Introduction
Marc was referred to me about five years after prison inmates took one guard and three other prisoners hostage at the maximum-security penitentiary where Marc was a guard on the crisis-management team. The hostages had been tortured savagely during the long negotiations before the gymnasium, in which the hostage takers had barricaded themselves with their victims, was finally forced open. Marc was the first guard on the scene, and the first to confront the horrifying vision of the mutilated corpses of the three hostage prisoners and the appalling wounds of the guard, Jean. Marc’s friend and co-worker lay with burns covering every exposed inch of skin, the result of torture with cigarettes and lighters. Later, Marc was to recall most distinctly the intense concentration of energy that was required to deal with the psychopathic inmates, the long minutes as he carried Jean in his arms to the infirmary, and the clean-up of the pieces of brain tissue and smears of blood from the walls and floor of the gymnasium.
When I met him, Marc had not been able to work for the past three years, disabled by a tremor in his right arm that had developed progressively as he attempted to maintain his self-appointed role of protector of his fellow guards—helping them recover from the trauma of the hostage incident and continuing to be the first to take action whenever there was trouble. He had been examined by a neurologist and told that the tremor was a permanent condition for which no treatment was offered. The tremor worsened whenever a conversation with old colleagues or the sight of passing prison trucks reminded him of the hostage crisis.
Even without the shaking in his arm, it is doubtful that Marc could have held a job at that point: he was suffering severe symptoms of posttraumatic stress that several attempts at psychotherapy had been unable to improve. He was plagued by frequent nightmares, paralyzing flashbacks, outbursts of rage, and fits of depression. He had become sexually impotent, violent toward his wife, completely impatient with the slightest provocation. Marc reacted most strongly to the sight of men with tattoos or men who, according to his view, “looked like criminals”. As his symptoms worsened, he had self-medicated his pain with alcohol and drugs, and eventually spent many weeks in a psychiatric ward for treatment of his suicidal tendencies. By the time I saw him, it was clear that he held out no great hope that yet another psychologist with yet another new form of therapy would be able to help him.
In our first session, we discussed Marc’s background, the nature of his current difficulties, the effects of his problems on his family and social life. I explained to him how Eye Movement Integration works, and the type of reactions he might experience, and he agreed to return the following week for the first treatment. During that second session we began EMI with Marc focusing on his most intense memory—the first impression he had when he broke through the gymnasium door and saw the devastation. For ten seconds or so, Marc’s eyes tracked the movement of my hand, leading him in a series of horizontal, vertical, and diagonal patterns,
