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Hypnotherapy for successful weight loss and healthy eating

Hypnotherapy and hypnosis are proven by medical research to be effective methods for controlling eating, losing weight and treating obesity. I combine these with mindful eating exercises, congnitive-behavioural hypnosis and solution-oriented therapy to make a comprehensive weight-loss programme. It also includes healing for emotions driving the eating, if that is needed.

It's really important to know, and some websites don't make clear, that weight loss and unhappy eating aren't one single issue. There's a spectrum from habit overeating via comfort eating through bingeing, binge-vomiting and on all the way on to, in the far extreme, severe anorexia nervosa. These different eating issues need very different methods! To lose weight or control eating most successfully, you have to know where you are and apply the right approach.

Very roughly, the levels of food issue go something like this:

  • 1. Habit over-eating (below on this page - what works for losing weight with hypnosis ) This is the general national obesity epidemic - too much of the wrong foods. Includes also can't-eat-vegetables syndrome, chocaholism (chocolate addiction), and crispaholism (crisp addiction). Commonly combined with comfort eating. Hypnosis is proven by medical research to be very helpful. This is what is featured in the news as "hypno-dieting" or "hypno-slimming". Keys to success include:
    >>> feeling that you deserve to eat better
    >>> motivation - feeling that you want to eat better
    >>> clear new ways of behaving with food which disrupt of habits, clearly programmed into the mind to eat better.

    Hypnotherapy is excellent with all of these.
  • 2. Comfort eating (below on this page: overcoming comfort eating with hypnosis) This is when you are eating emotionally, and the reasons are obvious - you feel stressed / down / rejected etc and turn to the chocolate biscuits. Most of us do this at times and it's perfectly OK, unless it starts to pile on weight - and that is very common.
  • 3. Chaotic or driven over-eating / dieting, including bingeing and non-health-theatening eating disorders symptoms (non-life-threatening bulemia and anorexia) This is when eating feels a charged issue, maybe even completely out of control, but the root causes aren't clear. (These causes are sometimes emotional, sometimes not.) This includes: • emotional eating • bingeing / binge eating disorder • food obsession • food addiction • secret gorging • compulsive overeating • overeating due to depression • over-eating due to feeling worthless • intermittent binge-vomiting and binge / purging (ie mild to moderate symptoms of bulimia nervosa) • extremist dieting and obsession with being thin (in effect, mild to moderate aspects of anorexia nervosa, but where the person is still eating enough and, if a woman, still has periods) • unrealistic body image, and excessive concern with body image • exercise addiction / obsession • obsessional calorie counting • spontaneous vomiting • orthorexia (obsession with healthy foods) • "diet trauma syndrome" (my term for when someone has yo-yo dieted so often they become afraid of eating) • ... and many other things.
    People don't always want to change these things, but still feel there is something that they want help with. I am happy to help people explore whether they want to change or not, and to give a friendly and respectful welcome to the part of the person that doesn't want to eat, doesn't want to stop exercising, doesn't want to stop binge-vomiting, and and so on. Deep change comes from accepting and making friends with all parts of ourself, not by pushing parts of ourselves away, fearing to look at ourselves, or prescriptively labelling a behaviour as "bad" and supressing it ("You MUST eat" when a person isn't sure about that.)
  • 4. Severe eating disorders (See: "Have I got an eating disorder?" ) Severe bulimia can be damaging to health and anorexia is always a most grave condition. Families have to live with the fear that someone they love may die in front of their eyes, and indeed this does happen. In Bristol the STEPS program based at Southmead Hospital has a good reputation and may well provide all the therapy you need, and anyone with a life-threatening eating disorder should certainly be in STEPS excellent hands. I am happy to explore if perhaps I can add something useful and supportive to what you are getting elsewhere. I do use methods, such a individual family constellation, parts work, and male-female balancing which can add a distinctive insight. Please note that in this situation I work on healing the underlying (maybe hidden) emotions. I don't simply and solely "hypnotise people to make them eat," unless they wholeheartedly do want that at some stage of the therapy. It is characteristic of eating disorders that the person finds their way of eating beneficial and doesn't want to change. So I'm happy to work with people who are only exploring whether they wish to change, and to give a respectful and friendly welcome to the part of the person who doesn't so wish. The job of the therapy is to create felt connections ("felt" meaning not just intellectual) to deeper underlying needs and emotions, so that the person becomes clear that the eating behaviour is an unconscious means to an end. For example, eating disorders may unconsciously offer sufferers a way to not feel emotions, to be cared for, to try to keep adolescence and sexuality at bay, to deal with not loving themselves, and many other things. When a person really feels in their bones that, for example, their anorexia is keeping control of their emotions, they can begin to explore new ways of relating to their emotions, and learn new skills to deal with them better. Then the eating behaviour is needed less and less, and it gets easier and easier for the person to choose to eat. So I meet eacher person where they are, and help explore their emotions in a direction that feels helpful to them.

