Hypnotherapy for Pain

Hypnotherapy has been shown to be highly effective in managing and reducing both acute and chronic pain. For some people, chronic pain can reduce significantly, and in some cases, may even resolve. By working with the subconscious mind, clients can:

+ Reduce the intensity or change pain signals.
+ Release emotional stress & trauma connected to pain.
+ Build resilience and coping strategies.
+ Improve overall quality of life.

Hypnotherapy is used worldwide to support people experiencing many different types of pain, including migraines, arthritis, fibromyalgia, chronic nerve pain, chronic pelvic pain, back pain, joint pain, and pain associated with previous surgery or injury. It can also be helpful where pain is influenced by the nervous system, stress and emotional factors, such as with Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS). 

Hypnotherapy has been used in medicine for centuries, long before modern anesthetics were available. Surgeons once utilized hypnosis to create deep states of relaxation and even numb specific areas of the body, allowing surgical procedures to be carried out with little or no pain relief.

Today, this ability to reduce pain is still used in dentistry and pain management, where hypnosis can calm the mind and ease any discomfort. In some cases it can release and heal old pain.

How Hypnotherapy Helps Pain

Over on the 'About Hypnotherapy' page, I mentioned Hollywood, and how simply watching scenes unfold can provoke intense emotion. 

Well, emotions are a physiological response. We weep salty water when we're sad, our muscles tighten when we're stressed, and our hearts beat faster when we're afraid. Emotion is actually experienced physically. Our emotions can be changed however. Even when we are sad, it's possible to laugh at something funny. Sometimes, when we are so sad, we catch ourselves laughing or smiling at something and even tell ourselves not to, because we're supposed to be sad! But for only a moment, we forgot, we were engrossed in what was happening, laughed, then consciously remembered not to. Sometimes it can be challenging to change emotions, but we know it's possible. We do it every day. So if emotions are physical, and can be changed, what's so different about pain?

Pain is not just a physical sensation in the body, it's also not purely psychological, or biological. Pain is influenced by emotion, memory, prediction, expectations, environment, beliefs, a host of other influences. Pain doesn't just live in the body, and it certainly doesn't just live in the mind - it resides in our entire being, and is very real.

As pain psychologist Dr Rachel Zoffness explains:
"We’ve been told that pain is purely physical, something to do just with bones and body parts. The truth is that pain is constructed by the brain – influenced not just by injuries, but also by emotions, expectations, and environment. This means you have infinitely more control over pain than you ever imagined: because if the brain can change, pain can change."
- Dr Rachel Zoffness, Tell Me Where It Hurts

The truth is, when we change the influences on pain, we can change the experience of pain. 

How Effective is Hypnotherapy with Pain

Hypnotherapy can be highly effective in working with many different types of pain. It works with a host of abilities, including changing expectations, altering the way pain is processed, lowering the body's stress response, and changing the relationship between emotion and physical response.

For some people, pain can change far more than they ever expected.