Hypnotherapy means the use of hypnosis for the treatment and relief of a variety of somatic and psychological symptoms.
Hypnotherapy can be used to bring relief to existing conditions or to change areas where there are issues. The list of situations where it can aid the individual is endless and it is particularly effective for those who wish to take greater control—or perhaps regain control—of some aspect of their life.
Certain uses are well known such as for quitting smoking and for pain relief, but did you know that hypnotherapy can also be used to overcome a fear of public speaking, to improve performance on the playing field or even to prevent blushing?
Some of the many conditions that can be treated through hypnotherapy:
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Thanks to the On-line Medical Dictionary for their descriptions of these conditions.
Agoraphobia
- An unexplained fear of open spaces.
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- Anorexia
- The uncontrolled lack or loss of the appetite for food.
(Note that Anorexia Nervosa is described as an eating disorder characterised by a misperception of body image. Individuals with anorexia nervosa often believe they are overweight even when they are grossly underweight.)
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- Anxiety
- It is a word that has a wide ranging description, but
technically it is the unpleasant emotional state consisting of
psychophysiological responses to anticipation of unreal or imagined danger,
ostensibly resulting from unrecognised intrapsychic conflict. (You asked!)
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- Arthritis
- An inflammatory condition that affects joints.
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- Assertiveness
- Assertiveness training is a form of therapy in which a
client learns to feel free to make legitimate demands and refusals in
situations which previously elicited inappropriate responses.
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- Asthma
- A disease process that is characterised by paradoxical
narrowing of the bronchi (lung passageways) making breathing difficult.
Symptoms include wheezing, difficulty breathing (particularly exhaling air) and tightness in the chest.
Factors which can exacerbate asthma include rapid changes in temperature or humidity, allergies, upper respiratory infections, exercise, stress or smoke (from cigarettes).
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- Bed-wetting
- Technically known as 'Nocturnal Enuresis', it is the
involuntary passage of urine at night-time in children. Most bed-wetting
stops by the age of three and is twice as common in boys as in girls.
Causes have been attributed to delay in bladder muscle development, adjustment disorder (parents too controlling or aggressive), too early (and too coercive) to toilet training, diabetes and spinal cord lesions (rare).
A urinary tract infection should be excluded in the cases of a sudden onset of bed-wetting.
Treatment includes behaviour modification (rewarding good behaviour), supportive and helpful attitude by parents, limiting fluids at bedtime and alarm devices (a sleep pad that sets off an alarm when it gets wet). Vasopressin nasal spray has been used successfully to treat this condition in some children.
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- Blushing
- Involuntary reddening, especially of the face,
associated with feelings of embarrassment, confusion or shame.
As most sufferers will tell you, it is not the blushing that is the problem, but the fear of blushing, hence the alternative name of 'Erythrophobia'. (Erythro- is used to denote reddening, associated with red blood cells)
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- Bruxism
- Compulsive grinding or clenching of the teeth
especially at night.
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- Bulimia
- An eating disorder which is characterised by
self-induced vomiting after eating.
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- Compulsive
behaviour
- The behaviour of performing an act persistently and
repetitively without it leading to reward or pleasure. The act is usually a
small, circumscribed behaviour, almost ritualistic, yet not pathologically
disturbing.
Examples of compulsive behaviour include twirling of hair, checking something constantly, not wanting pennies in change, straightening tilted pictures, etc.
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- Creativity
enhancement
- Hypnotherapy can be beneficial in overcoming writers'
or artists' blocks, along with other situations where creativity is useful,
such as for problem solving.
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- Dentist fears
- 'Dentist-phobia' leads to dental problems associated
with lack of dental hygiene and dental maintenance. The phobia should be
addressed before the dental situation becomes unpleasant.
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- Depression
- A mental state of depressed mood characterised by
feelings of sadness, despair and discouragement. Depression ranges from
normal feelings of the blues through dysthymia to major depression.
