My clients need to be de-hypnotised first before change is created

As a hypnotherapist, it can be heartbreaking hearing the stories of clients when they share with me (whilst under hypnosis) some of the things caregivers said to them when they were little.

Adults who were entrusted with the lives of innocent, defenceless little children. Caregivers whose job it was to keep them safe and free from harm, whose job it was to help them grow into their fullest potential and best versions of themselves. Sadly, for many of my clients, that isn't always the case.

For some, they experienced verbal abuse far to graphic to write here, but it takes no stretch of the imagination to surmise the cruelty and evil that can be said by some adults to a small helpless child, words often rooted in hate and contempt.

Sometimes, I have to be careful to not let me own voice quiver from the emotions that momentarily come over me when my clients repeats to me the cruelty that was inflicted on them or when I hear the

barrage of heinous words that rained upon them, when they were young children. My clients who are now all grown up, took in those words to their very core and came to believe that they truly were "good for nothing", not wanted and that nobody would ever want them or love them.

In time, the voice of the abuser becomes their own internal voice.

No wonder some people who've experienced such traumatic childhoods like this and who believe those awful things that were said to them, drink today. I probably would too if I lived their life and believed what they believed.

I'm so lucky I come from the most loving, caring, safe home. I was nurtured, surrounded by love and encouraged all of my life. That is why I can categorically tell my clients that what happened to them was wrong and should never have taken place. I know it with every fibre of my being. I know peace, I know safety and I know how to help somebody who doesn't know what that feels like. I know how to describe it. I know what it sounds like and I know how it feels. I believe it is my job to help my clients come to know this too, not just intellectually because some already know it intellectually. I believe it is my job to help them re-establish a sense of safety within their own autonomic nervous system. To know it on a 'felt sense' level, as the adult they are today.

A child does not have the intellectual ability nor maturity when they are little to understand that what is being said to them is undeniably incorrect and that the adult has no right to speak to them that way.

From a child's perspective, they conclude it must be true. Why else would a parent, grandparent, caregiver, say that or treat them in such a way, if it were not true? For many, there is no possibility that the adult is wrong.

For a young child, when something is said or done to them, it's because they 'deserved it'. There is no other explanation, no other logic or rationale. You see, between the ages of 0-7, the critical factor in the mind where you learn to question things or reject concepts is not fully developed. That is why Christmas is such a magical time of year for young children. Their minds are little sponges taking in everything that is said to them. They don't filter out the good from the bad, they take it all in and innocently believe.

Conversely to the child told how wrong or bad they are, when a child is ignored and neglected, unspoken words are just as damaging because then a child questions why they are not good enough to spend time with, to be cared for or even spoken to. So even when no words are said out loud, a clear message is still received by the young child - You aren't good enough. I don't love you. You are unloveable".

It my job as a clinical hypnotherapist to first de-hypnotise my clients of the damaging messages they received as children. Things that simply are not and were never true to begin with. It is only then that I can go about creating new empowering beliefs for my clients to take on. Words that will help them find loving people in life or in a lot of cases, let in the love that is already actually around them but which they don't feel deserving to let in.

Nothing gives me greater satisfaction than helping a client take back their voice and their power as the adult they are today and overcome the pain and trauma from their past. I love it when in hypnosis my clients are ready to stop hating themselves, to stop hurting themselves and to put the blame where it rightfully deserves to be - with the perpetrator. Then they can let in the empowering new set of beliefs that will change the entire trajectory of their life for the better .