With the right approach it can be easier than you think to lose weight and feel happy and relaxed about food. Medical research proves hypnosis can be very helpful in a programme of sensible eating for weight loss. And my programme includes much more than just hypnotherapy - mindful eating, cognitive-behavioural hypnosis, emotional healing if needed, and more. I have a warm, human
and respectful approach.
To make an appointment,
just ring me directly.
Leave a message and I'll call you back.
Andrew White 0845-3510604 / 0117-968-7307. I'm happy to answer questions or arrange, in Bristol or Taunton, a free, no-obligation half-hour initial meeting.

Simple habit overeating and simple comfort eating - what works to lose weight?

There's a national obesity epidemic, and the cause is simple. Big portions of calorie-rich food on top of inactive lifestyle pile on the weight.

Don't put up with being weighed down by weight! There’s nothing mysterious about being slim. The French love good food, and their diet in fact contains much more fat than in the USA. But the Americans are very obese, while the French remain slim. Their secret? – small portions, eaten at family meals with ceremony and enjoyment, plus a certain self-pride.

And the Poles, for example, are shocked to see how overweight we are in the UK. In Poland they eat more vegetables, more home cooking, little convenience food, and they are happy, well-fed and SLIM. They don't feel hungry, starved or deprived. Being slim is simple and achievable - for the French, for the Poles, AND FOR YOU.

Simple comfort eating (stressful day, reach for the biscuits) is typically easily dealt with by a combination of hypnosis and easy application of mindfulness while eating. The French and the Poles have the same everyday stresses as everyone else and they don't feel driven to comfort eating. (If the emotional component is stronger, then see here for emotional eating, bingeing, and mild to moderate eating disorders.

(1) The key to weight loss is FEELING GREAT

The key to losing weight is feeling positive, and hypnotherapy is SO helpful in achieving that. It's easy to lose weight when:

Hypnosis and hypnotherapy have a wonderful capacity to flood the mind with bright, positive feelings and success images which can be exactly what's needed to galvanise weight loss which really works.

(2) Don't diet ... really, don't

The thing to avoid at all costs is deprivation dieting: “I really want it, but I’m going to force myself to be good and not have it.” This always fails. Again, hypnosis, hypnotherapy and the other tools I use are excellent at preventing this inner fight.

Indeed, more than deprivation dieting: don't diet at all. A diet lasts as long as the book or article you read is fresh in your mind, then it wears off. And whoosh!, the weight comes back on again. What you need is a sustainable long-term shift in your relationship with food. This is completely achievable and if you are just a habit eater it needn't take long at all. But you don't get it from one-size-fits-all suggestion hypnosis. What I do is always individualised to each person. As you need, we cover some or all of:

Along with habit overeating I class things like chocaholism and crispaholism (chocolate addiction and crisp addiction). These are typically just habits, most often dealt with completely in just one or two sessions.

Finally, a lot of people can't eat vegetables. There is a small epidemic of this! It is also normally easily cured in a session or two.

Please see here for emotional eating, bingeing, and mild to moderate eating disorder symptoms.

With the right approach it can be easy to lose weight and feel happy and relaxed about food. It's completely possible and medical research proves hypnosis can be VERY helpful. And I offer much more than hypnotherapy, including also mindful eating, cognitive-behavioural hypnosis, and more. For an appointment or more information, just ring. Leave a message and I'll call you back.
Andrew White 0845-3510604 / 0117-968-7307. I'm happy to answer questions or arrange, in Bristol or Taunton, a free, no-obligation half-hour initial meeting. My approach is friendly, respectful, and very effective.

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In general, mankind, since the improvement of cookery, eats about twice as much as nature requires.

Benjamin Franklin (1706 - 1790)

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To arrange an appointment, or for more information, ring and speak to me direct. Clinics: In Bristol, 7, Unity St, BS1 5HH (off Park St, by College Green, easy parking) and in Clifton, on the edge of the Downs; in Central London; 2, Middle St Taunton, TA1 1SH.

0117-968-7307

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