My experience of hypnotherapy (for eating problem)

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Subject: My experience of hypnotherapy (for eating problem)

Hi everyone I've wanted to post about this for a few days now to let you know how I got on with my hypnotherapy last week, but i've had great diffulty finding the words which do justice to my experience. Forgive me for not elaborating more, i'm finding it difficult to comprehend myself what has happened, but will do my best to answer questions. Anyway my background: I've been bulimic for 4 years. It started at a very stressful time in my life and i turned to food to help me relax. Since then it turned into a very deep rooted habit and food was always on my mind. The amount i binged on and frequency of binges increased steadily until my problem was seriously limiting my life; i was making myself broke, antisocial and unhealthy. Most importantly it was dragging my hapiness down and made getting through each day a struggle. Food was constantly on my mind. It was comparable to a terrible drug addiction. I'd wake up every day and tell myself 'today is the day i stop' but by the evening i had caved in, such was the power of my conpulsion. Will power was simply not enough. I felt this constant terrible sense of either being out of control or struggling to overcome my problem. I'm only 21 and felt I was wasting what are meant to be the best years of my life. I came to my wits end so many times. These are the things i tried with little or no success: - Keeping a diary - Counselling - Confiding in friends - Never carrying spare cash or card with me - Self help books - Even at one point for every penny i spent on a binge i forced myself to destroy / cut up the same amount again as punishment!! - I'm sure i tried other things too So a few weeks ago, after coming to my wits end once again, I started to research hypnotherapy. I'd heard it was often used for addictions and helping to break habits, which was exactly what my problem was based around, rather than it being a body-image thing. So last week i had my appointment. I turned up feeling a little anxious that i was pinning too much hope on it helping my problem, and how that may effect the success of the treatment. I didn't really know what to expect so i just tried to relax as much as possible, though was constantly worried that i wasn't relaxed enough and was ANALYSING too much. First the lady spent about 45mins talking with me to understand my problem. She said some really poignant things about the nature of addictions and actually helped me to feel 'normal' for the first time in ages! Then she set about doing the actual hypnotherapy which is a really deep state of relaxation. I guess I was expecting to have some kind of 'Eureaka' moment which would tell me that it had worked. Instead, i was constantly thinking 'is it working? am i doing everything right? am i actually hypnotised now? is it going to make a difference? am i wasting my money?!' I guess because of that i was quite scepical that any long term change in me had occured, although I did leave feeling really positive, really happy and really enthusiastic to get on with my life. Looking back i guess i came out of there feeling care-free but doubting that the feeling would last. She also did some NLP based therapy based on tapping body parts which I can use at home (felt like a right wally and again very sceptical!) Fast forward a week. I know its only been a week but I feel like something amazing has happened. It truly has made a massive difference. I've eaten like a normal person all week and its been an absolute pleasure, not a struggle like before. I can go between meals and food won't be on my mind at all. I haven't felt the compulsion to binge. I've had two binges but both times i was aware that i was making a conscious DECISION to do so rather than it being a compulsion. I know that i could VERY easily have stopped myself. In honesty I think i wanted to test my reaction to the binge, since i'm still quite sceptical that this will last. In fact my reaction has been to carry on eating normally with absolutely NO effort or will-power required. Nothing is a struggle anymore. I don't feel controlled by an addiction; i feel empowered. I don't feel as though i'm wasting my life away. I'm too scared to say that i'm definitely CURED, i guess only time will tell that. But as you can see I'm thrilled that this has helped me so much. I never thought it would, even though I was at my wits end. Also i realise its a very personal thing and what worked for me wont work for everyone. But i hope my story brings hope or comfort to at least some of you out there struggling with terrible addictions, whatever they are. Feel free to PM me x

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rainbowdust33
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Subject: My experience of hypnotherapy (for eating problem)

Hello, thanks for sharing your story in the post above.

I am considering having hypnotherapy at the minute for an eating problem, but mine is more of an anxiety problem than an eating disorder (I don't like eating in front of people, might not sound very bad, but its ruining my life).

I was just wondering how you got on at your further sessions and if you would recommend hypnotherapy to someone else??

Thanks

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CurlyThoughts
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Subject: My experience of hypnotherapy (for eating problem)

I know this is slightly different but last year I had hypnotherapy to cure my phobia of spiders. (I know lots of people are scared of spiders but this was ridiculous, I couldnt go into a room without checking everywhere to see if there was one there and if there was one on there I couldn't leave the room cos had to watch it so it didnt move but had to get someone else to remove it so just used to scream until someone came to sort it ... my bf was a saint lol). It had to stop so i went to London zoo and they did the same thing, talked about what made us afraid, why they're actually safe and good etc and tehn the hypnotherapy in a deep relaxation. Afterwards I went into the insect house there (something i couldnt do before) and actually held a tarantula!

Sorry for the long explanation but just wanted to say that I was so sceptical, all the way through I was the same as the OP, very doubtful, worried was I actually hypnotised etc and it worked. I would definitely recommend it if it is an anxiety issue because you need to train the mind not to think like that.

However, I would also possibly suggest counselling either before or at the same time as hypnotherapy to find out what the root of the anxiety is and deal with it, otherwise it may just be displaced into a different outlet. Good luck!
xx

PS so glad it worked for the OP, seems like you're managing to take control of your life.

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rainbowdust33
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Quoted:

I know this is slightly different but last year I had hypnotherapy to cure my phobia of spiders. (I know lots of people are scared of spiders but this was ridiculous, I couldnt go into a room without checking everywhere to see if there was one there and if there was one on there I couldn't leave the room cos had to watch it so it didnt move but had to get someone else to remove it so just used to scream until someone came to sort it ... my bf was a saint lol). It had to stop so i went to London zoo and they did the same thing, talked about what made us afraid, why they're actually safe and good etc and tehn the hypnotherapy in a deep relaxation. Afterwards I went into the insect house there (something i couldnt do before) and actually held a tarantula! Sorry for the long explanation but just wanted to say that I was so sceptical, all the way through I was the same as the OP, very doubtful, worried was I actually hypnotised etc and it worked. I would definitely recommend it if it is an anxiety issue because you need to train the mind not to think like that. However, I would also possibly suggest counselling either before or at the same time as hypnotherapy to find out what the root of the anxiety is and deal with it, otherwise it may just be displaced into a different outlet. Good luck! xx PS so glad it worked for the OP, seems like you're managing to take control of your life.
Posted by CurlyThoughts

Thanks, thats really helpful. I'm going to start looking into hypnotherapists in my area. Any idea how you know which are meant to be good?? xx

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