, a witness to trauma or someone who has heard about it second hand, reaching out for professional support and speaking to someone who is not involved in your everyday life can be daunting. However, it’s more helpful to see it as your first step towards understanding your issues, reconnecting with yourself, and finding ways to manage your thoughts and feelings so you can begin to reclaim your life again.
I’m Rebecca and I am a highly experienced and BABCP accredited psychotherapist, offering CBT/Trauma Focussed CBT, EMDR and The Rewind Technique for adults on a short term (up to 6 sessions) or longer term (up to 24 sessions) basis online, although I am physically based in North Berwick, East Lothian. We can work together online or on the telephone and either way, I provide you with a safe, confidential and non-judgmental space for you to share your experiences, explore the difficulties you are facing and find ways to move on in your life in a positive way.
I have a particular interest in working with trauma and complex trauma, however I can help with a wide range of issues such as low mood, general anxiety, social anxiety, health anxiety, OCD and phobias. I can also work with general stress, loss and bereavement and other issues such as emotional regulation from a poly vagal perspective.
For more information about how online cognitive behavioural psychotherapy, EMDR or The Rewind Technique can help, please see my Working With Me page.
I also run groups, workshops and retreats and am particularly interested in combining yoga, poly vagal theory and mindfulness into my practice.
How CBT can help you
Whether you choose CBT, EMDR, The Rewind Technique or a combination of all three, I provide you with time and space to talk freely and deeply about the challenges you are facing. Exploring your thoughts, feelings, physical sensations and behaviours can help you make sense of your struggles, developing your self-awareness and reconnecting with your authentic self. As your therapist, my role is to listen with empathy and compassion. I am not here to fix or rescue you. I am here to give you the space to talk, and to gently challenge your thoughts, as well as offer you the tools and techniques you need to reach a greater understanding of yourself, and your traumas or loss. This way, you can make positive choices in your life and work towards greater independence.
Because I work holistically, I firmly believe that you have the answers within you. You are in control of yourself and your processes; you bring the issues you want to discuss to each session, you determine the direction we take and the pace we work at. It is a completely client led process. This way you can find your own answers, you can learn how to manage your thoughts, feelings and behaviours and achieve lasting results.
Be heard
Therapy takes place in a safe, non-judgemental space, where I will listen with sensitivity, empathy and compassion. In the therapy space thoughts and feelings can be expressed freely and in confidence and your authentic self will be heard, accepted and valued. I work in a trauma informed way and will be sensitive to your experiences.
Fulfill your potential
Whether you are struggling with a specific issue, or you just feel stuck in a difficult place and that something is preventing you from fulfilling your potential, CBT, EMDR and The Rewind Technique can help you make sense of your issues. They can help you see your reality from a fresh, objective perspective which can lead to a greater understanding of yourself, and help you to reconnect with your core values. Through the CBT, EMDR or Rewind Technique process, you can develop ways to better manage your emotions and make more positive life choices.
You're not alone
No one should be expected to face their trauma alone, but the sad fact is that many people feel they are alone in their pain. During psychotherapy, we will work together, collaboratively, on helping you understand yourself and your problems in new ways, so you can find your own answers. Not just reducing symptoms such as re-experiencing, hypervigalence, avoidance and distorted thinking, but ultimately become more connected to yourself and others.
Issues I can help with
I have extensive experience working with trauma, but I can help you with a range of issues you may be dealing with. If you don’t see the issue you are dealing with listed, please get in contact to see if online cognitive behavioural psychotherapy, EMDR or The Rewind Technique can help.
- Trauma/PTSD
- Complex Trauma
- Low Mood/Depression
- General Anxiety
- Phobias
- Health Anxiety
- OCD
- Panic
- Social Anxiety
I can also work transdiagnostically and help you work on challenging your negative thinking, living with your demanding standards, understanding burnout and what it is to self care properly, living with low self esteem, understanding perfectionism, loss and bereavement issues, relationship issues and emotional regulation.
Frequently asked questions
CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) is a type of talking therapy. It is a common treatment for a range of mental health problems. It is evidence based and It focuses on how your thoughts, beliefs and attitudes affect how you feel and ultimately how you behave. Trauma Focussed CBT
EMDR or Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing Therapy involves eye movement techniques or tapping in a specific way while you process traumatic memories that leads to a peaceful resolution. It is also an evidence based therapy and comprises of an eight phase process and clients are not expected to talk at length about their trauma.
