Pain Relief

Clients who come to my clinic in Leatherhead for hypnotherapy suffer from a variety of painful conditions.  They may come to lose weight for example because the doctor has advised this will help relieve their arthritis or to stop smoking again on doctor’s advice.  

One question they often ask is “can hypnosis relieve pain?”  The simple answer is ‘yes’ sometimes.  When a client is stressed or anxious then pain is often worse.  If a client is in pain this may cause them to tense their bodies and muscles and therefore the pain increases.

The client can take home a recording of the technique they have been taught in the session to use at home.  A client can also learn a simple self-hypnosis technique which will enable them to find relief quickly.  

If the client has a visual modality then they can turn the pain into an object or a shape and visualise it shrinking and getting smaller.  The client can do this between appointments when using self-hypnosis.  

Another technique for reducing pain can be asking the client to imagine they are in the control centre of the brain and finding a dial that they can turn down to reduce the pain.  A simple lock on the dial can keep the pain at a lower level for some time.  

One of the techniques I have used successfully at my Leatherhead clinic is to ask the client to visualise the site of the pain and imagine what it looks like.  For example an arthritic knee could look red and inflamed inside.  If the client has a good visual imagination they can imagine soothing the joint with cream and lubrication.  One of my clients who learned this technique was able to use it on a regular basis.  A car journey of three hours, which had become six hours because of the need for frequent stops to move the painful joints, was reduced back to three and a half hours when the client as a passenger used this technique.

As a therapist I am always careful to leave a residue of pain.  For example if the client scored his pain at nine or ten on a scale of one to ten, this could be reduced to two or three to make it more bearable but still remind the client that the injury or disease was still there and they wouldn’t try to over do things.  Pain is nature’s way of telling us that all is not well and we should take care.

Contact me to find out more.