Susan M Odden LCMHC, MSN, RN

Susan Odden is a Psychotherapist, EMDRIA Certified EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing) Practitioner, and Registered Nurse, specializing in helping people reprocess the variety of traumatic events experienced in their everyday lives and workplace. Susan is uniquely qualified to offer EMDR and Brief Focused EMDR (BF EMDR) trauma therapy to Frontline Providers. Her years of experience include serving as an EMT with the Orange County Fire Department, Orlando Fl, a first responder in rural Vermont, and four years as a burn nurse, adult and pediatric, at the Arizona Burn Center, Phoenix, AZ. Susan has witnessed and addressed a range of physical and emotional pain experienced across lifespan, including elements of human suffering from several professional caregiving perspectives. Trauma can be acute. A physical and/or emotional response to a horrible event like an accident, crime, natural disaster, experiencing or witnessing violence, death, and more. Immediately after a traumatic event, shock and denial are typical. Trauma can also be chronic. A lifetime of being bullied, neglected, enduring constant criticism, and witnessing human suffering, to name a few examples. After exposure to trauma, individual human brains and bodies manifest the experience differently. Our brains have a tremendous capacity for protecting us from physical harm. We create ways to cope, and the outcomes vary. Commonly, the brain creates a trigger that tells the body to react to danger (irrationally) even years after the danger has passed. The basis for EMDR therapy is the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model. AIP shows that maladaptively stored memories of trauma create obstacles to rational processing. EMDR is utilized to eliminate barriers and empower complete processing of the memory, leading to reduction or elimination of triggers, and trauma symptoms.