Dr. Pria Alpern

Dr. Pria Alpern Clinical psychologist | Trauma, EMDR & SE
EMDRIA Approved Trainer
📍NYC

The trauma intake is the first intervention. The questions you ask in the first session shape what your client believes ...
03/12/2026

The trauma intake is the first intervention. The questions you ask in the first session shape what your client believes is possible in treatment. These five questions have changed the way I open trauma work, and I’ve watched them change the way my trainees do too.

Save this. You’ll want to come back to it.

I have been training EMDR clinicians for years, and this moment comes up more than almost anything else. People who are ...
03/11/2026

I have been training EMDR clinicians for years, and this moment comes up more than almost anything else. People who are weeks out of basic training ask me about it. So do people who have been practicing for a decade. Blocked processing is not a beginner problem. It is a clinical reality that every EMDR therapist encounters, repeatedly, for the entire span of their career.

03/10/2026

Survival responses don’t turn off when the threat is over. They stay until the nervous system learns it’s safe.
This is one of the most important things I teach in my trauma trainings: learning to read these patterns before you even open your treatment plan.
If you’re a therapist who wants to go deeper on this, our Manhattan Center for Trauma Studies membership community has live study groups, peer consultation, and a full resource library built around exactly this. First month is on us. 🔗 in bio.

03/07/2026

Shame isn’t just a feeling for many trauma survivors. It can become an identity. Jim Knipe’s work on chronic shame-based depression explains how children adopt a sense of “badness” to preserve attachment to caregivers who hurt them, and how that shame gets carried into adulthood as depression, self-hatred, and a felt sense of moral defectiveness. We’re exploring his chapter in my next trauma study group on March 19th (12–1 pm ET, Zoom). This one is for therapists: we’ll get into his AIP approach to targeting shame as a protective ego state and working toward more integrated self-understanding. ✨$40 standard / $25 reduced rate. Free for MCTS members. Session will be recorded. ✨Register at the 🔗 in bio.

03/06/2026

Let’s run through three methods for target identification in EMDR treatment planning

Jonathan Shedler recently published a piece arguing that most of what gets called therapy is not, in fact, therapy at al...
03/05/2026

Jonathan Shedler recently published a piece arguing that most of what gets called therapy is not, in fact, therapy at all. He is right about something important, which is that training, expertise, and sitting with discomfort are important features of clinical work. Where his argument narrows is in what it implies, that there is a recognizable standard of “real” psychotherapy, and that clinicians either meet it or they don’t. For those of us who work in the trauma field, that framing misses something fundamental about how healing unfolds. Trauma does not respond to a single theoretical lens.

03/04/2026

I teach these three fundamental target identification approaches in my EMDR basic training. If you’re a therapist considering taking EMDR basic training, see details below for my next online training cohort! ✨EMDR Basic Training (virtual, July ‘26 & Sept ‘26)✨ This training includes 50 hours combining lecture, practicum, and consultation to build competence in the eight phases of EMDR therapy (ASWB ACE + NY State approved for 40 Contact Hours). Payment plan available. 🎉 Early career and nonprofit therapists are eligible for 15% off tuition✨More details via the 🔗 in beacons

03/02/2026

You don’t have to do this work alone. Join a community of trauma. Therapist committed to growth and lifelong learning. First month free… 🔗 in my beacons.

03/02/2026

Replying to great question!

02/28/2026

✨EMDR therapists✨be sure to save this video to reference whenever you need it!

If you’re a therapist considering training in EMDR, registration is open for my next online basic training cohort this summer/fall! We start July 17. Go to my beacons 🔗 to learn more.

Someone posted in a therapist Facebook group recently. Seven words: “I don’t wanna be a therapist anymore.”The comments ...
02/27/2026

Someone posted in a therapist Facebook group recently. Seven words: “I don’t wanna be a therapist anymore.”

The comments flooded in. Hundreds of them. Therapists who had waited tables to take a break. Therapists who’d been in the field 8 years, 14 years, 20 years, 30 years, all saying some version of: me too, me too, me too.

02/26/2026

✨EMDR Basic Training (virtual, July ‘26 & Sept ‘26)✨ This training includes 50 hours combining lecture, practicum, and consultation to build competence in the eight phases of EMDR therapy (ASWB ACE + NY State approved for 40 Contact Hours). Payment plan available. 🎉 Early career and nonprofit therapists are eligible for 15% off tuition✨More details via my beacons 🔗

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