Archive for April, 2007

Hypnotherapy is one of the best known and most widely used treatments for IBS, and can offer sufferers a drug-free solution to their symptoms of diarrhea, constipation, stomach pain and bloating.

There are now many hundreds of hypnotherapists who offer what is called gut-directed hypnotherapy for IBS, which takes the general techniques of hypnotherapy and applies them directly to the abdominal pain and digestive symptoms which IBS sufferers struggle with. This type of hypnotherapy has been clinically tested and found to be very helpful to many IBS patients.

One of the first studies of hypnotherapy for IBS was conducted by Dr Peter Whorwell, a leading expert on IBS and hypnotherapy in the UK. A trial he conducted in the 1980s found that a group of IBS sufferers who had failed to respond to other treatments showed dramatic improvements when treated with gut-directed hypnotherapy. Since then, other therapists have shown similar results.

What hypnotherapy involves

Hypnotherapy in a medical setting bears no relation to the kind of stage hypnosis where volunteers are made to do ridiculous things in the name of entertainment. In fact, patients remain entirely in control of their own actions, and are simply coaxed into a kind of deep relaxation state.

While the patients is in this state the therapist will talk to you and make positive suggestions one typical method for IBS is to ask you to place your hand over your abdomen and imagine that a healing warmth is flowing from your hand to your stomach.

Some hypnotherapists will record each session for you so that you can listen to them again between your appointments, and therefore increase the effectiveness of the therapy.

Self-hypnosis

If you don t have the time or the resources to visit a qualified hypnotherapist, you might find some relief in one of the self-hypnosis CDs available, which can be listened to in the comfort of your own home.

While you will not get an individual treatment program from a ready-made CD, you will be able to benefit from the general hypnosis approach, and you can choose to listen to the CDs whenever you have the time.

The IBS Audio Program, developed by the UK hypnotherapist Michael Mahoney, is the most widely used program for IBS sufferers, and is available on audio CD and cassette. The program is designed to be used over 100 days, and includes four CDs and a program booklet. The makers claim that around 80% of listeners experience a significant reduction of pain and bowel dysfunction.

The program consists of three therapeutic session CDs, with an introduction and five different hypnotherapy sessions. It also includes a bonus fourth CD (the IBS Companion), which explains IBS to non-sufferers.

About the author:

Sophie Lee has suffered from IBS for more than 15 years. She runs IBS Tales http://www.ibstales.com where you can read hundreds of personal stories from IBS sufferers and self-help tips.

Technorati Tags: Hypnosis, Hypnotherapy, Hypnotism, 5 PATH Hypnotherapy, Hypnotherapist, Hypnotist

To lose weight, all you have to do is eat less and exercise more.

Easy, isn’t it? So why can’t you?

There are many emotional and physical reasons why we put the weight on in the first place. Having said that, many of us that are overweight manage to keep it on for longer than makes sense.

Take my friend Hannah (not her real name). Well-liked for her hospitality, she feeds you plenty whenever you go to visit. Her kitchen is full of cakes and snacks. Her living room is scattered with chocolates, biscuits and cookies. She tells you of all the meals she has cooked for her family that week and gives you new recipes that she’s found. She’s tried them and they’re delicious.

Can you imagine if Hannah had been a heroin addict?

Take my friend Hannah the heroin addict (not her real name). Well-liked for her hospitality, she makes sure she has a good supply whenever you go to visit. Her kitchen is scattered with burnt spoons and discarded bits of aluminum foil. Her living room is full of the sickly-sweet smell of brown. She tells you of how the social services have taken the last remaining child off her that week and gives you the number of the new dealer that she’s found. She’s slept with him and he’s given it to her cheap.

Not so homely and cuddly anymore, is she now?

Overeating is an addiction. Many people who overeat also over-exercise. Some both overeat and deliberately under-exercise. And every time I think I have heard all the excuses, I hear another, even more inventive one. I’m too fat to expose my body in a swimsuit ; I have a slow metabolism said as she tucks into the 17th chocolate bar that day; Gyms are full of slim, sexy people [no they're not, and how would you know anyway if you've never been?]; This isn’t bad for you said about the 14th fast-food snack that day; I need comfort food ; This is too good to waste ; etc. But the excuses are not the work of a lazy person or someone with no will-power. Quite the opposite. It takes a lot of hard work and determination to maintain excessive weight.

With EFT, we define those excuses as the work of a psychologically-reversed mind. The mind of someone whose body’s energy system is against their recovery. EFT, or Emotional Freedom Techniques addresses the psychology and the energy aspects of the condition at the same time. We use tapping to stimulate acupuncture meridian end-points whilst applying some clever psychology to free us from these excuses and allow us to be happily slim, attractive and healthy again.

EFT can be used as a motivator for your exercise program, removing the emotional blocks that are in the way of your success. It can unravel all those emotional root causes of the comfort eating.

EFT is also a very neat tool that literally changes the taste of foods. What is good for you ends up tasting delicious and what is bad for you ends up tasting unbearably disgusting. You literally tap the EFT sequence on your face, body and hands as you repeat a special phrase and look at, smell and taste the food. The food stays the same, only your perception of it changes. Fatty foods taste like petrol jelly. The average chocolate bar tastes of artificial flavourings, wax, hydrogenated vegetable fat, and sickly-sweet sugar. The average bread takes on the strong taste of yeast. Chocolate pudding tastes like hair conditioner. Cookies and cakes are hard to dissolve in your mouth, that is if you can get yourself to put them there. Gradually or all of a sudden, a new phrase that you are saying as you tap on the EFT points changes the smell, taste, and texture of the food. You really have to experience it to appreciate the full effect.

No matter what else is going on, people usually overeat because they feel out of control somehow in their lives. EFT allows you to take control by being proactive in getting the control back in your life. Try it, what do you have to lose but weight?

My name is Suzanne Zacharia and I am committed to spreading the word about health options. I believe that the more and better options one has, the more choice there is.

A virus caught along with 5 other students at university at the end of 1986, plus medical negligence, meant that I got smokers lung at a relatively young age. In desperation for help with my symptoms and quality of life, I turned to complementary therapy, and this is the 10th year I have outlived one doctor’s prognosis.

I am now a complementary therapist, author and trainer specialising in “energy” therapy. My company is called New Age London, more details via the links below.
http://www.NewAgeLondon.com
http://www.EFTLondon.co.uk
http://www.EFTCourse.co.uk

Technorati Tags: EFT, Emotional Freedom Technique, Energy Healing, Energy Psychology