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Journey through the Eyes: An EMDR Podcast

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by Kathy Couch, LCSW, FT

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Come learn with a community of like-minded peers everything EMDR. We are a community of clinicians hosting everyday clinical conversations from practice to business to trauma practice techniques and discussions. Come join our community of therapists looking to make lasting change. Click here for spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4Sj7OA6EGtklasiVR1Uz0l

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Recent Episodes

June 19, 2026

DCF Conclusion

KATHY ON THE COUCH | SHOW NOTES Episode 6 of 6 | The Pedagogical Roots Series Title: Coming Home — What Every Root Was Building Toward Host: Kathy Couch, LCSW, FT | Rewired360 Episode Summary We started this series with a question that might have seemed a little sideways for an EMDR podcast: what does pedagogy have to do with consultation? Six episodes later, I hope the answer feels less like a theory and more like something you've actually felt — in your own consultation relationships, in the rooms where you've been the learner, and in the rooms where you've been the one holding space for someone else's growth. This final episode is a coming home. We're circling back through every thinker we've visited across this series — not to summarize them, but to let them land together. Because none of them were ever meant to stand alone. They were always building toward something. And that something is the Developmental Consultation Framework. The Series at a Glance <a class="underline underline underline-offset-2 decoration-1 decoration-current/40 hover:decoration-current focus:decoration-current" href="https://www.rewired360.com/podcasts/kathy-on-the-couch/episodes/2149172589">Episode 1 — Freire, Power & the Training Room</a> We started where the whole series had to start: with power. Paulo Freire named what most of us have experienced but rarely said out loud — that teaching, at its worst, is a transaction where the expert deposits knowledge into the learner and calls it education. He called this the banking model, and he spent his career dismantling it. What he built in its place was problem-posing pedagogy: a model of dialogue rooted in the learner's lived reality, where the content of learning comes from the generative themes already alive in the room. For consultation, this is foundational. The consultee's case is not raw material for the consultant's expertise to organize. It is the living content of the encounter. <a class="underline underline underline-offset-2 decoration-1 decoration-current/40 hover:decoration-current focus:decoration-current" href="https://www.rewired360.com/podcasts/kathy-on-the-couch/episodes/2149175346">Episode 2 — John Dewey: Experience, Democracy, and the Regulated Learner</a> John Dewey gave us the word that ties everything in this series together: experience. Learning is not the transfer of information — it is the transformation of experience through reflection. Dewey also gave us something that doesn't show up enough in clinical training conversations: the idea that the learning environment itself has to be democratic, which means the learner has to be treated as a whole person, not a skill set to be corrected. For consultation, this meant looking at what we actually create when we hold a session — and whether it's a space where real experience can surface and be worked with. <a class="underline underline underline-offset-2 decoration-1 decoration-current/40 hover:decoration-current focus:decoration-current" href="https://www.rewired360.com/podcasts/kathy-on-the-couch/episodes/2149172590">Episode 3 — Lev Vygotsky: The ZPD in Consultation, Letting the Consultee Lead</a> Vygotsky gave us the map. The Zone of Proximal Development — that narrow band between what the consultee can already do independently and what becomes possible with skilled support — is the only place where real development happens. Not behind it, where we're consolidating what they already know. Not above it, where we activate without integration. Right at the edge. This episode was where the Scaffolded Learning Crosswalk started to take shape — because ZPD without a tool to locate it stays abstract. The Crosswalk