You may be aware that you need therapy because you are struggling with something such as anxiety, low mood or trying to come to terms with a bereavement. However, therapy can also be beneficial if you feel lost, or stuck, or you feel that something is preventing you from living the life you want to live and achieving your goals.
Either way, reaching out and working with a therapist can help you become unstuck, and find ways to manage your feelings and move forward in life the way that you want to.
Some techniques that I use require a PTSD diagnosis and others do not. I will carry out a full assessment at the beginning of therapy to ensure we know whether PTSD is a likely factor and plan treatment accordingly.
That's a normal thought , it's just your mind looking out for you, so we have 3 options:
- You can try hard to convince your mind that this really will work, however this is not that easy!
- You can give up therapy as your mind says it won't work, however we know that not all thoughts are true.
- We can let your mind say that and acknowledge it's looking out for you , and work as a team and be open to see what happens.
Schema therapy aims to help you to understand the blueprint of your life. It explores the way you have developed your sense of self and how you integrate incoming information with this core belief. Maladaptive schemas develop where there were unmet childhood needs.
Schema Therapy is very useful for people who have had early experiences of trauma or neglect or for those who often feel empty, distressed or overwhelmed.
Once a schema is activated we often have set ways of responding in terms of our thoughts, feelings and behaviours. Schema Therapy aims to change maladaptive schemas through cognitive, behavioural and experiential techniques.
This is a short technique that helps to greatly reduce and even remove traumatic or phobic symptoms completely through relaxation and guided imagery, all without having to talk about the details of the traumatic incident(s). The Rewind Technique originated from NLP and is also known as the visual/kinaesthetic dissociation technique.
It helps manage intrusive thoughts and images, flashbacks, nightmares especially that you may be experiencing and can form part of your overall treatment plan.
Critical Incident Stress Debriefing can be carried out on site of the trauma for any number of affected people whether they are first responders or colleagues. This type of work usually happens in a group setting between 24-48 hours after the event.
There are various models of debriefing, which all follow a similar 7 stage protocol. They start with an introduction to the group and participants are encouraged to share their take on the facts, their thoughts, feelings, physical sensations and behaviours and are provided with psycho-education before being prepared to re-enter their workplace or return home to their families.
TF-CBT, EMDR and The Rewind Technique may also all be carried out in a group setting upon request.
In Trauma Focussed CBT we use a technique called Imaginal Exposure whereby we ask you to go back in your imagination to the time of the trauma and we will identify the 'Hot Spots' for you.
We then repeatedly work on you recounting this out loud several times per session. We will also record it for you to play back to yourself outside of the session.
The idea behind this is that with every retelling we are able to gain more information, update your 'hotspots' and file the memory away where it belongs so that it is no longer able to be triggered in an involuntary way.
Cognitive Processing Therapy is a specific type of CBT that has been effective in reducing symptoms of PTSD.
It can teach you how to modify and challenge unhelpful beliefs you may be holding onto related to the trauma you experienced.
It follows a set protocol where you will work on getting an overview of PTSD and CPT. Finding stuck points. Examining the impact of the trauma. Working with events, thoughts and feelings. Processing the traumatic (index) event. Asking yourself challenging questions. Learning to self challenge. Looking at problematic thinking and challenging beliefs. Identifying the trauma themes of safety, trust, power and control. Processing safety and introducing trust. Processing trust and introducing power and control. Processing power and control and introducing esteem. Reviewing esteem and introducing intimacy. Processing intimacy and writing a final impact statement.
EMDR is a therapy that combines mind and body and your emotions to process any mal-adaptively stored trauma memories. which are getting in the way of you processing information in your usual way and may be the cause of many mental health disorders such as PTSD.
It follows eight distinctive phases:
- History taking where a full history of your life is taken.
- Preparation where calm place and resilience building work are carried out.
- Assessment of both your unhelpful beliefs and preferred outcomes regarding your trauma.
- Desensitisation using bilateral stimulation in the form of eye movements or tapping
- Installation and strengthening of the preferred belief.
- Body Scan to identify any somatic distress.
- Closure and containment work.
- Review and maintenance phase.
Poly Vagal Therapy is a therapeutic approach that can help you to better understand and manage your body's response to stress and trauma. "The Body Keeps The Score!"
It focuses on the vagus nerve and the role it plays in regulating emotions and behaviour.
Trauma survivors bodies can get stuck in patterns of fight or flight or freeze and shutdown and this therapy helps you to come back to self regulation or the safe and social zone.
The length of time you need to see a therapist for is completely dependent on your unique situation. You may find that working with a therapist on a specific issue really helps and you feel confident managing your emotions yourself so it may only take a few sessions. Nice Guidelines recommend at least 8-12 weekly sessions for working with trauma.
