The Neurofeedback Experience

The initial session will be an intake session during which a discussion of your symptoms, in your own words, will take place. You will be asked to rate the severity of 5-8 symptoms you experience on a good day, a bad day, and an average day, on a score ranging from 0 ( no experience of the symptom ) to 10 ( a very sever experience of the symptom). Other relevant information will be requested, including a self-evaluation of your ACE score that will not require any disclosure of personal information to the provider. An opportunity will be given to share other relevant information, including current medications and current sources of stress in your life Then, first few sessions will involve an iterative process, beginning with certain very specific frequency settings and electrode placements, you will be asked to relax and simply watch an audio-visual presentation which you have selected depending on your personal preferences, which may be an animation, a movie, or a game theme. 

It is important to understand that there is no competitive element to the game themes; no task will be assigned and no correct or incorrect or high or low score evaluations will be taking place. You will simply relax and watch the screen. You are likely to notice some “flickering effect” or “shrinking and expanding” effect, or a speeding up or slowing down of fogging up and clearing effect of an animation; these effects may be pronounced or barely noticeable. These effects are the reflection of the brain receiving the feedback through the Cygnet system in response to the signals coming into the Cygnet system from the electrode placements that are monitoring brain functions of reward and inhibition. A rebalancing process is immediately beginning to take place whereby the brain, which innately understands optimum functioning or the absence of it, is empowered to rebalance itself once given visual evidence of how it is performing. Over the standard course of 20 thirty-minute sessions, plus additional sessions in some cases or as desired, the re-learning the brain has experienced becomes sustainable.

During the neurofeedback sessions the provider will occasionally ask how you are feeling and may make modest frequency adjustments. During a session, or in subsequent future sessions the provider may change the electrode placements, always making sure to ask how you are feeling. At the beginning of each session the provider will ask how you felt during the time that elapsed during the last session; this is important information that will guide the work of the provider. If you have questions about my procedures, we should discuss them whenever they arise.