Reflective Journal Entries: Accidental Hypnosis!

from Lucy Waterhouse, with thanks

I have to mention my client N, who came to me unexpectedly, her husband was doing some carpentry work in the centre and she had come with him just for something to do. 

I am constantly amazed at how fate brings us to the places we need to be without us even realising it! We were chatting in general, she was interested in finding out more about what hypnotherapy was and admitted that she was having a very difficult time in her marriage at the moment. 

Her husband had tried to commit suicide a couple of times but appeared to be doing better but she had been in several violent relationships prior to meeting him and had one time used violence against her husband who had then hit her back. 

That was the only time that they had ever been violent towards each other and other than that had a fairly stable relationship. She said that she wanted him to have some hypnotherapy to help him but it soon became very apparent that she had a lot of work to do as well. She openly talked about her kids about how proud she was of them and that the first one had been planned but that she had had undiagnosed post-natal depression and had found the first couple of years difficult, and then a lot sooner than they had expected she fell pregnant again with her second child a son, who wasn’t planned but who they were overjoyed about having. 

She had been worried about her mood following her first pregnancy and sure enough she had had severe, this time, post-natal depression with psychosis and at one point had planned to commit suicide and take her kids with her. As a result of this she hadn’t bonded with the second child at all for the first six months, which apparently in arguments he would throw in her face (he is in his early 20s now and still living at home) the fact that she hadn’t wanted him, he hadn’t been planned and she hadn’t bonded with him. She carried enormous guilt which as we talked became ever more apparent, with her saying the most awful things about herself, how she deserved to feel bad, that she was evil for not bonding, that she deserved the guilt, it was her fault, that she had ruined the child’s life and was to blame for her husband’s depression. 

I had stopped talking completely at this point and she was just pouring out information whilst sobbing openly. I offered her some hypnotherapy to help her to feel more relaxed and to help her sleep at night- she said that her sleep was awful- and maybe to let go of a little bit of this guilt she was talking about.

I put her in a trance and she relaxed noticeably, and did some work on sleep, and a detailed control panel to increase her confidence, reduce her anxiety, increase her ability to cope, and a few other things, then did a guided visualisation about letting go of that grief in a balloon- I have found this visualisation really effective for loads of problems- the returning to a waterfall of abundant resources that she could draw on any time she needed to. It was a long session and when I woke her up the transformation was incredible! She literally looked ten years younger, she was relaxed, happy, and enthusiastic about how good she felt, and immediately went to tell her husband about how much it could help him. I don’t know if I will see her again, but Julie told me that she had been in touch with her and told her that her sleep has really improved.

I seem to get an awful lot of past life clients. It seems to be a very popular subject at the moment with people turning to spiritual leanings at a time when the safety of our society and our freedom is very much at stake with political and religious movements threatening our welfare. I love doing past life work, but want to find ways of using it therapeutically and not ‘just’ for recreation. I have a book about healing through past lives which I will definitely be reading! Yes, this is an arena with huge potential for healing and it is no surprise to me that it is becoming more popular, no matter what one’s belief system is and always leaves a client remarkably changed for the better.

Reflective Journal Entries: Amazing Phobia Cure

From Lucy Waterhouse, with thanks

I have a returning client, L, who got in touch with me via facebook who I then had a chat with over the phone about her situation. She presented with a phobia of driving on motorways. He could pin point the time at which the phobia had been triggered, but couldn’t work out why it had been triggered, she simply reported that she had been driving down a road, not even a motorway, but an A road, with no place to come off for a few miles and had suddenly found herself gripped with panic.

She described a very phobic reaction, shortness of breath, a dissociation from her body, rapid heartbeat, burning hot ears and neck, dry mouth, nausea, every time she ‘tried’ to drive on a motorway especially, even for just one junction, knowing that she would only be on it for a few miles at the most. She said that her driving had become dangerous on motorways because she was driving so slowly that she was going to cause an accident and that because of this she was never going to go on a motorway again and that she basically waned help to avoid this fear spreading to driving I general around town as her job requires her to drive and she needs to be able to. I was really, for some reason, freaked out by this one, I don’t think I knew where to start. It was obviously a phobia from what she was describing but it didn’t seem to have an emotional trigger that either of us could identify, it had just apparently ‘happened’ though I know that this is not ever really the case, and that there must be something behind it, even though this information was not available to her. 