makes it operational. <a class="underline underline underline-offset-2 decoration-1 decoration-current/40 hover:decoration-current focus:decoration-current" href="https://www.rewired360.com/podcasts/kathy-on-the-couch/episodes/2149172591">Episode 4 — Maria Montessori & The Prepared Environment: What Self-Directed Learning Has to Do with Clinical Training</a> Montessori came as a surprise to a lot of listeners — she doesn't show up often in clinical training conversations. But her core insight is one of the most practical in the whole series: the educator's job is not to instruct. It is to prepare the environment so that the learner's own curiosity can take over. In consultation terms, this is the argument for restraint — for setting up the conditions for discovery and then stepping back and trusting the consultee to move into them. One well-placed scaffold. Then silence. That's not passive. That's Montessori. <a class="underline underline underline-offset-2 decoration-1 decoration-current/40 hover:decoration-current focus:decoration-current" href="https://www.rewired360.com/podcasts/kathy-on-the-couch/episodes/2149186670">Episode 5 — bell hooks: Engaged Pedagogy as Trauma-Informed Practice</a> bell hooks brought the body back into the room. Engaged pedagogy insists that learning is not a disembodied cognitive event — it happens in whole people, inside relationships, shaped by history and power and the felt sense of whether this space is actually safe. For consultation with trauma practitioners especially, this is not a soft add-on. It is the point. If the consultee doesn't feel genuinely seen — not evaluated, not managed, but actually met — the developmental work doesn't move. hooks named what Porges would later ground neurobiologically: you cannot learn from someone whose presence your nervous system has already flagged as unsafe. Where It All Lands: The Developmental Consultation Framework Five thinkers. Five episodes. And underneath all of them, the same argument, made in different registers. Freire said: the content has to come from the learner's real world, not the expert's curriculum. Dewey said: learning is the transformation of experience, not the reception of information. Vygotsky said: development only happens at the edge — and skilled guidance is what makes the edge workable. Montessori said: prepare the conditions, then trust the learner. Restraint is not absence. It is precision. bell hooks said: bring the whole person into the room — yours and theirs — or you're not really teaching at all. The Developmental Consultation Framework doesn't add a sixth voice to this conversation. It listens to all five and builds something clinical from what they share. Attunement as ground condition — that's Porges and hooks in the same breath. Component One, the consultee-led presentation — that's Freire's generative theme principle and Dewey's insistence that experience is the raw material. Component Two, developmental positioning — that's Vygotsky's ZPD made visible on a rubric you can actually use in session. Component Three, one scaffold, then stop — that's Montessori's prepared environment applied to a twelve-minute consultation window. None of these ideas are new. What the DCF does is make them workable — together, in real time, with a real consultee and a real case in front of you. What Comes Next If this series has been the why, the EMDR University Consultation Program is the how. It takes everything we've traced across these six episodes and builds it into a structured 10-hour program — two hours at a time, each module building directly on the one before it, from the Developmental Rubric and the Scaffolded Learning Crosswalk all the way through to live integrated consultation practice. If you're ready to take the framework off the podcast and into your consultation room, that's where we go next. Learn more and apply at <a class="underline underline underline-offset-2 decoration-1 decoration-current/40 hover:decoration-current focus:decoration-current" href="https://www.rewired360.com/EMDR-University-Consultation-Program">rewired360.com</a>. And if this series landed something for you — share it with a colleague who's thinking about what consultation is actually supposed to do. That's how this conversation grows. Thanks for spending six episodes with me on this. I'll see you on the couch. — Kathy

