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Uncategorized • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • By Brad Mace 0 Comments

General Anxiety Disorder (GAD)

mr-worry

General Anxiety Disorder (GAD)

Hello everyone and I hope that you have all had a positive week. This week I am talking about general anxiety disorder. Although this is a common symptom in a therapists consulting room I seem to have had a lot more enquiries/appointments  booked regarding this subject recently. Much more than normal.
Although everyone has times in their lives when they can get anxious or even nervous it becomes  a problem when these symptoms get so frequent and so strong that it takes over their lives. So how can you tell if it has become too much? Well if you are suffering from any of these symptoms on a regular basis you might want to get some help.

If you are worrying excessively about everyday things however big or small they might be. If you lay in bed at night and can’t go to sleep because you are overthinking these things or situations. Do you worry about things that haven’t happened and may never happen? Are these thoughts becoming more and more persistent?

Do you have irrational fears attached to a specific situation, event or thing? This could be social situations, flying, traveling, certain animals or insects or do you have a fear of heights. If your reactions are way out of proportion to the actual harm that could realistically happen to you then you are suffering from a phobia which is also a part symptom of general anxiety disorder.

Are you suffering from any physical symptoms? Muscle tension or tension headaches or even migraine on a regular basis? Sometimes people get so used to being tense that after a while they don’t realise they are suffering from symptoms until they are relaxed with hypnotherapy or other forms of relaxation. Other physical symptoms of anxiety are chronic digestive problems such as IBS (irritable bowel syndrome). The symptoms of IBS would be stomachaches, cramping, bloating, gas, constipation, and/or diarrhea.

Another symptom of GAD could be Stage fright. Most people get at least a few butterflies before addressing a group of people or otherwise being in the spotlight. But if the fear is so strong or if you spend a lot of time thinking and worrying about it, you may have a form of social anxiety disorder. Are you very self concious in front of only a small group of people. That is exactly how I was myself before I had my own therapy that led me myself to want to help others and become a hypnotherapist in Essex.

Have you ever suffered from a panic attack? A sudden  Rush of helplessness to your body with symptoms including breathing problems, a pounding or racing heart, tingling or numb hands, sweating, weakness or dizziness, chest pain, stomach pain, and feeling hot or cold. A real sick feeling in your stomach almost frozen on the spot. Not knowing whether to hit out (fight) or run (flight). This is called the fight or flight response.

Do you have flashbacks to a disturbing or traumatic event that has happened in the past? Do you constantly think or obsess about it. This is a symptom of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) which is also linked to GAD.

And finally are you obsessive? Are you constantly looking for everything you do to be perfect. Do you beat yourself up a lot in your mind with a feeling of nothing that you do is ever good enough.
Do you rely on alcohol or other drugs to mask your feelings?

If you have any of the above symptoms then you are probably suffering from a form of GAD. So, what can you do about it? I used to suffer from some of these symptoms and as I have mentioned in earlier blogs I went through Hypno-analysis and this cured me. In fact that is what lead me to become a therapist and want to help others. Analysis consisted of being regressed to events in my early life that caused my symptoms and by doing this emotional repressions were released allowing me to move forward. Another good tool for helping with GAD is Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT). I wish I had known about this powerful therapeutic tool when I was younger. It’s a great way to clear fears, anxieties and blockages in life.  Otherwise known as tapping, in a nutshell, it is tapping on your acupuncture points along with some talking therapy.  For more information see this video on EFT and you can also see this video of me showing you the EFT tapping points.

No one wants to be going through life with these symptoms and being shown the way to move forward and alleviate these symptoms has such an impact on peoples lives that they can emerge in a much bright and positive world.

If you suffer in any way with any of these symptoms do not hesitate to contact me for a free initial consultation at my Hypnotherapy practice in Hullbridge Essex.

 

 

Uncategorized • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • By Brad Mace 0 Comments

Success and what it means to you

Success loading pic

A question that I often get asked is how do you measure success? This isn’t an easy question to answer because success very much depends on the individual and what their own definition of success is. Some people measure success on financial gain and how successful they are in their career. Others measure success on how successful they are in love and relationships and on lifes achievements. As a therapist it is not always easy to measure success within your own practice because if you’ve made good progress with a client and they are ready to finish therapy you let them go off into the world and hopefully you don’t hear from them again because they are better and no longer need your help. I suppose I would consider myself successful in the way that I never usually have to work with a client again unless they come back for a completely different reason. For example I had a text from a client this week who had seen me for quit smoking hypnotherapy in Essex 6 months ago. After two months of not smoking he was so pleased that he had quit the habit so easily that he decided that he would go to the next step and stop drinking. This client was not an alcoholic by any means but he did realise that his drinking had also become a bit of a bad habit because of his lifestyle. So he returned to me for another two hour session but this time focusing on his drinking habit. During this session we used both emotional freedom technique and hypnotherapy. We chose a one off extra long session simply because he lives a long way away (he had chosen to travel to me for my quit-smoking session after a recommendation) so it was the best option in this case. I didn’t feel that there were any underlying issues to be dealt with so it was a much simpler process. So when I received the text this week saying that he was 6 months off the cigarettes and 2 months off alcohol I knew that it had been successful. The other way I can measure success is if I see a client as a recommendation from someone else who has seen me for therapy with successful results. I also offer a free top up if a quit-smoker is smoking within three months of seeing me. It is very rare that anyone returns for that. That’s says to me SUCCESS!

