Working Together: Ursula’s Experience of Imagery Rescripting

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Discover how Ursula transformed challenging memories from her past through imagery rescripting.

Table of Contents

I'd like to introduce you to Ursula, who I worked with for 20 sessions in 2025. Ursula had a positive experience of several of the interventions we worked on together, but in particular she found imagery rescripting very helpful and transformative. I've briefly mentioned this in a previous blog post (erectile dysfunction).

Ursula’s Experience of Therapy in Her Own Words

I'll hand you over to Ursula to give you a personal insight into the process and experience of therapy, which was powerful for us both.

Why I Sought Therapy

I came to see Caroline at a challenging time in my life – I felt fragile and had become afraid of my body response after I'd had unexpected panic attacks when recounting a traumatic event involving being in a car that had linked to similar childhood events. This had led me to fearing potential triggers, particularly in relation to a specific aspect of my work, and I'd become fearful of having a body response. I previously had therapy some years before, but never using a cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) approach, and I'd never heard of imagery rescripting.

My Experience of Imagery Rescripting

After a number of sessions with Caroline where we explored my thought patterns, the event that had led me to see her and various other helpful approaches including a timeline of my life with themes, we then moved to the imagery rescripting work. I was interested in knowing more about this technique, so Caroline shared some research papers with me – this helped me understand and have faith in this evidence-based approach.

I'd come to feel comfortable talking with Caroline in the sessions that preceded the imagery rescripting work – her warm, compassionate understanding had facilitated me feeling a sense of connection and safety. There was also laughter in the sessions, which helped me to feel relaxed. For me, this rapport was really important before the imagery rescripting sessions took place. To be able to be vulnerable enough to take someone with me into the dark recesses of my mind, where painful emotions remained, required trust. Caroline had facilitated me being able to allow myself to trust her and the process, because I felt we'd built a strong therapeutic alliance.

So, before the first imagery rescripting session, I knew I was going to be going back into an old memory. I'd quietly wondered if it was going to be a bit like that Black Mirror episode where the guy is able to step into old photographs to explore his memories accompanied by an AI guide! It wasn't really like that, but it was indeed like stepping back in time; reliving a memory with Caroline there guiding me. It felt reassuring to know I wasn't going back into these memories alone, but that Caroline would be there guiding me through the process.

The Practice Session

Caroline had explained that first we'd do a practice imagery rescripting session to see how I responded to it, before we used the approach with more traumatic memories. I had to think of a memory that had substance to it but wasn't too challenging to face. It helped to do this in advance, so I had a selection of potential memories that I'd thought about from the timeline work.

I knew these rescripting sessions were going to be longer, so I sat in a comfortable place with cushions and a blanket. In each of the rescripting sessions I closed my eyes – this made it easier to block out distractions so I could really take myself back and enter the memory in my mind’s eye. I could hear Caroline’s voice – she was on the video call – but it felt almost like she was standing next to me as I went back in time. I completed three imagery rescripting sessions (focusing on one memory in each). In the first, I returned to a memory I experienced as a 20-year-old at university (the practice session); the next one was when I was a small child; and in the last, I revisited the memory from a few years before that had led me to therapy.

Each rescripting session followed the same process involving three stages. To elaborate the process, I’ll explain the ‘practice’ rescripting session where I went into a memory from many years before, when I was a student at university living in a new city. In the first stage, Caroline asked me to describe the memory as my younger self experiencing it. To bring the memory alive in my mind, Caroline asked me what I could see and what I was doing. She'd explained that we'd go through a beginning, middle and end to my description of events and, even if I couldn’t remember it all exactly, I could add in the details.

I described the memory to her as if I was reliving it live in my mind. I described the details as I saw them through my younger eyes – of getting ready in my university room, then being in a restaurant with my much older partner and colleagues who I felt intimidated by, then my partner humiliating me in front of them, then feeling a sense of shame and embarrassment, then the end of the evening afterwards.

The second stage was going through the memory again, but this time as myself at the age I am now, watching my younger self. In this stage, Caroline asked me how I felt for my younger self. I recall feeling compassionately towards my younger, less knowledgeable self. I noticed how vulnerable I'd been then without really knowing it at that age. I was also able to see that my then partner’s unkind behaviour had lacked empathy, and that the colleagues weren't really people to be intimidated by. I also saw myself as a young woman that was much freer, focusing on having fun and adventures. I realised I missed those aspects of my younger self.

In the third rescripting stage, I went through the memory again, from start to finish, with myself as I am now watching my younger self. However, this time my current self intervened to ‘rescript’ the memory. So, in the part of the memory when I felt my partner humiliated me, I ‘edited’ the memory by stepping in to speak to my younger self and advised her. It felt almost like I was parenting my younger self by explaining that she was being treated without kindness and that she should say this was unacceptable to her partner.

Then, in the ‘new’ version of the memory, my younger self speaks up to advocate for herself, naming the bad behaviour, which she hadn’t done previously. It felt empowering. It's not like I didn’t know what the real trajectory of the actual events were, but I viewed it differently somehow after the rescripting. I could simultaneously see it through my older, more experienced eyes, as well as how I’d seen it through my younger eyes. The memory now had less emotional charge.

Working With More Traumatic Memories

I valued and actually enjoyed the imagery rescripting process with this memory, so then in subsequent sessions we moved to rescripting two much more traumatic memories that carried challenging emotions. I felt more able to approach these memories now, as I knew what to expect of the process. Also, knowing Caroline would be there as an anchor of calm gave me more confidence to face them. The subsequent two imagery rescripting sessions were harder, as I was taking myself back to these really difficult memories and going through them in my mind. However, through the imagery rescripting process, with my current self being able to intervene to offer my younger self comfort, the memories now had a different chosen ending where I felt looked after. These memories now hold less sadness and fear.

The first thing I noticed each time after the rescripting sessions, when I opened my eyes, was an overwhelming sense of peace. Not only in my mind, but I also felt deep relaxation in my body. I don’t know if this is how other people feel, but for me it was an incredibly powerful sense of calm – my busy mind had become quiet and still. It was like I'd let go of something (perhaps that I'd carried without really knowing it for decades) – it felt like a profound release.

I left the rescripting sessions with a newfound self-compassion, knowing my task was to continue to nurture myself. During the imagery rescripting, I felt like Caroline was championing my progress; she makes you feel proud of what you've achieved and she knows the emotional work you're doing is hard. I think she always wants her clients to be able to move past what has brought them to her through empowering them.

How Has Your Life Changed Since Therapy?

I used to make notes in and after sessions so I could reflect on my learning afterwards, practise the new techniques and do any ‘homework’ tasks. Now, when I look at these notes from earlier sessions, I can see such clear progress and a version of my thinking that's now much more in my past. I almost don't recognise who I was in those initial sessions.

I can now recognise my thought patterns and name them far more easily, then redirect my thoughts into ones that better serve me. I've become less fearful of having a body response. Also, I became aware through the life timeline and the rescripting work that I wasn't prioritising the things in my life that sustain me and give me joy.

So, I'm making an effort to focus on my wellbeing and plan more time doing things I find fun with the people in my life that bring me joy. I'm calmer and happier. I feel so much more empowered after the therapy with Caroline. I have new skills and awareness. I smile at the progress I made – it all felt life-changing.

What's Your Advice For Anyone Thinking of Starting Therapy?

Take action to start therapy so that you can heal and have a better life. We all need help at challenging times in our lives from others that have the knowledge, skills and compassion to support us to positively change. Start your therapeutic journey, so you can soon meet the happier person that you'll become.

Caroline’s Comments and Reflections

Trauma Memories

Traumatic memories have different characteristics. In Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), as we saw with Dickie, the memory is re-experienced, as if it's happening in the here and now. This quality of ‘nowness’ leads to fear and terror as if it were happening right now. We often refer to these experiences as 'flashbacks', which can be experienced across a range of senses.

Ursula didn't have PTSD, but her experience of trauma is no less valid. Ursula had experienced a range of traumatic and humiliating events during both adult and childhood that led to high levels of fear; an echo back to an earlier trauma where there's a seemingly familiar experience about a here-and-now event. These memories trigger representative emotions and beliefs that were generated previously, and lead to responding to these in the same way. It’s a shortcut in information processing to keep us safe, i.e. the brain is doing its best to keep us from harm. However, this shortcut may not be accurate and often leads to the reinforcement of the original emotions and mental representations of a similar experience. Thus, it's really difficult to change our mind and how we feel.

Imagery Rescripting

Ursula has given us a wonderful insight of her experience of imagery rescripting and the process, and I touched on this in the erectile dysfunction article too. We used this technique to process traumatic memories that were from childhood and early adulthood. I find this technique to be very helpful and often transformative. Looking into different perspectives of the same event can release the ‘stuckness’ of an unpleasant feeling, and changes what we believe about it.

The Therapeutic Alliance

Like Dickie, Ursula talked about the therapeutic alliance, and how valuable she found my approach in engaging and supporting her to do the work of returning to a memory that she'd rather not revisit. It can be scary to open a box that we've been doing everything we can to avoid.

I'd like to thank Ursula for all her hard work and courage in the therapeutic process. She really did do all the work.