Teaching Breathing Skills Early
EMDR for First RespondersI have a particular goal in the first session with all my first responder clients, and that is to give them a skill that is undeniable that it can help them to feel better now. And what I often use is some type of breathing exercise, either square breathing, and I have a laminated square in the office, and I teach them how to square breathe around it, corner to corner, or some type of counted breathing, four counts in, four counts out, so that they leave with a real experience of feeling a little bit better. What I like to call this is Tactical Breathing Exercises. This will make sense to the first responder because they probably had it in some type of training for mental focus. And when I use this term, I explain this will help you concentrate and help your system be able to focus better.
The most important reason I do this is because when they come in, they are suffering, or they wouldn't be there. And it's important to me to be able to give them something that they can take with them that they know helps them feel even a little bit better. This also helps in the trust that they'll come back again.