Success for me was learning to walk again after a serious hit and run accident. I will never take walking  far granted again! Yet to someone else walking is just a natural everyday activity. A client that is suffering from a social phobia or a general anxiety disorder would feel successful by being able to walk into a room full of people without those nerves with their head held high and a big smile on their face for the first time ever.

A big mistake many people make is to compare themselves to others.  They may see a colleague in a better job earning better money with a lovely car. That same colleague could be looking at you in a solid happy relationship thinking they would give up everything that they have to be in that position. So it’s all relative to the person.  If you are working in a sales environment then success would be meeting and exceeding your targets. Many people thrive on the adrenalin rush that this brings.

My aim at positivelycalm is to help you achieve the success that is important for you. Part of this would be removing barriers that may be stopping you achieving all that you want to achieve. Emotion Freedom Technique is very good for this because sometimes our anxieties play havoc with us achieving our goals. So if we can remove our blocks then there is no stopping us getting to where we want to be and even further! Our believe system is so important in this process. A common problem all therapists find with clients is that they don’t feel good enough. If you believe that you are not good enough for something then you probably won’t be. If you believe that you are good enough then you will be. It’s all there for you in the power of your own mind. All of us are good enough. We just need to believe. Sometimes we just need some help in untapping our potential. There is nothing wrong with seeking help along the way. Whatever your goal, wether it is hypnotherapy for weight loss or hypnotherapy for quit smoking, just making that decision to go ahead is your first step to SUCCESS! So if you would like some help to achieve your dreams come and see me at positivelycalm for some therapy in Essex.

Uncategorized • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • By Brad Mace 0 Comments

Hypnotherapy and Addiction

Hypnotherapy and addiction

Image saying addiction there is a way out

This week I am talking about addiction and how hypnotherapy can help. The word addiction comes from the latin word addiction which mean a ‘giving over, surrender to.’ The dictionary would describe the noun for the word addiction as ‘the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, as narcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma.’ Some scientists  believe that some of us have naturally addictive personalities which could be a make up of our genetics. It may be harder for people with certain genes to quit once they start. Or they may experience more severe withdrawal symptoms if they try to quit.

Habits are not addictions, but bad habits share traits of addictive behaviors and bad habits can become addictions. Things like sex-addiction and gambling can have a huge control over peoples lives. And there is the key word ‘control’. If something has such a control over our lives there is nothing more empowering than taking that control back.

Cocaine addiction seems to be becoming more common and I have noticed quite a dramatic rise in clients with cocaine addiction since I first started working as a therapist fifteen years ago. Smoking has, of course, always been a popular one for addicts and also alcohol. This is also where we cross into a grey area with the difference between addiction and habit. I see smoking as more of a habit which is why we can use some psychotherapy and suggestion to break the habit rather than having to get to a root cause of the problem. All that is needed for this is one 2-hour quit-smoking session and that session has a high success rate. If, on the rare occasion, this is not successful then I would look into some analysis to see if there is an emotion being fed.

 

Factors that make it harder to become addicted also may be genetic. For example, someone may feel sick from a drug that makes other people feel good. But someone’s genetic makeup will never doom them to inevitably become an addict. Remember, environment makes up a large part of addiction risk. This is where I believe that hypno-analysis is very important to get to the root cause of what may be causing the addiction or indeed root causes as this is often more than one factor. Hypno-analysis is a tool used in hypnotherapy to discharge any negative emotion from the subconscious that may be causing symptoms. We refer to these trapped negative emotions as ‘repressions’. During our former years from when we are born to when we mature, this could be 16,17,18, we are all different, if something happens to us that we cannot emotionally deal with then that emotion gets repressed into our subconscious and it can sit there causing us to do things that are out of our control. In my experience these memories are normally remembered consciously but when hypnotising a client and suggesting to the subconscious that it release anything that may still be bothering it what the client is not normally aware of is how much emotion is still attached to that memory. It is that very emotion which has been causing the symptom wether it be anxiety, bad habits, addiction or fears. Because our subconscious always overrides our conscious that is why we feel we don’t have control over our addiction. It’s a bit like the smoker who has a cigarette  lit in his/her hand before they have even consciously thought about lighting a cigarette. This is why hypnotherapy is effective for quit-smoking because it does some re-programming in the subconscious stopping the client thinking about smoking all the time. This is where suggestion works comes into play. So where hypno-analysis uses regression to let go of past trauma suggestion is used to re-frame negative thoughts in our subconscious to help us overcome our symptom. Therefore I would normally use a combination of hypno-analysis and suggestion when helping a client overcome an addiction using hypnotherapy.

Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) also known as tapping can also be used alongside hypnotherapy as a tool to ‘tap away’ our negative emotions that may be related to a particular habit or addiction. This is a great tool to give a client to take away with them to use should they get any unwanted urges towards their particular habit or addiction. Using this tool they can bring down the strength of the particular emotion that could be driving their addiction or habit. It’s another great way for the client to take control back. Please see my Emotional Freedom Technique Page and video for further information.

No one should be kept from living the life of their dreams because of an addiction or a bad habit.

 

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