It in many ways resembles the grief and mourning that follow bereavement; there are often feelings of low self-esteem, guilt and self-reproach, withdrawal from interpersonal contact and somatic symptoms such as eating and sleep disturbances.
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- Eczema
- A pruritic papulovesicular dermatitis occurring as a
reaction to many endogenous and exogenous agents. It is characterised in the
acute stage by erythema, oedema associated with a serous exudate between the
cells of the epidermis (spongiosis) and an inflammatory infiltrate in the
dermis, oozing and vesiculation and crusting and scaling and in the more
chronic stages by lichenification or thickening or both, signs of
excoriations and hyperpigmentation or hypopigmentation or both. Atopic
dermatitis is the most common type of dermatitis
Once an organic cause has been ruled out, Eczema - as with most skin conditions - responds very well to hypnotherapy.
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- Emotional
difficulties
- Many emotional difficulties can be relieved by
hypnotherapy either by enabling one to cope better with those emotions, or
by finding different, more appropriate emotions to replace those that are
causing difficulty.
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- Exam nerves
- Hypnotherapy is excellent for those who suffer with
anxiety before examinations.
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- Fear of flying
- Many sufferers only seek help for flying phobias when
they are have the prospect of a flight ahead, and they can't avoid it.
Hypnotherapy can help in the short term, to enable the sufferer to take that flight, or in the long term, to dissolve the phobia completely.
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- Headaches
- Headaches come in many forms, and those related to
anxiety and stress are particularly amenable to hypnotherapeutic
intervention.
Note that headaches can be of organic origin so it is important to have a medical check before seeking hypnotherapeutic treatment.
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- IBS
- A functional bowel disorder characterised by recurrent
crampy abdominal pain and diarrhoea. Invasive gastrointestinal diagnostics
are often unrevealing.
There is some feeling that IBS is primarily anxiety-based in origin, and it is known to respond well to hypnotherapy.
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- Impotence
- Impotence is the inability to achieve or sustain a
penile erection, however there are many sexual conditions that can be
relieved by hypnotherapy, and the umbrella term for them is 'psychogenic
infertility'.
Note that this refers to the fact that there is no organic origin behind the complaints. Any new sexual disfunction should always be investigated by your doctor first to rule out the possibility of an organic cause.
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- Interpersonal
skills
- In business, or in one's social life, the ability to
interact easily and efficiently with others is a boon. Self-confidence
issues can prevent this, and hypnotherapy can help individuals to find their
inner-confidence and overcome their fears of interpersonal interaction.
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- Interview
preparation
- For those who feel they get unduly nervous before an
interview, hypnotherapy can be used to great effect to bring out the
confidence and strengths that are present in other situations and use them
to overcome excessive fear.
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- Lack of
concentration
- The ability to concentrate depends on the ability to
focus on one thing and ignore distractions. By addressing the causes of the
lack of concentration, individuals can discover the ability to focus
intensely, with the advantage that this brings of greater retention and more
efficient learning.
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- Lack of
confidence
- The bread and butter of hypnotherapy - everyone goes
through periods and situations where they lack confidence, but when it is
sustained then hypnotherapy can help to bring it back in a positive way.
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- Low self-esteem
- Low self-esteem can be the result of a lifetime of
events or from a single trauma. Either way, it can be debilitating. A
considered hypnotherapy program can enable one to rediscover their own
self-respect and start to live the life that they always knew they could.
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- Nail-biting
- This is a common form of habitual body manipulation
which is an expression of tension. It can often be successfully treated in
just one session.
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- Nightmares
- My search for an official definition found this: A
condition in sleep usually caused by improper eating or by digestive or
nervous troubles, and characterised by a sense of extreme uneasiness or
discomfort (as of weight on the chest or stomach, impossibility of motion or
speech, etc), or by frightful or oppressive dreams, from which one wakes
after extreme anxiety, in a troubled state of mind.
Peaceful sleep can be achieved through hypnotherapeutic intervention.
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- Over-eating
- Whether for weight control or to stop binging,
hypnotherapy is widely accepted as an excellent therapy to help control the
diet and to start to eat more healthily.
