Tim Maude Hypnotherapy

Author: Tim

  • Stress – An Overview – Part 2

    Stress – An Overview – Part 2

    In the previous part of “Stress – An Overview”, I looked at different types of stress and identified chronic stress as the type of stress that gives cause for concern. Part 2 looks at the effects of chronic stress – both physically and mentally.

    Physical effects of chronic stress

    When someone gets stressed, the brain starts to engage the fight or flight mechanisms within their body. With chronic stress, the brain is on high alert for something to happen at every moment. It starts to prepare the body to either run from something dangerous, or to fight it. It floods the body with adrenaline and cortisol, and the body responds to the change in chemicals.

    • The heart speeds up in order to send more oxygen to the muscles which may be needed. The blood vessels constrict, so that more oxygen is sent to the muscles. This increases the blood pressure. With chronic stress, the increased blood pressure can lead to other physical complications and difficulties with the circulatory system.
    • The breathing rate increases in order to get more oxygen into the body. The muscles tense up in order to protect the body from attack. With chronic stress, this can lead to tiredness, muscle spasms and headaches.
    • The bodies resources are diverted from the digestive system, as food digestion is not a priority in times of fight or flight. Sufferers may experience, constipation, IBS, acid reflux, and other digestive problems.
    • Resources are also diverted from the sexual organs, which can lead to a loss of libido, erectile dysfunction, vaginismus and reduced fertility.
    • The body’s immune system may not function as well as it should, leading to an increase in the number of infectious diseases.
    • The skin may develop eczema.
    • A range of other physical changes and conditions may occur such as an irregular menstrual cycle, migraines, sleeping difficulties, and high blood sugar.

    People suffering from chronic stress often have one or more of these physical conditions.

    Mental effects of chronic stress,

    Long term chronic stress can lead to further mental health problems. In a brain that is experiencing chronic stress, the primitive part of the brain becomes more active, and encourages the thinking part of the brain to feel bad as well as creating overwhelming compulsions. For example:

    • Anxiety
    • Worry
    • Panic attacks
    • Anger
    • Depression
    • Loss of motivation
    • OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder)
    • Agoraphobia
    • Loss of self-esteem
    • Self-blame
    • Self-harm
    • Anorexia Nervosa
    • Bulimia Nervosa
    • Binge eating

    Most people undergoing chronic stress will just develop increasing periods of anxiety. Some may develop other symptoms too.

    References

    Effects of stress on the body
    https://www.healthline.com/health/stress/effects-on-body

    Different types of stress.
    https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/open-gently/201812/the-three-types-stress

    Eustress
    https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/eustress-vs-distress

    Photo by George Pagan III on Unsplash

  • Stress – An Overview – Part 1

    Stress – An Overview – Part 1

    Introduction

    Everybody has stress sometimes. When we oversleep and realise we have to be off to work within the next 15 minutes; when we are really busy and we are suddenly given another five urgent tasks to complete; when we’re having a quiet conversation and there’s a loud crash as someone drops a dinner plate on the floor behind us. These are the times that we experience stress.

    Types of stress

    There are different types of stress:

    • Eustress – low-level stress that assists you getting through a lot of work
    • Acute stress – a short episode of stress in response to something that has happened
    • Chronic stress – persistent or continuous stress that happens most of the time.

    There are stressful times that most of us will be familiar with at sometime in our lives. They are moments of acute stress that stay with us for a short time and then dissipate. This is our natural response that says to us, “There’s something wrong – you need to do something about it now.”

    Just as acute stress draws our attention to something that might be wrong, eustress (pronounced you-stress) is a low-level stress that stays with us for longer periods of time and helps us get through a lot of work. Many people enjoy the experience of eustress, as it makes them more productive and they get a thrill out of doing a lot.

    However, chronic stress is stress that continues all day and every day – with barely a break. Eustress and acute stress on natural parts of every day life by people who enjoy a healthy lifestyle. Chronic stress, however, can lead to a lot of negative consequences.

    Causes of chronic stress.

    Chronic stress starts out with a lot of regular or continuous stressful events. These periods of acute stress run in to each other, so that the body is not able to recover from one episode of acute stress before another one starts. This means that the person is in a continuous state of stress.

