SAD: there's no need to be

by Marygrace Anderson

It's that time again. The weather is changing and the nights are getting darker, so be prepared. There is a lot of things you can do to prepare mentally. Lights, music, and action. Really SAD lights are great or making sure you have desk lamps on will boost your spirits, uplifting/happy/dance music will get you going and motivated. Finally get moving and out... exercise or go for a walk. You will feel so much better. Dark does not have to be bad or sad. Dark makes me think of being in a wonderful trance state where I can relax and give myself positive affirmations. Try it - it works.

Hypnotherapy and pain relief

by Marygrace Anderson


Sports injury, sprain, fracture, migraines, the list goes on and on but the pain is common in all of the above. It might be minor or unbearable, short term or reoccurring. Pain is pain. If you have to live with it, it can change your life in such negative ways like going out, relationships, depression, and sleeping problems. It doesn't need to be like that and hypnotherapy can help.

We all know the mind and body work together. Using hypnotherapy we can reduce the impact on your life and how you feel. There are various ways and techniques for lowering the impact on how you live with discomfort and change it from a negative response to a positive one. For your sake and those around you. Feel free to call me to discuss your situation, as it’s a very personalized condition for each individual.

Hypnosis reduces pain and speeds up recovery from surgery:


Since 1992, we have used hypnosis routinely in more than 1400 patients undergoing surgery. We found that hypnosis used with patients as an adjunct to conscious sedation and local anesthesia was associated with improved intraoperative patient comfort, and with reduced anxiety, pain, intraoperative requirements for anxiolytic and analgesic drugs, optimal surgical conditions and a faster recovery of the patient. We reported our clinical experience and our fundamental research.
[Hypnosis and its application in surgery] Faymonville ME, Defechereux T, Joris J, Adant JP, Hamoir E, Meurisse M, Service d'Anesthesie-Reanimation, Universite de Liege, Rev Med Liege. 1998 Jul;53(7):414-8. 


Hypnosis reduces pain intensity:


Analysis of the simple-simple main effects, holding both group and condition constant, revealed that application of hypnotic analgesia reduced report of pain intensity significantly more than report of pain unpleasantness.
Dahlgren LA, Kurtz RM, Strube MJ, Malone MD, Differential effects of hypnotic suggestion on multiple dimensions of pain. Journal of Pain & Symptom Management. 1995; 10(6): 464-70. 


Healed 41% faster from fracture


Healed significantly faster from surgery:

Two studies from Harvard Medical School show hypnosis significantly reduces the time it takes to heal.

• Study One: Six weeks after an ankle fracture, those in the hypnosis group showed the equivalent of eight and a half weeks of healing.
• Study Two: Three groups of people studied after breast reduction surgery. Hypnosis group healed "significantly faster" than supportive attention group and control group.

Harvard Medical School, Carol Ginandes and Union Institute in Cincinnati, Patricia Brooks, Harvard University Gazette Online.

Hypnosis reduces pain of headaches and anxiety:


The improvement was confirmed by the subjective evaluation data gathered with the use of a questionnaire and by a significant reduction in anxiety scores.
Melis PM, Rooimans W, Spierings EL, Hoogduin CA, Treatment of chronic tension-type headache with hypnotherapy: a single-blind time controlled study. Headache 1991; 31(10): 686-9. 


Hypnosis lowered post-treatment pain in burn injuries:

Patients in the hypnosis group reported less post treatment pain than did patients in the control group. The findings are used to replicate earlier studies of burn pain hypnoanalgesia, explain discrepancies in the literature, and highlight the potential importance of motivation with this population.
Patterson DR, Ptacek JT, Baseline pain as a moderator of hypnotic analgesia for burn injury treatment. Journal of Consulting & Clinical Psychology 1997; 65(1): 60-7. 


Hypnosis lowered phantom limb pain:

Hypnotic procedures appear to be a useful adjunct to established strategies for the treatment of phantom limb pain and would repay further, more systematic, investigation. Suggestions are provided as to the factors which should be considered for a more systematic research program.
Treatment of phantom limb pain using hypnotic imagery. Oakley DA, Whitman LG, Halligan PW, Department of Psychology, University College, London, UK. 