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- Pain control
- Hypnosis has been used for pain control (and
documented) - up to and including surgery - for over 100 years. It is
excellent for the pain associated with arthritis, phantom limb pain and for
anaesthesia in many predictably painful situations (e.g. for dental work)
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- Panic disorders
- Symptoms of a panic attack usually begin abruptly and
include rapid heartbeat, chest sensations, shortness of breath, dizziness,
tingling, and anxiety.
Hypnotherapy can help identify the root cause of the anxiety and can provide tools to be used to stop a panic attack. Just knowing that you will be able to handle an attack when it happens, can greatly reduce the impact of the event.
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- Performance
anxiety
- Many people experience acute anxiety before they have
to 'perform', whether it be on a stage, a sports field, in front of an
audience, or even in bed.
In all situations, the underlying causes have some similarity and some uniqueness. Investigation via hypnotherapy can lead to resolution and dissolution of the problem.
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- Pre-operative
fears
- It is natural to become nervous before any significant
event, but when this leads to avoidance, and that avoidance is harmful, then
hypnotherapy can help to bring out the confidence and calmness required to
deal with the situation.
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- Post-operative
recovery
- Recovery from an operation can be hastened, scarring
and bruising reduced, and pain and discomfort relieved if hypnotherapy, and
- once taught - self-hypnosis are used.
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- Psoriasis
- A common chronic, squamous dermatosis, marked by
exacerbations and remissions and having a polygenic inheritance pattern. The
most distinctive histological findings in well developed psoriasis are Munro
microabscesses and spongiform pustules.
It is characterised clinically by the presence of rounded, circumscribed, erythematous, dry scaling patches of various sizes, covered by greyish white or silvery white, umbilicated and lamellar scales, which have a predilection for the extensor surfaces, nails, scalp, genitalia and lumbosacral region. Central clearing and coalescence of the lesions produce a wide variety of clinical configurations, including annular or circinate, discoid or nummular, figurate and gyrate arrangements.
Like all skin conditions, if there is no organic cause, then stress-related factors are the likely culprit, and hypnotherapy can produce relief from symptoms.
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- Sleeping problems
- Insomnia, early waking, disturbed sleep, snoring...
when you are asleep your unconscious mind is still at work looking after
you, and it can take care of many of the things that bother us - if only we
could access it more directly. With hypnotherapy, we can do just that.
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- Smoking
- Perhaps the most widely known and accepted use of
hypnotherapy is to help stop smoking. It is effective, there are no negative
side-effects (there are many positive ones) and it can normally be achieved
in one session. All that is required is the motivation to become a
non-smoker.
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- Snoring
- The act of respiring through the open mouth so that the
currents of inspired and expired air cause a vibration of the uvula and soft
palate, thus giving rise to a sound more or less harsh.
Once any suggestion of an organic condition has been ruled out by a doctor, hypnotherapy can be utilised to help the sufferer to find their own way of sleeping peacefully and quietly.
Or, if the sufferer is not the snorer, but the snorer's partner, then it is the partner who can be helped - by learning to appreciate and enjoy the deep relaxation that the snorer is demonstrating.
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- Speech
impediments
- Stammering, stuttering, mumbling... many such
conditions can be aided by behavioural training whilst in hypnosis.
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- Tics
- Spasmodic muscular contractions most commonly involving
the face, mouth, eyes, head, neck or shoulder muscles. The movement often
appears purposeful but is involuntary.
As such activity is often exacerbated by stress, great relief can be achieved when the stress can be dealt with in an appropriate fashion.
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- Weight control
- After 'stop smoking' treatments, this is perhaps the
most well known use for hypnotherapy. You can achieve the weight that you
desire - you already know how to do it.
Hypnotherapy can help you to bring out the strengths and resources within you to make it happen, and more importantly, to adjust to the new life that you will have, so that you maintain it.
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| Thanks to the On-line Medical Dictionary for their descriptions of these conditions. |