Thrive & Grow Psychotherapy
Helping the Brain Find Its Way Forward

Lisa Johanns, Clinical Director

Trauma therapy is often associated with revisiting painful experiences. But healing can depend less on recounting what happened than on helping the brain process what remains unresolved. For individuals carrying memories that continue to shape emotions, relationships and everyday responses, that distinction can change how treatment is approached.

Thrive & Grow Psychotherapy , a Connecticut-based practice, specializes in Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), an evidence-based therapy that helps individuals process unresolved traumatic experiences and reduce their impact on daily life.

"When trauma disrupts the brain's natural processing system, experiences can remain stuck. EMDR gives the brain the tools it needs to help that material be processed in a more adaptive or helpful way," says Lisa Johanns, clinical director.

The Science of Processing Trauma

EMDR is guided by the Adaptive Information Processing model, which proposes that the brain possesses an intrinsic ability to process experiences and integrate them into existing memory networks. Trauma can interrupt this mechanism, leaving memories isolated in emotional states and disconnected from the systems that enable individuals to understand and contextualize their experiences.

EMDR uses bilateral stimulation, a process designed to facilitate communication between different regions of the brain, enabling previously unprocessed material to be integrated in a more adaptive manner and reducing the emotional intensity associated with traumatic memories. The practice has witnessed the impact of this process in clients' daily lives, including an increased ability to tolerate situations and triggers that once felt overwhelming. In one case, a client's trauma-related trigger had previously been so distressing that even encountering it on television was difficult. After EMDR processing, the client encountered the same trigger without immediately recognizing it as something that would normally prompt them to change the channel, only realizing afterward that they had been able to tolerate it.

Achieving these outcomes requires a structured and carefully paced process. EMDR follows an eight-phase framework that begins with understanding a client's history, strengthening emotional resources and establishing stability before reprocessing begins. Thrive & Grow Psychotherapy dedicates considerable attention to these early phases, helping clients establish the internal resources necessary to engage in therapy effectively. Standardized readiness criteria guide decisions regarding progression into reprocessing, reflecting the organization's commitment to approaching treatment thoughtfully and safely.

That emphasis on specialized EMDR care also informs the practice's work beyond individual treatment. Thrive & Grow Psychotherapy has expanded into continuing education, offering EMDR training programs and pursuing additional accreditations that will allow more clinicians to access specialized instruction.

A Specialized Approach to Complex and Developmental Trauma

Thrive & Grow Psychotherapy uses EMDR as its primary therapeutic framework to support individuals experiencing religious trauma, domestic violence, narcissistic abuse, medical trauma and perinatal loss. The organization's clinicians bring varied professional experiences that inform their work in these areas, enabling the practice to pair clients with therapists whose backgrounds align with their needs and circumstances.

Regular consultation and case reviews, along with an ongoing emphasis on clinician development, further strengthen this specialized approach and reflect the organization's commitment to cultivating confident and competent trauma therapists.

The practice's specialized approach also extends to children and adolescents, whose experiences of trauma often require additional consideration of developmental and relational factors. Thrive & Grow Psychotherapy has particular experience working with foster and adoptive families, where early disruptions in caregiving relationships can influence emotional development and interpersonal functioning.

The organization actively involves parents and caregivers throughout treatment, from gathering developmental histories to reinforcing emotional regulation strategies outside the therapy room. Depending on the needs of the child and family, caregivers may also participate directly in aspects of treatment, recognizing the central role caregivers play in a child's development and well-being.

Expanding Access Through Education and Collaboration

Its commitment to education also extends to workforce development through an internship program and collaborations with local graduate programs in counseling and social work,, creating opportunities for emerging clinicians to gain exposure to evidence-based trauma therapies. These partnerships also help expand the availability of trauma services for underinsured populations within the community.

As it continues to broaden these initiatives, Thrive & Grow Psychotherapy remains focused on expanding access to specialized trauma services and helping more individuals access real healing.