The first time I saw her I did some metaphor processing. I told her to describe her feelings as though she was coming down the slip road onto the motorway and to really allow herself to experience the feelings as they came up in describing it. She reported all the feelings as they happened and I could see the colour drain from her face then saw her go very red and she said that she felt a swirling feeling in her stomach. We identified that the very first thing that she had felt was the swirling in her stomach and that (Embedded command) “if we intervene at that exact point of the swirling stomach and take that away then none of the other feelings will emerge” I asked her to reach into her stomach, physically and pull out the feeling, and I did the action to show her what I meant, grabbing in my fist this feeling and letting it hover in front of me- she did the same. I told her that as soon as the swirling started when she is driving then she should safely and quickly reach into her stomach and pull it out and put it on the dashboard, open the window and throw it out onto the road. We gave the feeling a colour, a shape and a size then altered it to suit her and she said that she would be able to do that. I then put her into a trance and did a guided visualisation of going down onto the motorway, safely comfortably, happily, and driving several junctions, overtaking and doing so with comfort and ease. I left her with the instructions to pull the feeling out if it came back. I hada text two days later saying that she had been roped into driving a relative back from Halesowen to Coventry via the motorway and she had done exactly what I said and that the other feelings hadn’t materialised at all but that she had had to remove the swirling feeling a few times. She had taken the long route home to avoid coming back on the motorway and had regretted it because the road was badly lit and it took twice as long. The second time I saw her she was really excited and pleased as punch at her progress and had made several more short trips on the motorway in the two weeks since our previous session, always using the same technique, but had also discovered something else, that if she blasted a song out that she knew all the words to her singing away was really helping. 

She had been adamant that having music on in the car would have made things worse in our first session but I had done a NBG with her and told her that new coping mechanisms would make themselves apparent as time went on… this was apparently one of them… So I saw her again and reinforced what we had done in the first session but also did work with her about letting go of the fear as she no longer needed it, I thanked it for what it had done in keeping her safe but said that now whenever she exhaled whilst driving, more of the fear would be released, and that singing would make it disappear even more quickly! I said to her that she had all the resources she needed and I knew that motorways would be a doddle from now on because all those resources would become apparent to her. I had a message off her at the weekend, nearly a week after our second session and she had been on several motorway trips without any of the fear that she had felt before, even slightly longer trips, to Telford and Alton Towers and nothing had happened negatively. 

She said that she wanted one more session to help her with over taking as she was still plonking herself behind a lorry and sticking at about 50-60 mph because it felt comfortable but that she felt ready to take the next step! She was absolutely thrilled and signed off ‘thank you thank you thank you!’ I have to admit that even I was shocked at the efficacy of the work we had done, I mean I totally believe that hypnotherapy works, I have seen it work and it has worked on me, but I am still astonished when I am able to facilitate such a big change in someone so quickly! I am constantly amazed by this hypnosis ‘thing’ every time it works! It works because you are brave enough to tackle your own hesitations too and listen to the client and respond even when, as you say, you get a bit freaked out not knowing what to do. Fear is fear is fear and you know how to handle this. Great work.  

Reflective Journal Entries: Difficult client doesn't think it will work

From Lucy Waterhouse, with thanks

Another client who I found very difficult to work with was a woman, B, who I have also mentioned in my workbook. She presented with pain issues and told me that she is in constant pain and that she is terribly ill. 

The first thing that worried me about this was the fact that she immediately told me that her counselor had agreed that she didn’t have to pay for the session and that she didn’t think it would work. I don’t see a problem with seeing clients for free in general if they are invested in the change, but right from the outset it was obvious that she had no investment in moving forward through this issue at all. 

That she had so much invested in being ill and disabled and that most of her relationships with friends were based on them being able to help her in some way. I didn’t have high hopes for a lasting positive outcome but still gave the best I could to her. She had no problem getting into trance and I did a basic control panel to increase motivation to change then worked with her using the script that I wrote for my advanced workbook, about the pain suit. Her responses were good throughout and I thought that maybe in spite of her conscious efforts to remain ill that her unconscious mind might benefit from learning some new coping skills, so I carried out the session as I had intended and with full investment on my part. 