However, the emotions you are facing right now may have their roots in something deeper, some unresolved issues from your past, which may take longer to explore and to make sense of. No two clients are the same and no two issues are the same so therapy takes as long as it needs to, for you to feel that you are in control of your emotions and so you feel equipped to manage them going forward. We usually work to blocks of six and review at the end of each block.
In each CBT session, we will discuss anything that is troubling you. This could be thoughts that you are struggling to deal with, unwanted feelings you may have, or certain behaviours that you feel you can’t control.
Every session is like a problem-solving session, in which you share your experiences. Using various tools and techniques, you reflect objectively on your thoughts, feelings and behaviours we explore them thoroughly, so you can understand them better. With this new understanding, you can take back control and develop ways to manage them in more helpful ways.
In an EMDR sessions we will follow the eight phase protocol comprising of history taking, client preparation, assessment, processing, installation, body scan, closure and re-evaluation of the treatments effect. This therapy is focussed more on working at an emotional level and where you feel this in your physical body, remember ' The Body Keeps The Score' even if you head says otherwise.
Narrative Exposure Therapy is particularly relevant in helping survivors of multiple traumas or what is sometimes referred Complex Trauma or Complex PTSD.
In this therapy we use a life to explore your traumatic experiences in chronological order. By doing this it's aim is for you to slowly and methodologically repair negative associations and responses.
Unlike TF-CBT it doesn't start with the worst event but the first event. It can help you to remember the finer sensory details and help fill in the gaps you may have in your memory helping you to complete and process your life story as a whole and no longer be defined by your trauma.
When we talk of trauma we are often referring to a single incident such as a car crash, an attack or any other one off traumatic incident.
Complex Trauma refers to a series of traumatic events that take place over a period of time perhaps months or even years. This is particularly difficult for survivors as they may see no end to it or forever be on guard waiting for the next incident to occur.
I am experienced in providing vicarious trauma assessments and psychological wellbeing resilience assessments for Police Scotland, The Scottish Government, Supreme Court and The Crown Office & Procurator Fiscal Service.
I have been the Clinical Lead for The Scottish Government's Inquiry into Childhood Abuse offering consultative support .
I have been Clinical Lead for Police Scotland offering Trauma Triage assessments for Trauma Focussed CBT & EMDR onward referrals.
I have been the out of hours Clinical Lead on call for The Met Police Trauma Support offering initial clinical assessments and ongoing short term counselling.
I have been on-call 24/7 for onsite Clinical Incident Stress Debriefing trauma work for high profile incidents such as sudden deaths by accidents, suicides and Covid 19 related deaths as well as for MET Police Major Incidents.
I have offered bespoke services for organisations who require specialist trauma services and have over ten years experience in providing telephone, and online video counselling as well as ECBT to blue light organisations, as well as the NHS and Central Government.
Fees
Initial 10 minute telephone conversation - FREE.
- Initial Assessment – 50 mins - £100.
- Therapy Session CBT, EMDR or Rewind Technique – 50 mins - £95
- Psycho-Educational Groups - From £30 per person per hour.
- Critical Incident Stress Debriefing on site - £600 daily rate plus travel/accommodation expenses.
- Details upon request for workshops and retreats.
Availability
Online Trauma Clinic: Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday:
11.00am, 12.30pm, 2.30pm, 4.00pm and 5.30pm.
Cancellation Policy:
If you need to cancel an appointment for any reason, please give at least 24 hours’ notice to avoid being charged in full for the session.
Get in touch
Feel free to contact me if you have any questions about how CBT psychotherapy, clinical supervision or CBT training works. I also offer a free 10 minute initial telephone conversation. This enables us to discuss the reasons you are thinking of having psychotherapy, whether it could be helpful for you and whether I am the right therapist to help.
You can call me on 078 9009 6981 if you would prefer to leave a message or speak to me first. I am happy to discuss any queries or questions you may have prior to arranging an initial appointment.
All enquires are usually answered within 24 hours, and all contact is strictly confidential and uses secure phone and email services.
Please note I do not offer crisis support and all sessions are pre booked. If you are at high risk of harm to yourself (have thoughts, and a plan and means to carry this out) please contact your GP or 111 if out of hours, or The Samaritans on 08457 909090. Alternatively, if you are at immediate risk (have thoughts, a plan, means and intent) please go to A&E or call 999 urgently.
I am a registered clinician with the following private insurers:
