She’s taking it one day at a time.
As she walked the streets of NYC this week, “Hot in Cleveland” actress Valerie Bertinelli reflected on the “mental, emotional beatdowns” she has suffered.
“It’s really a tribute to our brains and our hearts and our human bodies because it does, our bodies do hold trauma,” Bertinelli, 65, said Wednesday in an Instagram video.
Bertinelli’s trauma dates back to childhood. She was “literally born into grief” because her older brother, Mark, died from accidental poisoning while her mother was pregnant with her. Her parents anguished in silence and didn’t open up to her until she was a teenager.
She also experienced emotional, mental and verbal abuse in her romantic relationships, which led to significant body image issues and fueled her use of food and alcohol to numb her feelings.
She has since found relief in eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR), a trauma-focused psychotherapy that’s typically an eight-phase process.
The therapist has the patient recall a painful event while guiding them through eye movements that mimic rapid eye movement that occurs during sleep — when the brain naturally processes events — or other forms of rhythmic stimulation to help their brain reprocess the memory.
The eight phases are:
- Selecting a memory to process
- Learning how EMDR works and developing coping and relaxing skills
- Identifying the images, beliefs, emotions and sensations associated with the memory
- Easing the distress by following the therapist’s fingers as they move back and forth, listening to alternating tones through headphones or tapping on the body
- Replacing the negative belief tied to the memory with a positive one
- Making sure there isn’t lingering physical tension or discomfort related to the memory
- Closing the session to allow the patient to return to a calm, stable state
- Evaluating their progress and adjusting if necessary
“EMDR and talk therapy has helped me immensely, and now I can walk through certain streets without being retraumatized,” Bertinelli said Thursday on Instagram.
“I encourage you to get help if you need it and I want you to know, it gets better.”
The “One Day at a Time” actress said she includes healing meditations in her upcoming memoir, “Getting Naked,” due out March 10.
She describes the book as a “collection of intimate and vulnerable essays, exploring aging, love, friendship, secrets and acceptance.”
She will touch on “insecurities that have haunted” her for decades, including struggles with her body image and her intense drive for perfection.
The book will also likely explore her painful 2022 divorce from financial planner Tom Vitale and the traumatic 2020 death of her ex-husband, legendary guitarist Eddie Van Halen, from a stroke after a lengthy cancer battle.
The couple, who were married from 1981 to 2007, have a 34-year-old son, Wolfgang Van Halen.
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