April 17, 2026

Allison Leslie

Title : Building the Nest: Somatic EMDR, the Human-Animal Bond & Trauma Therapy Guest : Alison Leslie, LCSW, SEP Release Date : 2026-04-17 Audience : Trauma Clinicians, EMDR Therapists, Grief Therapists ============================================================ [INTRO] Welcome to Kathy on the Couch, your podcast for everyday clinicians who sit with grief, trauma, and the hardest human experiences every day. You weren't meant to carry this alone — and this is a space for therapists who hold space for others and sometimes need a place to be held too. I am Kathy — your EMDR consultant, trainer, and thanatologist specializing in methods of death, dying, and bereavement. I created this podcast to support those who do the deep work, especially trauma and grief therapists and EMDR clinicians who want real conversations, meaningful support, and a community where the hard questions are finally welcome. We're also thrilled to announce the Kathy on the Couch Membership Community — your home for grief and trauma consultation and professional growth. Inside you'll find a monthly consultation group, monthly NBCC CE training, course modules, resource kits, and a community that holds space for those who hold it all. If you're looking for deeper connection, join our membership community. If you're an EMDR therapist seeking certification or consultation, visit EMDR University. And please give us a five-star review wherever you get your podcasts. Now let's get comfortable and head on over to the couch. ============================================================ [ SEGMENT 1] Topic: Alison's Origin Story — Nature, Animals & the Missing Body Piece in EMDR Tony introduces Alison, noting they connected through mutual colleague Becca at the EMDRIA conference. Alison shares her clinical journey: from a recreation therapy undergrad at Indiana University — where she "played in the woods for four years" — to animal-assisted social work, foster care programs with shelter dogs, and eventually a three-year somatic experiencing training that brought her back to EMDR. KEY POINTS: - Alison initially found EMDR clunky and confusing, and set it down - Somatic experiencing revealed what was missing: the body - Once the body piece clicked, EMDR and SE integrated seamlessly - Her foster care shelter dog work showed her that animals help clients form new predictions — "a living being cares about me" - The neurobiology of the human-animal bond and of EMDR/SE all point to the same thing: creating enough safety for new learning ============================================================ [SEGMENT 2] Topic: The Nest Metaphor, Pendulation & Phase Two EMDR Alison introduces the Nest Metaphor — a nature-based framework she created for trauma conceptualization, history taking, and healing. Discussion covers pendulation as a somatic resource, and the critical importance of phase two preparation as building capacity for comfort — not just processing trauma. KEY POINTS: - The Nest Metaphor uses the imagery of bird nests across a life span: womb nest, early home nest, today's nest, future nest - Clients often unconsciously build the same nest they grew up in — in a different tree, in a different city - A photo of a nest built with cigarette butts: adaptive for the bird, harmful for the nestlings — opens conversation about ACEs, environmental racism, and systemic harm - Pendulation (somatic experiencing): the natural rhythm of expansion and constriction — moving into difficulty and back out to resource - Connection to the Dual Process Model of grief (Stroebe & Schut): oscillating between loss and restoration - Phase two EMDR: building capacity to tolerate comfort BEFORE reprocessing — "if it's not safe to be safe, the body scan will register as danger" - "We have everything we need to heal inside" — the therapist's job is to create conditions, not be the change agent ============================================================ [SEGMENT 3] Topic: The Human-Animal Bond as a Somatic Resource in Trauma Therapy Alison explains how companion animals already function as co-regulators in clients' lives — and how clinicians can bring that into the therapy room as a bottom-up somatic intervention. Discussion also covers linked violence and the limits of the human-animal bond for some clients. KEY POINTS: - The human-animal bond is not simply "unconditional love" — animals co-regulate us when their own nervous system is safe and settled - Teaching clients to slow down and really receive their animal's greeting creates measurable physiological shifts: oxytocin, lower blood pressure, ventral vagal state - "If your dog is sleeping next to you during a panic attack — what does that tell you? It's safe." - We can use companion animals to build interoceptive awareness and predictive safety from the bottom up - Linked violence: animal abuse, domestic violence, child abuse, and elder abuse are statistically connected — animals are also used as tools of control and threat - The human-animal bond is not a resource for every client; hold both the healing potential and the harm context ============================================================ [OUTRO / CTA] Primary CTA: Join the Kathy on the Couch Membership Community Thank you so much for joining us on another episode of Kathy on the Couch. We hope today's conversation sparked new ideas and offered you practical tools you can bring into your practice. Rewired360 is here to companion you along your clinical career path. Until next time — keep connecting, keep learning, and keep rewiring for success. Take care. ------------------------------------------------------------ GUEST RESOURCES: Website : www.empower-healing.com Email : alison@empower-healing.com Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/alison.leslie.empower.healing LinkedIn : www.linkedin.com/in/alison-leslie-234abb277 UPCOMING TRAININGS (at time of recording): - April 2026 | Nest Metaphor (3 hrs) — Advanced EMDR Institute - May 2026 | Somatic EMDR (15 hrs) — Trauma Therapist Institute ALWAYS INCLUDE: - Join the KOC Membership : https://www.rewired360.com/koc-membership - All Rewired360 Trainings : https://rewired360.ce-go.com/courses/all - All Links & Resources : https://linktr.ee/rewired360 ============================================================ GUEST BIO (for show notes) Alison Leslie, LCSW, SEP Alison Leslie is a trauma-informed clinician, consultant, and educator known for making complex trauma work feel both grounded and doable. Her clinical work and teaching focus on bridging EMDR therapy, somatic therapy, ego state work, and the human-animal bond, with particular attention to dissociation, attachment wounds, and chronic stress physiology. Alison is the creator of The Nest Metaphor, a nature-based, somatically informed framework designed to strengthen and support the healing process. Using the "nest" as a lived, non-judgmental lens, she helps clinicians map how early environments shaped nervous system capacity, protective strategies, and a client's relationship to safety, support, and agency — while building the future nest that supports flourishing over survival. She has co-authored chapters and articles on trauma and the human-animal bond, presented at EMDRIA conferences in 2023, 2024, and 2025, and holds multiple EMDRIA-approved advanced trainings. ============================================================ END OF TRANSCRIPT