Hypnosis has a reliable and significant impact on acute and chronic pain:

Hypnosis has been demonstrated to reduce analogue pain, and studies on the mechanisms of laboratory pain reduction have provided useful applications to clinical populations. Studies showing central nervous system activity during hypnotic procedures offer preliminary information concerning possible physiological mechanisms of hypnotic analgesia. Randomized controlled studies with clinical populations indicate that hypnosis has a reliable and significant impact on acute procedural pain and chronic pain conditions. Methodological issues of this body of research are discussed, as are methods to better integrate hypnosis into comprehensive pain treatment.
Hypnosis and clinical pain. Patterson DR, Jensen MP, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA USA 98104 Psychol Bull. 2003 Jul;129(4):495-521. 


Hypnosis is a powerful tool in pain therapy and is biological in addiction to psychological:


Attempting to elucidate cerebral mechanisms behind hypnotic analgesia, we measured regional cerebral blood flow with positron emission tomography in patients with fibromyalgia, during hypnotically-induced analgesia and resting wakefulness. The patients experienced less pain during hypnosis than at rest. The cerebral blood-flow was bilaterally increased in the orbitofrontal and subcallosial cingulate cortices, the right thalamus, and the left inferior parietal cortex, and was decreased bilaterally in the cingulate cortex. The observed blood-flow pattern supports notions of a multifactorial nature of hypnotic analgesia, with an interplay between cortical and subcortical brain dynamics.
Copyright 1999 European Federation of Chapters of the International Association for the Study of Pain.
Functional anatomy of hypnotic analgesia: a PET study of patients with fibromyalgia. Wik G, Fischer H, Bragee B, Finer B, Fredrikson M, Department of Clinical Neurosciences, Karolinska Institute and Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden Eur J Pain. 1999 Mar;3(1):7-12. 


Hypnosis useful in hospital emergency rooms:


Hypnosis can be a useful adjunct in the emergency department setting. Its efficacy in various clinical applications has been replicated in controlled studies. Application to burns, pain, pediatric procedures, surgery, psychiatric presentations (e.g., coma, somatoform disorder, anxiety, and post traumatic stress), and obstetric situations (e.g., hyperemesis, labor, and delivery) are described.
Emerg Med Clin North Am. 2000 May;18(2):327-38, x. The use of hypnosis in emergency medicine. Peebles-Kleiger MJ, Menninger School of Psychiatry and Mental Health Sciences, Menninger Clinic, Topeka, KS, USA. peeblemj@menninger.edu


For more information, you can contact Marygrace on 07931 547 414, visit the MG Hypnosis website or email her on mghypnosis@aol.com.

The benefits of hypnobirthing classes

Marygrace Anderson is now offering hypnobirthing classes at The Putney Clinic of Physical Therapy.

The benefits of hypnobirthing include:

• Manage any discomfort through powerful breathing techniques. 
• Reduces fear, tension and discomfort, thus naturally increasing discomfort threshold. 
• Learn relaxation techniques that will help your body to work the way it is designed to. 
• Learn how to put yourself in control of your birth, rather than blindly turning your birthing experience over to your doctor or midwife. 
• Less medication and chemical anaesthesia is needed as muscles thin and open easily. 
• Hypnosis shortens the first stage of delivery by approximately 3 – 4 hours for mother's delivering their babies. For subsequent deliveries, it is not unusual for them to be as quick as 60 - 120 minutes long. 
• Learn visualisation techniques that can help your body to do what it wants to do.
• Allow your mind and body to work together in harmony. 
• Experience the pleasures of birth rather than the negative experiences you may have heard from others. 
• Release worries and concerns you may have about birth. 
• Enables mother to go into "hypnotic relaxation" if unable to sleep between feeds. 
• Raises resistance to fatigue during delivery thus minimizing maternal exhaustion. 
• Encourages the production of milk. Decreases "post natal blues" and speeds up recovery.
• Use the endorphin release to increase your body's natural anaesthetic; a much safer option than relying on pharmaceuticals and other drugs.

For more information contact 07931 547414 or email mghypnosis@aol.com or call the Putney Clinic of Physical Therapy on 020 8789 3881.

