Patrick Clancy describes miracle treatment that helped the most with trauma of losing kids

Patrick Clancy says a therapy treatment he used to cope with the trauma of losing his children worked “like a miracle.”Speaking in extended clips from the latest episode of “60 Minutes,” the 36-year-old said that EMDR, a trauma-focused psychotherapy, helped him face what he was dealing with “head on.”“It’s unpleasant but they get you used to dealing with that,” Clancy said.“And, eventually, you’re better at processing it … After I did it — all of those sessions — the waking up screaming, the horrible dreams, they mostly stopped.

I mean, it was like a miracle.”Clancy spoke out for the first time since his ex-wife, Lindsay Clancy, went on trial for allegedly killing their three young children — Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and 8-month-old Callan — at their Duxbury, Massachusetts, home on Jan.24, 2023.He said that the “traumatic” memories of the event can be “overwhelming.”“I think the thing that helped the most was EMDR,” he told CBS correspondent Ross Douthat.

“It’s a little unusual.They put you right back in that place that you’ve been trying to avoid for years and you face it head-on.”Here’s everything to know about EMDR.EMDR stands for eye movement desensitization and reprocessing.

It is a type of psychotherapy that uses bilateral stimulation — typically eye movements, going back and forth — to help a patient heal from psychological trauma.According to the EMDR Institute, when EMDR therapy is successful, the distressing events and trauma are “transformed on an emotional level.”“For instance, a rape victim shifts from feeling horror and self-disgust to holding the firm belief that, ‘I survived it and I am strong,'” they explain.It’s usually an eight-phase process.The phases are:EMDR patients focus on a traumatic or distressing memory while engaging in bilateral stimulation — or something that alternates from side to side.

This often involves moving one’s eyes to follow a therapist’s fingers o...