April 2, 2026

What Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia Actually Tells Us

KATHY ON THE COUCH — SHOW NOTES ============================================================ Episode Code: S05E08 Release Date: 2026-04-02 URL Slug: what-respiratory-sinus-arrhythmia-actually-tells-us Series: The Polyvagal Debate — Episode 2 of 3 ============================================================ What Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia Actually Tells Us The breath-linked heart rate pattern at the center of the polyvagal debate — what it measures, what it doesn't, and what that means for your clinical language. ------------------------------------------------------------ EPISODE SUMMARY ------------------------------------------------------------ Your heart rate speeds up when you inhale and slows when you exhale. That rhythm has a name — respiratory sinus arrhythmia, or RSA — and it sits at the center of one of the most important scientific debates in trauma and grief therapy right now. In this episode, Kathy Couch, LCSW, FT, breaks down what RSA actually is in plain language, what Stephen Porges says it tells us about the nervous system, and why researcher Paul Grossman argues that Porges may have overreached. This is not a takedown of polyvagal theory. It is an invitation to think carefully about what we actually know, what we claim to clients, and how to hold a clinical heuristic and a neurobiological claim at the same time. Polyvagal theory has become a shared language across trauma, grief, somatic, and relational therapy — and that language gives clients a way to understand their own experience, which matters. But the framework rests on specific neurobiological claims, and those claims are contested. Kathy walks through the RSA question at the heart of the debate: what does that breath-linked heart rate variability actually measure? Does it index a distinct social engagement system? Is the dorsal vagal shutdown state neurobiologically real? And most importantly — what does any of this mean for how you work with clients? ------------------------------------------------------------ WHAT YOU'LL HEAR IN THIS EPISODE ------------------------------------------------------------ • A plain-language explanation of respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) — the breath-linked heart rate pattern that Porges identifies as the primary marker of ventral vagal regulation and the physiological foundation of polyvagal theory. • What Porges claims RSA tells us: that high RSA indexes activation of the myelinated ventral vagal pathway, which supports social engagement, safety, and connection — and that this system is anatomically and evolutionarily distinct from the dorsal vagal system. • What Grossman and colleagues argue in response: that the anatomical evidence for a clean myelinated/unmyelinated vagal split is weaker than Porges suggests, that RSA may not be a pure index of ventral vagal tone, and that the three-state model overstates the neurobiological case. • The dorsal vagal shutdown question — whether the freeze, collapse, and dissociation states clinicians observe are actually driven by dorsal vagal activation in the way polyvagal theory describes, and what the current evidence supports. • How to hold both the clinical heuristic and the neurobiological claim — why polyvagal language can be useful with clients even when the underlying science is contested, and where the distinction between metaphor and mechanism really matters. • Practical nervous system language for the consulting room — how to teach clients the map without presenting it as a verified brain scan, and what to say when a client comes in already knowing the theory is controversial. ------------------------------------------------------------ KEY CONCEPTS & FRAMEWORKS ------------------------------------------------------------ Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia (RSA) The natural fluctuation in heart rate that occurs with breathing — heart rate increases during inhalation and decreases during exhalation. Polyvagal theory identifies RSA as the primary marker of ventral vagal activity and, by extension, of the capacity for social engagement and self-regulation (Porges, 1995, 2001). Higher RSA is generally associated with better cardiovascular health, stress recovery, and social engagement capacity, and is one measure of heart rate variability (HRV). Polyvagal Theory — The Three-State Model Porges's (1995) hierarchical model of autonomic nervous system function, proposing three evolutionarily layered states: ventral vagal (social engagement, safety), sympathetic activation (mobilization, fight/flight), and dorsal vagal (immobilization, shutdown, freeze). The model is foundational to trauma and somatic therapies and has shaped clinical language around co-regulation and neuroception (Porges, 2011). The Grossman Critique Grossman and Taylor (2007) and subsequent commentary raise concerns about the neuroanatomical precision of polyvagal claims — specifically whether RSA reliably indexes a distinct myelinated vagal pathway, and whether the dorsal vagal shutdown state is anatomically and functionally distinct in the way the three-state model proposes. The critique does not reject the clinical value of polyvagal-informed practice; it calls for greater precision in how neurobiological claims are framed and communicated. Clinical Heuristic vs. Neurobiological Claim A clinical heuristic is a framework that helps clinicians and clients organize experience — it is useful when it guides observation, language, and intervention, even if the underlying mechanism is not fully established. A neurobiological claim is a specific assertion about how the brain and body actually work. Holding both requires intellectual honesty about the difference between "this framework helps" and "this mechanism is proven." ------------------------------------------------------------ RESOURCES MENTIONED ------------------------------------------------------------ Porges, S. W. (1995). Orienting in a defensive world: Mammalian modifications of our evolutionary heritage. A polyvagal theory. Psychophysiology, 32(4), 301–318. Porges, S. W. (2001). The polyvagal theory: Phylogenetic substrates of a social nervous system. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 42(2), 123–146. Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. W. W. Norton. Grossman, P., & Taylor, E. W. (2007). Toward understanding respiratory sinus arrhythmia: Relations to cardiac vagal tone, evolution and biobehavioral functions. Biological Psychology, 74(2), 263–285. Full APA references are available in the companion Rooted Practice Blog post at rewired360.com. ------------------------------------------------------------ FEATURED TRAINING & COMMUNITY LINKS ------------------------------------------------------------ 🗓️ Featured Training: Update the Polyvagal Theory Debate | April 21, 2026 | 1 NBCC CE If this conversation is making you want to go deeper — to actually read both papers, sit with the evidence, and figure out how to bring this into consultation and clinical language — that is exactly what this CE is for. We go through both papers together, do the clinical translation work, and you leave with language you can actually use. Date: Tuesday, April 21, 2026 | 9:00–10:00 AM MDT Register: https://rewired360.ce-go.com/live-event/update-the-polyvagal-theory-debate Community: Join the Kathy on the Couch Community: https://rewired360.com/koc-membership ------------------------------------------------------------ BACKEND DATA & NAVIGATION ------------------------------------------------------------ Audience Segment: Trauma & Grief Clinicians | EMDR Clinicians | Clinical Educators Learning Category: Neuroscience Literacy | Trauma-Informed Practice | Professional Development Product: Rewired360 Podcast Post Type: Podcast Episode Tags: polyvagal theory | respiratory sinus arrhythmia | RSA | stephen porges | paul grossman | autonomic nervous system | dorsal vagal | ventral vagal | nervous system language | clinical heuristic | heart rate variability | HRV | trauma-informed practice | neuroscience literacy Series Navigation: ← Previous: S05E07 — The Paper That Started the Debate → Next: S05E09 — What Clinicians Should Do With This ------------------------------------------------------------ DISCLAIMER ------------------------------------------------------------ The information shared on this podcast reflects the perspectives and experiences of the host. It is not intended to substitute for professional consultation, supervision, or individual guidance. ============================================================ END OF SHOW NOTES — S05E08 ===================================================

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What is Journey through the Eyes: An EMDR Podcast?: Come learn with a community of like-minded peers everything EMDR. We are a community of clinicians hosting everyday clinical conversations from practice to business to trauma practice techniques and discussions. Come join our community of therapists looking to make lasting change. Click here for spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4Sj7OA6EGtklasiVR1Uz0l
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