When I woke her up, she was very quick to remind me again that she wasn’t paying and that she didn’t think it would work. I had carefully meta questioned her in the beginning gently inferring that her unconscious maybe had embraced the pain as it offered her so much validation and reward. I didn’t use those words, I was much more subtle, and she immediately got very defensive and her defensiveness was suggesting that I was right. She claimed afterwards that although she felt very relaxed she was still in pain and therefore it hadn’t worked. I honestly don’t know where to go with this one, whether she will be back, but I find myself feeling impatient with her just thinking and writing about the experience, I need to look at my own expectations for clients and remember that it is their expectations that we work with, and that I can work with motivation but everyone works at their own pace and unless the client is on board then no amount of cajoling and hoping on my part is going to work magic. Big learning curve here I think and we all need to have some of these to give us a balanced view on what we can help with and how the onus is sometimes with the client in certain cases.

Reflective Journal Entries: Difficult trance

From Lucy Waterhouse, with thanks

I had a client who I found particularly difficult to get into trance, a girl, A, who told me straight away that she didn’t think it would work as she has real difficulty in visualising things. 

Obviously I then tailored the session to include other senses, sounds, smells, using language and colour rather than visualising actual ‘things’. She had come with an interest in having a past life regression session and beforehand we had discussed the possibility of her unconscious mind not allowing this to happen for whatever reason and that if that was the case we could work on something else, and she picked confidence. 

The session was very difficult right from the start with her finding it very difficult to achieve a level of trance that was deep enough for the past life part to happen, so I changed tack and worked on confidence instead, knowing that even if she was not in a deep trance that her unconscious mind would be taking in everything anyway. 

She was disappointed that she didn’t have a past life experience but then told me that she had Asperger’s which made sense as to why she had found it so difficult to get into a trance in the usual way. She also told me that she wanted to come back for a different issue in the future because she wanted to deal with “her problems” before she moved abroad. She asked me to talk to Julie, one of the women who I am working for at the therapy practice and also her counselor to tell me what it was she wanted to work on. She gave both me and Julie permission to talk about this when she wasn’t there, saying that she felt uncomfortable saying It herself but wanting me to have some awareness of it the next time she comes in. Julie told me that she had been sexually abused as a child and that she wanted help moving on from that with hypnotherapy as the counselling was helpful in identifying areas to work on but wasn’t resolving things quickly or efficiently enough for her liking. I bought an Erickson book called ‘reclaiming her-story” dealing with female survivors of sexual abuse via metaphor and storytelling in hypnosis. 

I have yet to properly read this book but have had a leaf through it and it seems like it will be very helpful. I will make time to read it ASAP as I know her moving date is drawing nearer and I will be seeing her soon, though I don’t know when. I sparked an interest in finding out ways of working with clients who have autistic spectrum disorders and sensory disorders in general which is why I want so much to help my friend’s daughter with her incontinence issues.

Reflective Journal Entries: Male weight loss and more

From Lucy Waterhouse, with thanks

D, a guy that I have seen twice who initially came for weight loss. 

He is a giant of a man, very tall and very broad and worked out with weights, he is also the main carer for his step son who is profoundly disabled who he absolutely adores- a genuine gentle giant. On our first session I intuitively felt that weight loss was not the issue, so I decided that we would do some gestalt chair work to find out what the issue actually was. So I had him sat in one chair telling his inner weight loss saboteur why he wanted to lose weight and asking him what was the reason for the sabotaging. We worked this way for twenty minutes or so resulting in him breaking down in tears (something he claimed he never does- “big boys don’t cry” he said) as his saboteur told him that he didn’t deserve to live after all the horrible things he had done. 

I didn’t inquire as to what the horrible things were but he told me that he had been a part of a notorious biker gang and had a past littered with his perceived wrongdoings and the part of him that kept sabotaging his efforts for weight loss and therefore prolonged life was punishing him thoroughly for the things that he had done that he perceived as “evil” even though now he is a genuinely lovely man with a family and dogs who he adores and a good wholesome life. 