    One example of modern-day stress is a stressful job where the expectation is that you will do more work than you have time for, and you have to take your work home with you. This sort of job delivers a constant low or medium-level stress with very little let-up.

    Other examples include people who find themselves in constant highly stressful situations that they are not able to get out of: A parent with a baby who doesn’t want to sleep night after night; someone who is bullied regularly who will not only be under stress while they’re being bullied, but also find themselves constantly stressed as they worry about being bullied.

    In these circumstances, the brain reenforces the pathways that lead to stress, because they are being used all the time. The pathways that lead to relaxation and calm are not used and it becomes harder and harder to relax as those pathways are underused. The brain learns that a state of chronic stress is “normal” and so stays in that state, even when there is nothing to be stressed about.

    References

    Effects of stress on the body
    https://www.healthline.com/health/stress/effects-on-body

    Different types of stress.
    https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/open-gently/201812/the-three-types-stress

    Eustress
    https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/eustress-vs-distress

    Photo by George Pagan III on Unsplash

  • A Quick Guide to Social Anxiety & Hypnotherapy

    A Quick Guide to Social Anxiety & Hypnotherapy

    Having anxiety about social situations is far more wide-spread than you might think. Around one in ten people in the UK will have social anxiety at some point in their lives. It is so common that it has its own medical classification – it is known to doctors as Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD), or sometimes, Social Phobia.

    Social anxiety is a problem when someone has anxiety or fear in social situations – meeting people, being in a workplace, going to a supermarket when it is busy … any situation where there are a lot of people around can trigger social anxiety. It is diagnosed more often in women than in men, and often starts in the teenage years.

    How do I know if I have social anxiety?

    When in a social situation, someone with social anxiety may suffer some of these symptoms:

    • A feeling of anxiety or fear – for no apparent reason
    • Thinking that other people may be judging them
    • Sweating, blushing or trembling
    • Feeling embarrassed
    • Being self-conscious
    • Difficulty speaking clearly – both hesitant and unable to find the right words to say
    • Having a feeling of not being good enough compared to everyone around them
    • Finding it difficult to maintain eye contact
    • Physical changes such as increased heart rate, dry mouth, or fast breathing

    People with social anxiety disorder may change their lifestyle in order to avoid social situations, being happier on their own or with small groups of close friends.

    What causes social anxiety?

    The exact cause of social anxiety will vary from individual to individual. It tends to run in families, so there may be genetic factors involved. Some people may have had a bad experience in a social situation in the past which their brain has not processed fully; they may think of themselves as lacking importance, or not as good as everyone else in the group; or they may simply have a super-shy personality.

    The cause of an individual’s social anxiety is not really very important in dealing with the issue. The cause may be interesting, but it does not help in sorting it all out.

    How can hypnotherapy help with social anxiety?

    As with all anxiety-related problems, it’s only a problem if it’s a problem. If a person is content with their life as it is, there is no need to do anything about it. However, if social anxiety prevents them from living how they want to live, then hypnotherapy can help.

    Hypnotherapy allows an individual to change those automatic feelings of fear, anxiety and generally being uncomfortable in social situations. It can also help by improving self-esteem, a factor which is sometimes associated with social anxiety. Hypnotherapy can help individuals be fully comfortable and in control of their feelings in a social situation.

    References

    NHS advice on social anxiety
    https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/social-anxiety/

    Royal College of Psychiatrists description of social phobia
    https://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/mental-health/problems-disorders/shyness-and-social-phobia

    Hypnotherapy for social anxiety
    https://www.mindsethealth.com/matter/hypnosis-social-anxiety

    Photo by Kimson Doan on Unsplash

  • What is Hypnotherapy?

    What is Hypnotherapy?

    Hypnotherapy is a therapy designed to enable us to change our thoughts, feelings and behaviours. Why would we want to do that? Because sometimes we don’t seem to be able to control our thoughts, feelings and behaviours.

    Sometimes we think about things that we don’t want to think about – worrying about what might happen, or remembering an embarrassing situation – thoughts that seem to come into our heads without being able to control them. Sometimes we feel bad – feeling down, anxious or angry – feelings that we don’t like, but seem to happen on their own. And sometimes we do things that we don’t think are good, but do not seem to be able to stop ourselves doing – eating too much, spending too long scrolling through our phones, or checking that we have locked the door five times before settling down for the night.

