EMDR training
Practitioner programs
Trauma training
Free Course
Polyvagal Theory for EMDR Therapists
A Neuro-Informed Approach to Healing
You’ve probably noticed it. Some clients simply can’t stay regulated enough to work through EMDR targets. They dissociate, shut down, or flood, and no matter how well you follow the protocol, things stall.
The missing piece?
Their nervous system isn’t ready, and that changes everything.
This free one-hour CE workshop introduces Polyvagal-Informed EMDR (PV-EMDR), a neuro-informed approach that helps you recognize and work with your clients’ physiological state to prepare them for effective memory reprocessing.
You’ll walk away understanding how the science of safety and stress (Polyvagal Theory) intersects with Shapiro’s Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model, and how to apply this integration directly to your EMDR practice.
Practical Skills
Practical Interventions You'll Learn
In this free polyvagal-informed EMDR course, you'll learn how to:
- Describe the three branches of the autonomic nervous system and how each shapes a client's trauma response
- Recognize neuroception of safety and danger as the subconscious process driving client reactivity in session
- Assess physiological readiness for EMDR reprocessing using the Preparation Hierarchy
- Apply at least one polyvagal-informed intervention in Phase 2 to enhance stabilization and ventral access
- Strengthen your own therapeutic presence as the client's first co-regulator
- Recognize when a stalled EMDR session is a nervous system issue rather than a protocol issue
- Connect Polyvagal Theory with Shapiro's Adaptive Information Processing model in your clinical thinking
- Build a foundational polyvagal-informed EMDR framework you can deepen through more advanced clinical training
What You Get
What's Waiting for You Inside This Training
Three branches of the ANS
Identify ventral, sympathetic, and dorsal states and how each shapes trauma responses in session.
Neuroception in clinical practice
Recognize the body's safety and danger signals as the subconscious driver of client reactivity.
Preparation Hierarchy basics
Assess physiological readiness for EMDR reprocessing before moving into target work.
Phase 2 polyvagal intervention
Apply at least one polyvagal-informed technique to enhance stabilization and ventral access.
Therapist as first co-regulator
Strengthen therapeutic presence as the foundation of effective trauma processing.
Polyvagal-AIP integration
Connect Polyvagal Theory with Shapiro's Adaptive Information Processing model in your EMDR work.
Lifetime on-demand access
Go at your own pace and return to the material whenever a stuck EMDR session calls for it.
Free community membership
Join TTI's shame-free community of practitioners for ongoing conversations, support, and resources. No cost, no catch.
Meet Your Trainer
About Your Trainer
Rebecca Kase
MSW, LCSW
Trauma Therapist Institute Founder Rebecca Kase is recognized as one of the foremost EMDR trainers and trauma experts in the U.S. She is an LCSW, professional EMDR consultant and trainer, registered yoga teacher, and author of Polyvagal Informed EMDR: A Neuro-Informed Approach to Healing (2023).
Rebecca has been practicing in the field of trauma counseling since 2006. She’s an expert in working with complex trauma and dissociation and has practiced in both nonprofit and private practice settings. In her own therapy practice, Rebecca incorporates yoga therapy, ego states, somatic approaches, Polyvagal Theory and EMDR into her work with clients, which includes veterans and adults with Complex PTSD. Rebecca is known as a skillful, clear and enthusiastic teacher. She’ll keep you engaged and make you giggle, even in an online trauma training course!
Take The Next Step
Ready to Begin?
When EMDR Stalls, It Is Often the Nervous System
Some clients cannot stay regulated enough to process. They dissociate, flood, or shut down. This free course gives you the three autonomic branches, neuroception, the Preparation Hierarchy, and one Phase 2 polyvagal intervention to help you recognize what is actually happening and respond clinically.
Free. Lifetime access. 1 CE hour from ASWB and NBCC.