The metaquestioning, chair work and then the fork in the road that we did together took us up to our maximum time and I said to him that now we knew that it wasn’t an issue of whether he *could* lose weight, but a matter of whether he *deserved* to lose weight, next time he could afford to come we would do some work in trance to address these issues. 

The second time he came about 4 weeks later, he reported that his eating patterns had changed dramatically and that the nature of his workouts had changed too from working on making himself bigger and stronger to making himself fitter and leaner. I reinforced the work we had already started working specifically on his self-worth and the session progressed as I had hoped with clear IMRs and animated facial expressions during different parts of the session. He is booked in for his third and maybe final session in a weeks time.

Reflective Journal Entries: Anxiety and lack of self-belief

From Lucy Waterhouse, with thanks

Another client has come back several times, D, who has struggled for many years with anxiety and lack of self-belief. His work life balance was completely out of whack and he was losing sleep because of it. I first addressed his sleep, then we have since moved onto work life balance, self-belief, self-esteem and confidence and ultimately the guided metaphor, imagery about him being a tree, having his roots spread far and wide and his role as a strong and constant feature in his kids’ lives. 

He had said at our last session that he was at the end of his rope, but afterwards, as I reported in my workbook, he was really excited about how he felt afterwards and said ‘bring it on!’ He had struggled with his ability to stand his ground with the students at the university where he worked as a professor, saying that if a student was to challenge his grading of a paper, even if he felt strongly that he was marking them fairly, he would ultimately capitulate and change the mark. Because of this he felt that to avoid conflict he was marking rather generously and felt that this would put his work in jeopardy. We have worked together three times now and the difference in him is astonishing, he has blossomed into a much more confident and forth coming man who isn’t afraid to assert himself in various situations. I have a final session coming up with him too. This again is great news and is a huge accolade to your skills and please remember to keep reading these successes back to yourself to remind yourself of the good work you do. Brilliant.

Reflective Journal Entries: Multiple Sessions?

From Lucy Waterhouse, with thanks

I am finding to my amazement that I am getting clients booking to see me for multiple sessions! Not just booking them, but coming to see me, coming back and reporting huge improvements and recommending me to other people in their network who are also coming for support. 

I have had several returning clients now, one has been a woman who has stopped smoking. I knew that it wasn’t going to work to do it all in one go as she was very clear right from the start that she wasn’t prepared to just stop. So I worked with her over about four sessions to completely address her need for nicotine and also the habit of smoking as a physical behaviour. 

She has been back four, maybe 5 times and we have built up a good relationship. She is very streetwise and I have found that I have had to adapt my style and language to fit her, as I think coming over all academic and wordy would just have alienated her and made the hypnotherapy less accessible to her. Working with her at her level- and she is a very intelligent woman, who has not had the privilege of having access to education or a lifestyle that has brought out the best in her in an academic way, but who is incredibly driven and resourceful and passionate. 

We found plenty in common with each other and it was obviously something that she felt worked and was producing results as she kept coming back! I am expecting to see her for her fifth and final session in the next few weeks if he books it but have high hopes that she has kicked the habit for good after our last session where I used metaphor as described in my workbook, blowing the addictive behaviour and feelings into a balloon and watching it float away, enjoying the scenery and her kids and the trees that are the lungs of the earth, bringing life giving oxygen to all of us. She was particularly moved after this session and very motivated throughout all of our sessions as she had lost her mother to lung cancer through smoking at a young age and didn’t want her ids to go through the same. She also had her oldest child being very supportive of making these changes and I regularly brought her children into her hypnotherapy as a source of inspiration, future pacing her and telling her how proud her kids are to have a mother who only breathes clean air. She has enrolled into a mixed martial arts programme and her asthma has abated significantly and she feels (she told me!) that she has a whole new lease on life and had no idea how much time she spent in her addiction, smoking and thinking about smoking, how many late night runs to the off license for cigarettes etc. Again, well done here and I am thankful you have escaped the trap that ensnares many of the one hit wonder and ‘it didn’t work first time’ syndrome. Having such a good comprehension of addictive behaviour and empathy is priceless thank you.