Using Hypnotherapy & Hypnosis To Assist With Eating Disorders

Definition of Eating Disorder Any of a range of psychological disorders characterised by abnormal or disturbed eating habits (such as anorexia nervosa).

Habitual Overeating Emotional Eating/Comfort Eating Binge Eating Bulimia (Nervosa) Anorexia (Nervosa)

Habitual Overeating May not be affecting life too much but persistent over eating will lead to weight gain and problems associated with that.

Emotional Eating/Comfort Eating May still be habitual but there will overeating that is driven by feelings and emotions. Could be very mild - e.g. person is lonely so snacks on biscuits and chocolates in the evening for comfort

Emotional Eating/Comfort Eating Or could be more intense, whereby the person is constantly trying to satisfy a feeling using food, but is never satiated, so continues to eat

Binge Eating The person has intense bouts of eating (binges) that usually continue until the person feels ill or has run out of food.

Binge Eating Can often be 2 or 3 pack of biscuits, or a whole box of cereal, or whole loaf of bread or all of these together, for example.

Binge Eating The usual characteristic is Once I start, I can t stop. It feels like a secret greedy person has taken over.

Bulimia (Nervosa) This is usually very similar to Binge Eating but after the Binge, the person purges (vomits) to get rid of the food. Hence it is sometimes known as Bingeing & Purging.

Bulimia (Nervosa) However, in some cases the person gets so habitual with the process, the person purges after every meal (or nearly every meal) or snack.

Bulimia (Nervosa) In excessive cases, the person may purge (ie Vomit) 7 or 8 times a day. In extreme cases, this could be almost continuous and so 15 times a day or more

Anorexia (Nervosa) With Anorexia, the person will restrict their food intake or exercise excessively (or both) in order to keep their weight as low as possible.

Anorexia (Nervosa) In some cases, this can be mild, where the person is still eating but restricting the diet to non-fat foods

Anorexia (Nervosa) In more severe cases, the person restricts intake completely

Anorexia (Nervosa) Either way, the person is usually keeping a mental check of the calories in vs exercise performed, in order to make sure their weight either stays the same or reduces

Whilst comfort eating and binge eating are almost certainly guaranteed to be driven by some form of emotion bulimia and anorexia behaviours are driven by FEAR

Bulimia is often just binge eating but the person is scared of gaining weight so purges to get rid of it and feel safe. The purging therefore makes sense.

Bulimia is often just binge eating but the person is fearful of gaining weight and so purges to get rid of it and feel safe. The purging therefore makes sense, with respect to the fear.

Similarly with Anorexia, the person is fearful of gaining weight so the restriction or exercising behaviour makes sense, with respect to the fear.

With all emotionally driven eating disorders, if you try and bring about a change in behaviour without addressing the feeling/emotion behind it, you are likely to run into difficulties.

People with eating disorders often start out feeling very GOOD about them and quite in control The binges are exciting The purging is relieving and gives a sense of control The weight loss caused by restriction feels like an achievement

But eventually, the behaviour that once gave the person something good starts creating fear if they don t do it. So it starts to control them

and feelings of guilt, shame and bad person ensue. (Many of which were the original underlying cause that set it off in the first place).

With Anorexia the person will begin to hear the voice that starts telling them what they should and shouldn't do and the person feels they have to obey.

With Bulimia, the person will usually try to restrict as well, but the control breaks down and binges occur.

From my experience, Binge Eating and Bulimia are usually fairly simple to resolve because the person has moments of letting go

whereas with Anorexia, the tight control makes the person controlling of their feelings and emotions as well.

With Bulimia, a person usually maintains a more realistic view of their body size and weight

But with Anorexia the person typically has a very false image of how they look. However emaciated they may seem to others, they see only fat which means they can be very resistant to seeking help

Because getting help for an anorexic person means getting fatter. Getting better means getting fatter - the thing they dread. It is important to be aware of this in any conversation, especially with parents.

