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OUR SERVICES

EMDR & Brainspotting

Montréal • Québec • Ontario • Online

EMDR, Brainspotting, and Somatic Therapies for Trauma

At Clinique Altera, we are committed to providing somatic, body-based interventions that meet you where you are. We believe healing involves both mind and body. Through approaches such as EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) and Brainspotting, a focused brain-body therapeutic modality that supports transformation, emotional release, and deeper internal regulation, we help access the brain’s natural capacity to heal, guiding you toward relief, integration, and a steadier internal landscape.

We can help with:

PTSD & Trauma

Healing after accidents, violence, abuse, medical trauma, childhood trauma, or distressing life events.
Complex Trauma

Support for longstanding trauma patterns related to attachment wounds, neglect, chronic stress, or developmental trauma.
Anxiety & Panic

Help reduce panic attacks, chronic worry, nervous system activation, and fear responses.
Childhood Wounds

Processing painful early experiences that continue to shape self-esteem, relationships, or emotional reactions.
Relationship Trauma

Healing from betrayal, abandonment, toxic relationships, emotional abuse, or repeated relational injuries.
Grief & Loss

Support for unresolved grief, traumatic loss, complicated bereavement, and life transitions.
Performance Anxiety

For athletes, professionals, creatives, students, and leaders navigating blocks, pressure, or self-doubt.
First Responders & Frontline Stress

Trauma-informed support for cumulative exposure, burnout, hypervigilance, and difficult memories.
Self-Esteem & Shame

Processing experiences that created deep shame, worthlessness, or internalized negative beliefs.
Phobias & Fear Responses

Targeted support for fears, triggers, avoidance, and specific phobias.
OCD & Intrusive Distress

Can help process fear-based memories or emotional roots that intensify intrusive experiences (alongside evidence-based OCD treatment).
Stress & Burnout

When chronic overwhelm, nervous system fatigue, and emotional exhaustion are taking a toll.
Victims of Crime

Sensitive support for survivors of assault, violence, harassment, stalking, or traumatic incidents.
Addiction & Recovery

Addressing trauma and emotional pain that often underlie coping through substances or compulsive behaviours.
Body-Based Symptoms

When stress shows up through tension, dissociation, sleep disruption, headaches, or somatic distress.

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OUR APPROACH

At Clinique Altera, we view trauma healing as both a psychological and nervous system process. Distressing experiences are not only remembered through thoughts, but can also remain stored in the body through tension, reactivity, shutdown, or emotional overwhelm. Our approach to EMDR and Brainspotting is grounded in helping the brain and body process what has remained stuck so that healing can move forward.

Both EMDR and Brainspotting support deep reprocessing without requiring you to repeatedly retell painful experiences in detail. EMDR uses bilateral stimulation such as eye movements, tapping, or tones to help the brain integrate unresolved memories and reduce emotional charge. Brainspotting uses specific eye positions, body awareness, and therapeutic attunement to access and release stored activation held in the nervous system.

While we offer both modalities, our clinicians often lean toward Brainspotting because of its gentle, flexible, and highly relational nature. Rather than following a fixed sequence, Brainspotting allows the process to unfold through the client’s body cues, pace, and inner experience. It can be especially supportive for complex trauma, attachment wounds, dissociation, neurodivergence, and clients who have found more structured approaches difficult or overwhelming.

We often integrate these methods within a broader relational and trauma-informed framework that may include psychodynamic insight, somatic awareness, attachment-based work, and nervous system regulation tools. Our goal is not simply symptom reduction, but deeper healing, greater self-understanding, and lasting change.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS