Massacre in Norway triggers lessons in bereavement, grief, trauma and mental health
The massacre in Norway raises many points about mental health, bereavement, grief and trauma.
Let’s look first at Anders Behring Breivik whose actions resulted in 76 people being killed or, as we write this, unaccounted for. While it might have been legally judicious for his lawyer to label Breivik “insane”, using that word says more about prejudice than it does about understanding mental health.
When people retreat from the norm – behaving anti-socially, whether by withdrawing from others or behaving inhumanely towards themselves or others – it is often because they feel out of kilter with the world, or misunderstood by it, or because they cannot manage their emotions. This is not a defence of Breivik’s behavour (clearly extreme and exceptional) but it is an example of what can happen if mental illnesses are not recognised, diagnosed or treated.
While the majority of our clients are well-informed and self-aware, mental illness remains a taboo. Talking about mental health issues with partners, family, friends – or with colleagues at work – is not something everyone has the chance or inclination to do. Keeping concerns private does not often lead to extremes of behaviour – but it can cause significant shifts in behaviour or personality, turning people in on themselves. And that could lead to self-harm, eating disorders, mis-using drugs or alcohol, an over-reliance on smoking; it could cause anxiety, panic, stress, phobias, sleep issues. It can also affect behaviour and performance at work and relationships. Anyone feeling they do not fit in, that others are against them, or that they cannot cope deserves support and encouragement. Yet, as our human instinct is often to shy away from exposing what we think of as private weaknesses or inadequacies, support is often hard to seek.
The Norwegian tragedy also shows how others can be affected, directly or indirectly.
We’ve heard about the guilt that some survivors of the incident feel – that they escaped his attention or were just of out range so they lived but others didn’t. There is anger at the police – for taking what the public considered too long to respond to the incident, and for not having the right means to get their fast. Many who witnessed the incident were immediately traumatised and may remain affected by the trauma for some time. Some parents felt relief on learning their child was safe, but their relief was tinged with sadness at others’ loss. We saw the tearful response of the King and Queen of Norway at the memorial service, shocked and saddened by the individual deaths and by what was the country’s biggest loss of life since the second world war. And we noted the stunned expression on the Norwegian prime minister’s face as he took control of the incident, balancing his emotions with his responsibilities to set a lead for the country and protect its reputation as a tourist destination.
Paramedics who reached the scene described the people they found as traumatised. Those paramedics are likely to have built up resilience that helps them manage their reactions to traumatic incidents but they might need continuing support to maintain that resilience.
And we’ve experienced our own reactions, at a distance from the incident, trying to make sense of it from our perspectives, with many of us reliving grief at lives lost years ago or recently.
All of these reactions are normal – grief is a complex emotion even when a death or loss occurs naturally and is expected. Sometimes it takes an extreme act for people to notice the extent of their own or others’ mental distress – and to give themselves permission to seek help to overcome it.
If this traumatic incident has triggered difficult emotions, changed behaviours, or reopened issues you thought were under control, do get in touch with us for professional, therapeutic support. We offer a range of therapies including EMDR (recognised by NICE as particularly effective for recovering from trauma), CBT, hypnotherapy, psychotherapy and counselling - and often recommend a blend of therapies so each person receives the form of therapy that is best for them.
29/07/2011 | Posted in Psychotherapy, Psychodynamic therapy, Psychoanalytical therapy, Person-centred counselling, NLP, Integrative counselling, Hypnotherapy, Humanistic psychotherapy, Gestalt therapy, Existential counselling, EMDR, EFT, Counselling, CBT, Sensorimotor psychotherapy,
Hypnotherapy can help healing
Despite the way hypnosis is often portrayed in the media, on films and television, hypnotherapy is a real tool to help people overcome real issues in everyday life - issues such as weight loss, overcoming phobias and quitting bad habits like smoking and nail biting.
Hypnotherapy is also particularly useful for healing. In no way is it suggested that hypnotherapy should be used instead of conventional medicine and treatments, but it is a valuable alternative treatment that can work alongside conventional medicine. And it is now available on the NHS.
Hypnotherapy can be used to overcome emotional problems and mental blocks. It is often said that laughter is the best medicine and that being stressed does not help anybody. Using hypnosis simply as a relaxation and visualisation tool helps to relieve stress and that can allow conventional medicine and treatment to work twice as effectively.
Contrary to popular opinion, people do experience the feeling of hypnosis; they don’t black out or forget everything that was said. It is relaxing and helps the unconscious part of a person to work in coordination with the conscious part and stop us battling with ourselves. In this way, hypnosis allows the healing process to take place.
27/05/2009 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Hypnotherapy helps mum lose four stone
We have talked in previous articles about how hypnosis can be used to assist weight loss and, indeed, celebrities such as Lily Allen have dropped dress sizes using hypnotherapy.
According to reports in the media this week, one mother has had hypnosis to help her believe she had had a gastric band fitted. It took five sessions with a hypnotherapist to help Marie Corns after she had ballooned in weight to 15 stone and 6 lbs. After hypnotherapy, Marie found she felt full following small portions of food and, in the space of only four months, she lost just under four stone and went from a size 22 to a size 14.
Marion, 35, from Whiston, Merseyside, said: “I have tried every other diet and exercise plan the world has to offer. I’ve tried tablets, Weight Watchers, Atkins, SlimFast, even a personal trainer but none of them helped me. I can remember every part of the ‘procedure’, including being wheeled into theatre, the clink of the surgeon’s knife and even the smell of the anaesthetic. Now if I try to eat a large portion I feel a pulling sensation in my tummy.”Marie decided to try hypnotherapy after her friend had hypnosis to help her stop smoking. Naturally, when having hypnosis for weight loss it is important that people do follow dietary advice and see a properly qualified hypnotherapist.
25/05/2009 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Hypnotherapy for bulimia
Bulimia is a problem that affects many young people, particularly women although men can be affected too. The actress, Natalie India-West, who has just clinched a major acting role in a forthcoming film The Goodfellow, said:
"It started when I was at school, I was getting really into my dancing in a big way, the pressure of it was huge, I desperately wanted to be thin. Because I couldn't starve myself I thought if I make myself sick then hopefully I might lose weight, because it worked I thought 'oh great', but little did I know the consequences it would have on my life".Like many bulimics, Natalie was secretive and tried to hide her bulimia but she became weak and suffered nosebleeds and, at just seven and a half stone, she finally faced her problem and underwent hypnotherapy for her bulimia and treatment. Hypnotherapy can be used to help eating issues like anorexia and bulimia, and many more.
28/04/2009 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Checking hypnotherapist details
Thanks to the popularity of complementary therapies, hypnotherapy is considered a popular profession and therefore quite lucrative. With the recession and redundancies, many people are looking for a new career and it is expected that the recession will show an increase in the number of hypnotherapists as people see it as a way to retrain to a new profession. Naturally, there is nothing wrong with this, however, when you want to see a qualified hypnotherapist to help you overcome your phobia, increase your confidence, quit smoking, lose weight or any of a wide number of issues that hypnotherapy can successfully help you with, you want to make sure that who you are dealing with is both properly trained and qualified. It is important therefore to use a hypnotherapist you are comfortable with.
Seeing a hypnotherapist in their home is not something everyone is comfortable with and this is why many people choose to go to a company that employs hypnotherapists for this sort of work, provides the therapy rooms and also completes the proper checks on a hypnotherapist. There is little regulation in the UK and anybody can set themselves up as a hypnotherapist. It is therefore important that you seek ease of mind by using a hypnotherapist who has done a certain number of hours training, continues to train and keep up to date and has had the proper checks done.
06/04/2009 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
How can hypnotherapy help weight loss?
Many people have become much more interested in the idea of using hypnotherapy for weight loss after the media and hype surrounding Lily Allen’s recent weight loss using a hypnotherapist. The singer dropped two dress sizes and said that thanks to hypnotherapy she had found all the motivation she needed to get to the gym, enjoy her workouts and avoid the foods that had previously been her downfall. So can hypnosis really work to help people lose weight and how?
Hypnosis works in many instances for weight loss because losing weight is not just about stopping eating. Many who suffer from being overweight are overeating for emotional reasons. For example, many eat because they feel stressed, have low self-esteem or use it as a coping mechanism. Hypnotherapists help people to replace these negative thoughts and negative cycles with healthier ones, which help us to make healthier food choices. New, positive processes are established that reinforce feeling good about oneself, such as going to the gym or coping in other ways - taking a long bath or reading a good book. In this way, people lose weight not because the hypnosis did anything to them physically, but it stopped the emotional need to overeat.
24/02/2009 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Four stone weight loss with hypnotherapy
Sixty-eight year old Maureen Foster from Tamworth, Staffordshire was featured in the Tamworth Herald earlier this week as a result of her losing weight with hypnosis. Maureen has lost over four stone in weight and reduced her dress size from a size 22 to a size 12 using the process of hypnotherapy. Maureen told the newspaper:
“I've tried all the different diets and I've lost weight every time, but I've always put it back on. This is the only one that I've kept the weight off – it's not a diet, it's a way of life. I was a size 22, I had been as low as a 14 before, but I'd never been able to maintain it – now I'm a size 12. I've always struggled with my weight, all my life. But now it just feels normal."Maureen had tried every diet in the past but, thanks to hypnotherapy, she has lost weight and hasn’t eaten a chocolate or biscuit since and has found that she no longer wants them. In this case, Maureen was lucky to find that a hypnotherapy CD worked but in many cases these aren’t always perfect because they are made to suit a broad range of people. When you see a hypnotherapist for weight loss, they can tailor the session to suit you perfectly so sometimes even if you tried a hypnosis CD and it didn’t work, seeing a hypnotherapist has a much higher success rate, often in just one or two sessions.
11/01/2009 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Lily Allen and hypno-diets
The magazines and media have been full of celebrity gossip about Lily Allen this week as the singer has been showing off her new figure. Lily Allen has returned from her New Year trip to the US looking slimmer than ever, having reportedly dropped two full dress sizes using the latest trend in America - to use hypnotherapy for weight loss. The media has named this the"hypno-diet".
Susan Hepburn, a Harley Street hypnotist, said, "It's very big in LA and New York and it's becoming increasingly popular in London. During sessions, I taught Lily to favour healthy, low-fat meals instead of junk food. And to see that alcohol isn't a confidence booster, it's just extra calories that sabotage your efforts to get a good body".
Using hypnotherapy for weight loss is not new. However, giving it a media-friendly name like 'hypno-dieting' and seeing celebrities such as Lily Allen, Geri Halliwell and Sophie Dahl promoting the benefits does bring it into the public eye, showing how people can manage their weight without developing eating disorders.
08/01/2009 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Freud’s contribution to hypnotherapy
There is much debate about who invented hypnosis and how it was discovered. Sigmund Freud (1856 – 1939) is known for having invented psychoanalysis. He is generally credited with introducing the idea of dual consciousness to the western world i.e. the idea that we have both a conscious and subconscious mind and this underlying thought is the basis of hypnosis. Hence he made a great contribution to the development of hypnosis and subsequently hypnotherapy, the use of hypnosis for therapeutic benefit.
Nowadays, hypnotherapy is becoming more and more mainstream and many hypnotherapists do work for the NHS with referrals from GPs for patients who need to quit smoking or lose weight, although this is still fairly rare albeit often successful. Hypnotherapy is mainly thought of as a way of curing phobias and quitting smoking, but it can also be used for many other emotional and physical issues. If you are unsure if hypnosis can help you, make an enquiry with a hypnotherapist at a reputable clinic and a good hypnotherapist will be happy to answer any questions that you might have.
09/12/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Caesarean section under hypnotherapy
In Iran, obstetricians have recently performed the country’s second ever caesarean section operation using hypnotherapy instead of anaesthesia. Obstetrician, Roya Khodai, said:
“The patient was subjected to hypnotherapy upon entering the operation room and was ready to have the C-section after 30 minutes.”
Khodai said the c-section took around 30 minutes and the baby was born without any notable complication. She also added the mother’s vitals were controlled throughout the surgery, although an anaesthesiologist was available in case of any unexpected issues. The only complication reported apparently was a small amount of blood loss that was brought under control immediately, and both mum and baby are in good health.
Khodai also commented that hypnosis is considered effective as an alternative to anaesthesia for patients in minor surgery - caesarean sections are classed as a major operation - and is ideal to overcome complications relating to the use of anaesthesia.
Hypnotherapy is being used more frequently in operations, and is also successful in helping people to overcome emotional and physical problems such as quitting smoking, weight loss, phobias, and many more. Many women are turning to hypnosis for a natural, pain free labour without medication.
26/11/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy, Hypno-birthing,
Hypnotherapy and eating disorders
Many people who have had eating disorders say that hypnosis helps them to find out how to deal with the psychological and emotional part of the illness. Clients learn new eating habits and gain control over their life again. Binge eaters and those with bulimia feel more in control and those with anorexia learn how to see themselves and feel better about themselves. Comfort-eaters learn how to deal with their emotions instead of turning to food.
A common method in hypnosis, used for many things, is mental imagery. Hypnosis is when your mind is in a heightened state of concentration, with the hypnotherapist guiding the client towards helping themselves. Mental imagery is used to allow the client to envisage themselves improving throughout the hypnosis sessions.
Often, self hypnosis is helpful, too, and the hypnotherapist will teach the client how to use self-hypnosis so the client can use it whenever needed, when the hypnotherapist is not there.
Clients often need four to eight sessions, though some might benefit from more depending on the severity of their eating disorder. Each session lasts around 50 minutes. Before having hypnotherapy for an eating disorder it is best to seek advice from a medical professionals - to ensure that a client is doing what is good for them. There are no side effects with hypnosis.
20/11/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Blackpool man has hypnotherapy after acomplia
A Blackpool man was featured in the Blackpool Gazette recently as he told the paper how he had suffered suicidal thoughts after he had been prescribed a controversial weight loss diet drug, Acomplia, otherwise known as rimonabant. Gordon Pothecary came off the medication two months ago and, after reading of the worrying side effects in the papers this week, was shocked to discover the drug had been linked to suicide. The drug has now been banned in the UK.
Mr Pothecary, of Hornsey Avenue, said: "It did make me have suicidal thoughts. I would never have acted on them but it did make me think I would be better off not being here anymore. I felt I couldn't see a way out. I'd been taking another drug called Oralstat for about two-and-a-half months and I lost about 1.5lbs to 2lbs a month, but didn't suffer any side-effects. I went to see the nurse and she said they were changing my medication on to this new one. I lost about 12 or 13lbs in the first few months. It gradually got worse and worse, my stomach felt all tensed up, I was short-tempered. My moods were terrible. I would fly off the handle at the smallest things. All those side-effects I read about sounded very familiar: low mood, depression, anxiety, irritability, nervousness and I couldn't sleep."Mr Pothecary is now having hypnotherapy to help him to ease the symptoms and to get back to his old self and will shortly be starting counselling.
He commented: "After I came off it and started having hypnotherapy, I did feel better. Now I am gradually getting back to normal.”Hypnosis can help to ease both physical and mental symptoms and many people use it for weight loss.
04/11/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy, Counselling,
Mark Owen has hypnotherapy
Mark Owen, of Take That stardom, is having hypnotherapy, to help him quit smoking, as he is desperate to give up his smoking habit before his second child is born. Mark, aged 36, has smoked since his teenage years but now wants to stop smoking for his two year old son Elwood and his unborn child with his fiancée Emma Ferguson. After 20 years of smoking, Mark has found it very difficult to give up. Mark said:
“I was on 15 a day, more when I was working. The first two days were the hardest [but] I keep getting angry and snapping for no reason. I keep eating too, anything, just so I can put something in my mouth.”
Hypnosis is one of the best ways to give up smoking as it can help you at a subconscious level. Many stars have turned to hypnosis for help with phobias, weight loss and to quit their smoking habits. For the change to work, you must really want it and sometimes a life-changing event such as the birth of a new child can give you the incentive you need.
03/11/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Psychotherapy for seasonal affective disorder
There are many people who dread this time of year. It is when people start to feel the effects of Season Affective Disorder (SAD). Symptoms include feeling depressed, hopeless, anxious, as though you have no energy, oversleeping, losing interest in otherwise favourite activities, weight gain and difficulty concentrating.
They only apply during the autumn and winter and tend to fade during warmer, sunny days.
A doctor can advise if your own symptoms are actually related to SAD and they might run tests to rule out other possibilities. However, there is no test to diagnose SAD.
For those who do suffer from SAD, the most effective treatment is an increased exposure to sunlight and many people purchase a light box, which imitates natural light. Another option that not everyone thinks of is psychotherapy or cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT). CBT can help to pick out and change the thought processes that contribute to the symptoms. It is all about spotting negative thought processes and helping us to replace them with more positive thoughts.
SAD is a long-term illness. However, psychotherapy and CBT can often help sufferers to cope with it.
17/10/2008 | Posted in CBT, Psychotherapy,
What can hypnotherapy help with?
As regular readers will know, hypnotherapy is a powerful tool using hypnosis for therapeutic purposes. But many people still associate hypnotherapy with stopping smoking and curing fears and that is it.
Hypnotherapy can be used for so many different things that the list is almost endless and hypnotherapists are finding new uses for it all the time. It can be used for almost any problem or situation where the body and the mind both come into play. Here are just a few of the issues that hypnotherapy has been used to help:
- sports – improving performance, anxiety, coaching, overcoming concentration problem, increasing focus, motivation;
- business – stress management, assertiveness, motivation and direction, problem solving and communication, public speaking, confidence;
- education – increasing concentration and focus, improving memory, exam nerves, study techniques;
- personal – increasing confidence or self-esteem, curing phobias and fears (whether of spiders, flying, heights, thunderstorms), anxiety and depression, insomnia, habits, addictions and other unwanted behaviour (nail biting, bedwetting, smoking, alcohol, drugs), sexual or relationship issues, eating disorders, shyness and blushing, pain management;
- health - chronic pain, hypno-birthing, IBS, snoring, dermatitis, asthma, nausea from pregnancy or chemotherapy.
Hypnotherapy promotes better health, well being and better life. For years, it was helped thousands of people in their every day lives.
22/09/2008 | Posted in Hypno-birthing,
Overcoming corporate stress
Many business people recognise stress as their top complaint. But they do not necessarily realise how much stress can contribute to health problems until it is too late.
Although stress starts at work, it affects home life and other areas quite quickly. For example, it can interrupt normal sleeping patterns, cause weight loss or gain, and cause a lack of concentration. This can cause issues at home for the person's partner, children, family and friends.
Hypnotherapy is often used to relieve stress and many companies have seen success by incorporating hypnotherapy into their employees' routines and corporate benefits. Hypnosis helps, not just by relieving the stress but also by teaching the patient's mind how to deal with stress.
The physical problems we feel from stress are caused by a reaction in our mind. Sometimes a patient will have no conscious or concrete idea of why they are stressed. So the hypnotherapist can work with them on an unconscious level to help discover the reasons and how best to deal with them. It is not only a case of learning how to deal with new stress but also how to release the old stress of the past. Hypnotherapy can help people to do that.
06/08/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Using hypnotherapy for motivation
Everyone is aware of using hypnosis to help them quit smoking, increase confidence, release their fears or lose weight. If you think about all these different effects, they are all changes to your life. Ultimately, you need motivation to make a change or you wouldn't change.
However, even with motivation, even with wanting to change, change is not easy.
Hypnotherapy helps with motivating you to change - from the inside, really motivating your unconscious self so that it is easy to make that change. You may need motivation for other changes, so think of all the things hypnosis can help with simply by focussing on your motivation for the task in hand. You might need motivation to set up your own business or to work on a particular task at work. Hypnosis will focus your mind and help you to concentrate.
You can only work on one change at a time - to help your unconscious mind to absorb the changes you need.
Hypnosis helps remove those littles voices in your head that stop you from achieving your goal. Voices saying things like "you don't deserve it", "you're not good enough", "you have no time" and more - you will know which unhelpful phrases you hear yourself say to yourself.
Don't let a lack of motivation stop you getting or doing what you want in life.
31/07/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Symptoms of depression
Depression is more common than you might think, however, it is also often misdiagnosed when people feel down or are going through a tough period in their lives. Here is a list of common depression symptoms. Many people do not experience them all but if you have a few of these it might be worth seeking some help. Depression does not always mean treatment through medication. Often, other therapies can also help, such as psychotherapy, CBT or hypnotherapy.
- Low mood almost all day, every day
- Loss of interest or enjoyment in activities you normally like
- Feeling weepy, bursting into tears uncontrollably
- Feeling guilty, worthless or useless a lot of the time
- Lack of motivation, even for the simple thing sin life
- Lack of concentration, even to watch tv, read or work
- Lack of sleep or waking up early and unable to get back to sleep
- Lack of energy, always tired
- Going off sex and affection
- Poor appetite resulting in weight loss
- Too much appetite resulting in weight gain
- Often irritable, restless and agitated
- Symptoms are generally worse in the mornings
- Physical symptoms such as more frequent headaches, chest pain or general aches
- Preoccupation with death or suicide, thinking about it a lot
18/07/2008 | Posted in Psychotherapy, Hypnotherapy, CBT,
Atomic Kitten Liz lost weight with hypnotherapy
For those who saw Celebrity Love Island, it was painful to watch as 27 year old Atomic Kitten's blonde bombshell Liz McClarnon competed with fellow celebrities Lady Isabella Hervey and Rebecca Loos in competitive weigh ins.
According to Liz, she was not short of self confidence but the competitive weigh ins left her feeling humiliated and self conscious. Liz told Now Magazine:
"I was uncomfortable the whole time and hunched my shoulders to hide my body. When I got home and saw the pictures, I knew I had to do something. It wasn't just my weight that bothered me, but my lack of confidence. I didn't want to be that hunched, shy girl."Liz turned to her mum, a qualified hypnotherapist, for help and to stop her old junk food addiction. Before the hypnosis, Liz said she used to eat lots of chocolate and around four packets of crisps each day. She said that after just the one hypnotherapy session, her food habits started to change and it was easy to do so. The hypnotherapy helped her to lose more than one stone and she has now dropped from a size 12 to a svelte size 8 figure. Hypnotherapy can really help with weight loss as it can help you to change old habits.
08/07/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy,
Combating bulimia with CBT
Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is generally thought of as being one of the most successful psychotherapies for bulimia, or bulimia nervosa. Bulimia nervosa is an eating disorder where the sufferer will often binge on extremes of food and then force themselves to throw it up to prevent themselves from gaining weight. Many sufferers report a feeling of loss of control whilst bingeing and the purging is often their way of gaining back that control.
CBT, especially when combined with hypnosis, is a very effective and quick therapy. When dealing with bulimia, CBT aims to interrupt the old thinking processes associated with the issue, such as the preoccupation with food or weight, the 'all or nothing' thought process and the low self esteem that generally comes with bulimia. It also aims to interrupt the 'binge-purge' cycle.
Many therapists will ask their patients to keep a food diary and give feedback on the meal plans, triggers of thought processes, etc. CBT and hypnosis are used to challenge these old patterns. Around 50 per cent of bulimics are able to stop the binge-purge cycle using CBT. From the remaining 50 per cent, many show partial improvement and only a small minority do not respond. Sometimes, bulimia is a symptom of a food-obsessed family background so occasionally, family therapy is also recommended to decrease the chance of a relapse.
26/06/2008 | Posted in CBT, Hypnotherapy, Psychotherapy,
A virtual gastric band to lose weight
In the last year or so, publicity about the fitting of a gastric band around your stomach to help you lose weight has heightened and many people have undergone the procedure, despite its £7,000 plus price tag. Now imagine that if you were overweight and hypnotised, you could wake up convinced you had had the procedures and could experience all the sensations of the gastric band, including the steady weight loss without actually having had the surgery.
For one British-run clinic in southern Spain, they have been finetuning hypnotherapy combined with cognitive behavioural therapy to do just that. The patient undergoes six relaxing and pleasant sessions over a two week period, including one deep hypnotherapy session where they have the gastric band virtually-fitted. Just like when you have a real gastric band fitted, the patients even re-visit the clinic over the ensuing months to adjust the virtual gastric band to suit the weight loss rate agreed.
The use of hypnotherapy and CBT has been publicised widely as ideal therapies to combine, each underpins the other, working in conjunction with each other for some amazingly effective results in all sorts of cases. Even the BBC has run several documentaries on the use of the two therapies. Indeed, the medical profession has now come round to accept the idea of the mind-body link, and it may well be the answer to our global obesity issue.
In the case of the virtual gastric band, if nothing else, the client saves the £7,000 fee, the hospitalisation and surgery, no risks of MRSA, anasthetic or DVT (deep vein thrombosis) and more. As hypnotherapy grows in popularity and becomes more widely accepted, because people now feel it is not taboo to talk about it, we may well be seeing a real increase in acceptance from the medical profession.
23/06/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy, CBT,
Hypnotherapy and weight loss
Even if you don't believe that hypnotherapy can help you to lose weight by itself, there is no doubt that many people find it difficult to stick to a diet or exercise plan. This is where hypnosis can help. It can help to retrain your mind to increase your motivation, make that motivation feel more real for you and keep it in your mind.
Hypnotherapy can help you to think like a leaner person and develop new habits as well as discard old ones. This does not, however, make it the easy option and you should be wary of wild and exaggerated claims that it is some sort of magic. It is a shame that there are not more scientific, properly monitored studies into hypnosis and its effect on weight loss. Mott (1982) said:
"although hypnosis is sometimes referred to as a method of treatment, it is more accurate to regard hypnosis as a facilitator of a number of different treatment methods".Previous studies have shown that hypnotherapy works best when combined with a behavioural weight management program and works best when the hypnosis is tailored to the individual rather than just a group programme, which is why many people prefer to visit a hypnotherapist rather than use a CD recording. Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) helps to identify problematic behaviours and retrain and adopt new behaviours. If you are interested in how hypnotherapy can help you to lose weight, ask for details.
19/06/2008 | Posted in Hypnotherapy, CBT,
Obesity in 2010
In recent years, obesity has become a favourite topic in the news, with many articles and much publicity on the damage it can do to our bodies, our nation and our children.
A government report published earlier this year predicted that, by 2010, more than 12 million adults and a million children will be classed as obese. The problem is getting worse and we need to do something about it now.
Just going on a diet does not usually turn out to be a permanent solution for many people; to combat obesity requires a change in lifestyle. However, willpower and motivation play a huge factor.
Hypnotherapy is often used for weight loss and obesity so hypnotherapists are likely to see an even larger increase in the number of clients wanting hypnosis. Over-eating is an emotional need or want, rather than a physical one, so it makes sense to tackle the problem emotionally.
Many people associate eating with a comfort or habit or they overeat when they experience emotional turmoil of some kind, or a regular emotion such as boredom or upset. For this reason, other therapies such as Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) are ideal as this therapy focuses upon habits and behaviour and works to replace them with more positive habits.
Many people like to find a hypnotherapist who is able to combine the best techniques from more than one therapy to suit the individual. For example, CBT can be combined with hypnotherapy and has proved very effective.
17/06/2008 | Posted in CBT, Hypnotherapy,