How to help someone First of all we are not allowed to advertise being able to treat or cure eating disorders. But we can assist with the recovery or help with the symptoms

Habitual Overeating This may be PURE HABIT and so you can treat this the same way you would any habit

Habitual Overeating Find out what they Don t Want Find out what they DO want instead And give positive suggestions/mantras for being more in control and making different choices

Emotional Eating/ Comfort Eating If you try to control the symptom without addressing the emotional driving force, the person may encounter an inner conflict

Emotional Eating/ Comfort Eating By talking through with the client what feelings and emotions they are avoiding or using food to change how they feel you can help the client to introduce new options

Emotional Eating/ Comfort Eating Sometimes this may be very symptom focused (solution focused) E.g. Whenever you feel [x] you now do [y] (instead of eating)

Emotional Eating/ Comfort Eating Sometimes this may be very analytical E.g. you spend time with the person addressing the reason for their unhappiness first, and then begin to help them take control of their eating once they feel more in control emotionally.

Emotional Eating/ Comfort Eating Sometimes it will be a mixture of the two and may take a number of sessions to ease or resolve.

Emotional Eating/ Comfort Eating In these cases, the feelings and emotions tend to be fairly consistent but not always overly intense. E.g. feelings of loneliness, or boredom, or dissatisfaction.

Binge Eating Whereas with Binge Eating, the feelings tend to take over much more. There is a greater bubble of energy behind the behaviour and so a greater bubble of emotion.

Binge Eating From my experience, it is easiest to help someone overcome binge eating when you help them burst the bubble of energy/ emotion that is behind it.

Binge Eating So for Binge eating I will usually do some kind of analytical therapy/hypno-analysis to release any repressed or suppressed emotions Sometimes this is very simple requiring just one or two sessions

Binge Eating Sometimes a course of treatment is required if the person has a lot going on in the background that has been causing it. In these cases I will agree with the client that this is the course of action so they are informed and consenting before we proceed.

Binge Eating As the emotions become under control, the eating usually does as well and the binges stop by themselves. I will often assist this with some suggestion/self-hypnosis/ mantras etc, once I feel we are getting to a point where the client is ready to let go of the old behaviour.

Bulima I use virtually the same approach as for Binge Eating. I don t usually make any attempt to help the person control the purging until we have the bingeing under control otherwise the fear of gaining weight will be a factor.

Bulima People with Bulimia tend to fall into the insecure high-achiever personality type. They work hard, are very good but hold in their feelings and emotions. Often they have held them in for a long period of time following a specific ISE or series of events.

Bulima When I have helped them deal with the causes, the bingeing tends to reduce and with it the purging. A common response after some analytical work is, I still purged this week, but not sure why. I just did it because it s what I do? Which is a sign that we are moving from an emotionally driven behaviour to a habitual one

Bulima At the start, I would use the feeling they feel - bad, guilty, ashamed etc - as the starting point for a regression/analysis. Once it switches over to a habit I would switch to more suggestion/solution focused approach. Number of sessions varies from 1 or 2 in rarer cases, 3-6 might be an average if there is a lot to work through.

Anorexia With Anorexia I have found that ANY attempt to alleviate the symptoms is met with resistance for obvious reasons. So I always start with WHY they are doing what they do What does the Anorexic behaviour get them?

Anorexia E.g. Control - when there is no control in the rest of their life. Self-Worth - when it may have been previously lacking ( I m finally good at something ). Acceptance - ( the cool girls are skinny - I ll be like them ) Security - If I am underweight, no-one will ever be able to say I am fat The behaviour is always trying to achieve something if you can help the person resolve the thing they are trying to achieve, the behaviour may begin to reduce it s tenacity

Anorexia My own experience with clients has been that people with Anorexia tend to cling very tightly to it Success may be simple steps such as Trying a previously banned food Taking a piece of fruit whereas before only fruit juice was allowed Slowly and systematically Myth Busting

Anorexia People with Anorexia will typically have rules that they have to follow. And the voice will insist they do. My own approach has been to be understanding, without trying to fix them Helping resolve the fears and worries and self-doubts And gentle encouragement to challenge their fears and make small steps towards recovery

Anorexia Recovery from Anorexia is often a slow process and many people naturally recover after a period of time. It is also common for people to go from Anorexia to Bulimia and I take this as a good sign because they are beginning to let go I have seen people with Anorexia for one or two sessions and made a difference

Anorexia but I have also seen people for extended periods and still not managed to get a chink in the armour of self-hatred they sometimes feel In these cases, only when they begin to come out of it themselves, can I then begin to assist with the real issue that were causing it, etc.

I Hope You Found That UseFul Any Questions Please Just Ask.