New Year, new you

By Marygrace Anderson

New year, new you? Yeah right, but maybe, just maybe.

It didn't happen last year or the year before, but that is the point. Why didn't it? Well, I can tell you... The answer is you didn't really want it. Sorry, I meant to say you didn't REALLY want it in the way you need to commit to change. The missing link, the desire was just not there. How do I know? I've been there and failed. Now I have been there and succeeded.

My life changing moment happened seven years ago. I walked into a hypnotherapist's office seeking help to quit smoking. I am well-educated, strong-willed, very aware of the dangers of smoking and had the greatest motivation to stop, a new baby. (I had stopped throughout the pregnancy but went back to it).

I loved the experience so much I trained to become a certified hypnotherapist. I wanted to be able to change people's lives for the better and it is now what I do for a living. Now, I am presented with sceptics for sleep difficulties, confidence, phobias, weight loss, smoking and various other issues and - in a nice way - proved them wrong too. The nice thing about all of these people is they do have what I had and just needed a little help. They reached the point of desire to change. My role is to help make this desire happen with them.

Hypnotherapy is a treatment that uses hypnosis to alter the way you feel or change aspects of your life that need improving. Hypnosis is a perfectly natural condition that we experience every day of our lives, like daydreaming. We drift in and out of a hypnotic state all day long without being aware of it. Under hypnosis, we are capable of making amazing changes to our thinking patterns and unlocking unlimited potential to improve and transform our lives.

We discuss what you want to improve or change. Then we agree the goals and desired outcome you want to accomplish. Next, we'll work together with various techniques and hypnosis to achieve those results, all in a tranquil, calming and relaxing environment. So go ahead, and let me prove you wrong and give you a chance to say, "wow, a new me"!

For more information, you can contact Marygrace Anderson on 07931 547 414 or visit the MG Hypnosis website.

What is hypnotherapy?

By Marygrace Anderson

Hypnotherapy is a treatment that uses hypnosis to alter the way you feel or change aspects of your life that need improving.

What is hypnosis?

Hypnosis is a perfectly natural condition, which we experience every day of our lives, like day dreaming. We drift in and out of a hypnotic state all day long without being aware of it. Under hypnosis, we are capable of making amazing changes to our thinking patterns and unlocking unlimited potential to improve and transform our lives.

All hypnosis is self-hypnosis, meaning that you are in control at all times. A hypnotherapist guides and empowers the client throughout the hypnotic process. This is a focused state of relaxation, in which the subconscious mind can achieve incredible transformations for beneficial purposes.

The incredible commitment generated between hypnotherapist and client working together creates positive and therapeutic changes which can alter a person's life permanently. We focus on the solution, not the problem.

Who can be hypnotised?

Virtually everyone can be hypnotised. If you have the desire to make a change, then you will allow yourself to be guided into the wonderful and relaxing trance state. You cannot be hypnotised against your will. Children of all ages are welcome.

Is hypnosis safe?

Hypnotherapy is 100% safe. There are no side-effects and you are always in control.

What happens during the session?

We discuss what you want to improve or change. Then we agree the goals and desired outcome you want to accomplish. Next, we work together with various techniques and hypnosis to achieve those results, all in a tranquil, calming and relaxing environment.

How many sessions will I need and what are the fees?

It depends on what you need assistance with changing. Giving up smoking or eliminating a phobia are usually resolved in one session, while the majority of cases are treated in four sessions or less. The aim is to help you in the minimum number of sessions possible, so your motivation and desire to change will play a key role. You should achieve the results quickly and pleasantly. We will review your progress together after each session.

Fees are £145.00 for the first session (lasting 75 minutes) and reviewed thereafter if more sessions are required. Counselling and life coaching fees are based in the number of sessions agreed. Smoking cessation is £200.00, with 20% donated of this total donated to charity.

How can hypnotherapy help you?

Hypnotherapy can be effective in a number of ways. It can help you to increase confidence and self-esteem; improve motivation; manage your weight; quit smoking; manage stress and eliminate anxiety; eliminate phobias and panic attacks; stop unwanted habits and alleviate sleeping disorders.

For more information, you can contact Marygrace on 07931 547 414 or visit www.mghypnosis.co.uk.