There are many different types of therapies available today for pain conditions. Some work better than others, whilst others have proved to be worthless.
When it comes to pain management and the ability to live a full and active life, hypnotherapy could prove to be one of the most effective forms of therapies there is, able to drastically improve your quality of life.
In this article, I will discuss hypnotherapy for pain and how it can help you live an everyday life again and recover from your experience of pain – see also ‘Hypnosis for Fibromyalgia‘ (chronic muscular pain).
What is Hypnotherapy?
In simple terms, hypnotherapy is the method of putting someone into a light trance in order for him or her to reprogram his subconscious mind and work towards a positive change. It’s also known as hypnotism which is just one among many other therapies that deal with the same thing.
In therapy, hypnosis is used to encourage relaxation for clients in their sessions so as to explore their feelings and emotions. It is a powerful tool of change; it alters thoughts, induces trance, and directly influences the unconscious mind to make profound realizations.
Hypnosis has a High Success Rate
The number of patients being treated for physical and psychological afflictions, using hypnotic suggestions, is rapidly increasing. This is due to the overwhelming success of this approach that permits patients to address issues that are problematic at a subconscious level without the need for the treatments of medicine, analgesia, or surgery.
People want to learn how to relax and open their minds, as well as other techniques or treatments such as hypnotic suggestions that will allow them to quickly resolve health problems in their lives.
Types of Pain That Can be Relieved by Hypnotherapy
Pain is a complex sensory and emotional experience. It’s our body’s way of telling us that something’s wrong. It alerts us to problems, but it also can be a warning sign of an impending problem or serious disease.
Often, people have more than one kind of discomfort they are experiencing in their bodies. It can be acute — sudden and intense, as with an injury. Or it can be chronic — ongoing and persistent, as with arthritis.
Acute Pain
Acute pain lasts days, weeks rather than years. It is typically gone by the time the acute condition resolves (gets better).
It may or not respond well to medicine, analgesia, and other pain relief treatment such as surgery. Acute pain is usually a warning sign of impending illness or other problems requiring treatment. It occurs when tissues are damaged.
Chronic Pain
Chronic pain is a condition where a person experiences ongoing pain (the one that lasts for over 12 weeks, or past the normal time it takes for tissue healing) and often, but not always, will result in some type of functional impairment.
It may be described as “a constant ache or feeling of soreness”, “a dull pain”, or “soreness with occasional sharp stabbing pains”. The location of chronic pain can fall anywhere between the neck ache, upper or lower back.
Causes of Pain
Acute or chronic pain can be caused by many things, including disease, injury, surgery, and even the everyday obstacles of life. Some pain can be easily masked by medicine or analgesia like Percocet while others require alternative treatments like hypnotherapy or hypnotic suggestion.
How Hypnosis Works for Pain Management
There are medications available in the market that can help to control pain if you know how and where to take them. However, there are many folks who experience side effects from these types of medical treatments such as addiction.
Hypnosis is an all-natural treatment that doesn’t have side effects.
Helps Shift Your Focus Away From Your Pain
Hypnosis has been a proven effective treatment in the journal of the clinical plus international journal of clinical as a non-invasive and non-pain management tool. It helps you to quickly shift your focus away from the pain and reduce its intensity.
Although hypnosis or hypnotic suggestions are not for everyone, they are a great complement to traditional therapies for the management of pain. They are ideal for patients suffering from neck and back, headache, joint (Arthritis), shoulder, carpal tunnel syndrome, migraine, surgery pain, just to mention a few.
Hypnosis is a natural healing process where your mind can affect your body. It works because it uses the power of suggestions to help you enter a state of focused attention that enables you to control how you perceive and feel pain.
Encourages Your Brain to Relax and be Less Reactive to Pain
Hypnosis involves putting your conscious mind into a state of heightened concentration while the subconscious is opened up and allowed access to the area of your brain where the pain originates.
