My Experience With Hypnotherapy and NLP

My Hypnotherapy Experience.  

I had hypnotherapy just over a year ago now and I have never really spoken anywhere about my experience with the therapy or the NLP part so I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to share my experience. 

I had around 10-11 sessions, I did this privately during the summer of 2019. We first met and discussed the problem areas that I wanted help with and in the first session we did not do any hypnotherapy. We discussed how the mind works where we spoke about the conscious brain and subconscious brain and what they both do. I learned that the subconscious brain was an extremely important part of me and that it is where a lot of my brain does its work such as fight or flight and is basically the health and safety officer of our brain as my hypnotherapist said. My hypnotherapist also discussed the conscious brain being the boss as such the one that makes us unique and interacts with the world and likes to problem solve. We then spoke about the subconscious mind being negative it is always going to think the worse.  After the first session was over she gave me homework which was to write three positive things about my day every day and also to listen to a hypnotherapy track she gave me to go to sleep with every night. 

At the next sessions and for the rest of the sessions it started with NLP which stands for neuro-linguistic programming. First, she would ask me about the positives of the week, and then she would ask me to rate my confidence, happiness and I think energy level out of 10, 10 being the best. In the NLP part of the session, we would go over different skills and tools in improving confidence, improving sleep, improving anxiety levels, etc. In the second half of the session, I would be invited to lie on the couch, I would take my shoes off, lie on the couch on my back with a pillow at my head and a pillow under my knees, and a blanket on top of me. I would then close my eyes and she would play some relaxing background music and begin the hypnotherapy session, I found it extremely relaxing especially for someone with ADHD, I liked the aspect of hypnotherapy it was extremely soothing for my anxiety and worries. 

After around 10 or 11 sessions we decided to come to an end, I had built a lot more confidence in my ability and my anxiety had eased and I was getting good sleep and had more energy, and felt overall happier with my ability to cope. Unfortunately, this didn't really last too long after finishing but I do think it was mostly because my doctors decided to try and take me off medication just as I was getting 'stable'. I ended up having lots of panic attacks and just paranoia and overall hit a massive depressive episode. I don't think hypnotherapy was a waste of time but I do think it is something that you can't just stop having all together. My only dilemma was I couldn't afford to keep paying out for private hypnotherapy, still to this day though I listen to the two tapes that she had pre-recorded. I especially listen to them when I am having a bad night or day I just find they help me switch off and wake up feeling so much more refreshed and ready to take on the day ahead of me. 

I still use the NLP skills too as they are also DBT skills, well some are but some are CBT. I find the positive affirmations so helpful for my inner critic and self-doubt. I also like the self-appreciation part of the skills as I normally always negative talk about myself and since doing DBT as well I have really learned how important it is to learn to cheer myself on and appreciate myself and to look after myself. I think I would return to hypnotherapy if I can ever afford it in the future but right now whilst I am having DBT twice a week I just don't really need it.

That was my experience with hypnotherapy and NLP. Thank you for reading, have you experienced hypnotherapy?

Hannah x