Can Hypnosis Help?

What concerns does your child have? What concerns do you have about your child? At this time of year, returning to school can have a lot of negative consequences for children and teenagers. Your child may start bedwetting again. How do you handle your child's school phobia? Is your child bullied or indeed, is your child the bully? There is no doubt that our children's issues can leave us with sleepless nights. What is the right thing to do - get them to toughen it out, keep them at home? Children's anxieties are very real and as an adult, anxiety is difficult enough without the underdeveloped emotional attachment to the anxiety. Anxiety in children can manifest in the children becoming withdrawn, bedwetting, and developing tics. You may be at the end of your tether.

Hypnosis is a gentle relaxation which can occur at any level of consciousness. Have you ever driven home and not remembered the journey - that's hypnosis. We automatically day dream every 90 minutes - it is the mind's way of resetting itself. While hypnosis may be synonymous with stopping smoking and losing weight, it is in actual fact a key to your subconscious mind. We know that it is possible to change the neurology of the mind - i.e. re-programming the mind to be the way you want. So why not teach your child how to access their minds now so they no longer have to endure their anxieties.

Children are naturally gifted when it comes to imagination. You could say they are most natural candidates for hypnosis. Obviously, any experienced hypnotherapist will work within the child's framework - what works for little children will not work for teenagers as they are looking to be accepted into the world as young adults. Little tips would include when your child is asleep at night, whisper affirmations in the present tense - e.g. "you are a big boy/girl now who has dry nights and looks forward to waking in the morning in a dry bed", "when you are confident, you stand tall". Including the child's favourite superhero in the story is helpful and gives them a sense of strength that they can draw on. Sleep is when the subconscious mind makes sense of the world and untangles any worries.

In a hypnotic session, the parent is always present but it can be useful for the parent to wear headphones so the child feels they have some privacy. Obviously, children will find it easier to open up if they are not being bombarded with questions and it is important that the therapist has a rapport with the child. This is the time for the child to learn about the amazing workings of their own mind and how they don't need to be upset by what others say and do. Children feel things as we feel things but remember they are absorbing your issues as well as their own. Children need to be able to release these emotions in that they can gain confidence and assertiveness. In our world, it can seem as though children are being treated as mini-adults - they are not, they are children whose childhood needs to be spent learning about themselves and the world. Hypnosis is not about making the child into something you or the therapist wants - it is what the child wants and giving them skills they can take into adulthood.