For some people a traumatic event that they have been involved in or witnessed can leave them traumatised. Examples of this are road traffic accidents, assaults and sudden shock. Typical traumatic reactions are flashbacks, panic attacks, sleep disturbance and anxiety. Emotions are normally processed during dreaming sleep when there is rapid eye movement (REM). Sometimes traumatic events have not been properly processed which results in the person reexperiencing the trauma. EMDR enables the person to process traumatic memories and neutralise the accompanying emotions.