It reduces stress for the brain and encourages it to relax thus becoming less reactive to pain. This automatically offers pain relief. This technique or treatment is also able to block or refocus your mind to something pleasant instead of pain hence relieving your acute or chronic pain.
Self-Hypnotherapy for Pain
Are you struggling with pain from an injury, illness, or surgery? Or are you suffering from a chronic condition like fibromyalgia or arthritis? Self-hypnotherapy for pain can be one of the most effective tools to help reduce and manage the pain experienced from a variety of causes.
Self-hypnosis will work by helping you to relax deeply into a trance-like state where negative thoughts and associations will be replaced by thoughts of relaxation and gain, these, in turn, persuade the body to relax and assist in gaining a pain-free state.
Tools for Self Hypnosis
There are a variety of tools that help with the relaxation of the body and focus your mind so you can enter a state of self-hypnosis. One such tool is the self-hypnosis CD or video. They work by emitting suggestive messages to the subconscious mind.
With these treatment tools, you are actually guiding yourself into a trance in order to channel your heightened imagination to achieve success with whatever goal you desire and in our case; control of pain.
When you practice self-hypnosis, you will still be awake and aware of what is happening around you; you will simply be in a lighter state of relaxation. In this case, hypnosis may relieve your pain.
Chronic Pain Management by a Hypnotherapist
Choosing the right hypnotherapist for pain can make a difference as to whether or not it’s successful. There are many hypnotherapists and choosing the wrong one could mean it may not work for you.
You need to seek out those with experience with hypnotic suggestions, knowledge, and who have the skills, and certifications required. Choosing an experienced hypnotherapist for pain will help you out a lot in this matter.
An experienced hypnotherapist for pain will inspect your body and use a series of techniques that may help to eliminate or control your pain.
How Do You Use Hypnosis for Pain?
Have you ever considered the hypnotic suggestions for pain? They may be more effective than you realize. Here’s how it works. A professional hypnotist will diagnose your pain and its symptoms then begin treatment with hypnotic imagery, videos, or sounds.
The hypnotist puts you into a trance that helps your subconscious mind focus on the pain that’s bothering you and sends these thoughts to your subconscious mind. Your subconscious mind then sends messages to your body to release certain chemicals for relaxation.
Hypnosis takes just a few minutes, allowing you to enjoy instant relief from your pain.
How to Prepare for Hypnosis
Good preparation is vital for a successful outcome in your sessions. It allows you to relax, enables the hypnotherapist to effectively work with you, and increases the likelihood of achieving your goals such as physical therapy, and a life free of pain and stress.
There are some steps you can take to prepare for hypnosis and to have a successful session or treatment. If you follow these guidelines, you will be setting the stage for success and relaxation with hypnosis.
Wear Comfortable Clothes
To make your hypnosis session successful, be sure that you are as relaxed and comfortable as possible. You will want to wear loose, comfortable clothing without a lot of metal adornments that can clink or chime.
Avoid wearing watches or other jewelry that could jingle or clack together. Make sure that your footwear is not noisy or distracting to you or to the hypnotherapist.
Can Hypnosis Help with Pain?
Hypnosis has been used successfully to control pain for a hundred years or more, and today many dedicated practitioners offer this service to patients.
The most recent published study shows that hypnosis is effective for helping people with both chronic and acute pain. Older studies already showed that hypnosis can help with back, leg, dental, and other types of pain.
Hypnosis can also be very soothing and relaxing for people suffering from symptoms related to stress or anxiety.
Can Hypnotherapy Help With Chronic Pain?
Chronic pain—this kind will stop you from working, sleeping, and enjoying the day. Can hypnotherapy help with chronic pain? It can if you choose to work with a hypnotherapist who uses his or her expertise with hypnotic suggestions to put your mind at ease so that you can finally sleep, wake up feeling refreshed, and live a normal life again.
It is a safe and non-invasive treatment that has been reported to relieve chronic pain without the side effects of painkillers or surgery.