    So why do we think, feel and behave in ways that we don’t like? Why can we not be in full control of ourselves? It’s all down to the primitive part of our brain, the part that is more concerned with our survival than how we feel. The primitive part of our brain is very simple – it just follows patterns. So when it finds a pattern of how to get us to think, feel or behave, it sticks to it – even if we don’t like it, and even if doesn’t actually protect us.

    Hypnotherapy is all about getting into the parts of our brains that we are not consciously aware of. A hypnotherapist will lead it into a better place and help us convince that primitive part of our brain that there is a better way to think, feel or behave that is quite safe.

    Hypnotherapy is not like surgery – the hypnotherapist does not get into your brain and mend things. It is more akin to physiotherapy. Just as a physiotherapist helps us move our bodies so that the muscles and joints work better, so the hypnotherapist helps us use our brain in such a way that helps it works better over time.

    In a typical hypnotherapy session, some of the time will be spent talking, which, in itself, is a way of getting our brain to operate better. Then the hypnotherapist will take us into a relaxing trance – a state that is similar to that time when we are half asleep and half awake. During the trance, our brains have time to restructure themselves.

    If you have trouble controlling your thoughts, feelings or behaviours and would like some help, you might like to give hypnotherapy a go. I work in my clinic in Fleet, Hampshire – focusing mostly on anxiety-related issues. Give me a call or contact me on my website.

    Photo by Mark Williams on Unsplash

  • A Perfect Anxiety Storm

    A Perfect Anxiety Storm

    Are you an “OK” cleaner, or does your room have to be perfectly clean?

    It is surprising how often I meet a perfectionist in my anxiety clinic. Not that they tell me they are a perfectionist on the first session … it sort of emerges later. Sometimes they don’t realise they are a perfectionist until they examine themselves more closely. Of course, I never tell them they are a perfectionist – that’s not my job – I do not diagnose or analyse my client’s character, I simply help them to get to where they want.

    There’s the person that wants their room to be perfectly clean every day, or the blog writer who edits and re-edits their blog thirty times until it is just right. I once saw a man trimming the edge of his lawn with a pair of scissors in order to get the perfect neat edge …these are the perfectionists. They want the things within their control to be done perfectly.

    There is nothing wrong with desiring perfection – unless that desire is a source of anxiety. The problem comes when the perfectionist gets stressed out as they try in vain to achieve perfection. They build a self-imposed vision of their perfect world and get stressed out trying to achieve it – and then trying to maintain it. And that stress builds – and the stress creates anxiety.

    It is a hard lesson to learn, but we all have to learn it at some time in our lives … “Good enough is good enough.” It is nice when we achieve perfection, but if whatever we do achieves its purpose, then it is good enough.

    Whatever you can control – get it to be good enough. Cleaning your room so that it is hygienic and reasonable neat is good enough. You don’t have to clean under the bed every day. If your blog gets the main message over, you don’t need to re-edit it thirty times. Good enough is good enough.

    And yes, it is nice to achieve perfection once in a while – but you don’t have to stress about it – provided you have achieved something that is good enough.

    If you have trouble controlling your levels of stress and anxiety on your own, you might like to give hypnotherapy a try. I run my hypnotherapy clinic in Fleet, Hampshire – you can always try giving me a call.

    Photo by Jeremy Perkins on Unsplash

  • Burnt Out Britain

    Burnt Out Britain

    Increasing numbers of people in Britain are getting burnt out – so says a report by Jenevieve Treadwell as part of the think tank, Onward. The report is an interesting read, laying bare the facts round commonly held beliefs, and proposing a new idea about why people get burnt out.

    The report does not define “burn-out”, but associates it with tiredness, feeling overworked and feeling too knackered for leisure activities.

    Busting the three burn-out myths

    Treadwell argues that there are three myths about why more and more people are feel burnt out …

    1. We are sleeping less – wrong … statistics show we are now sleeping more on average than we did in 1974
    2. We are working more – wrong … at least for men, who are working very slightly less than in 1974. Woman are working slightly more.
    3. We are feeling more rushed – wrong … survey’s suggest that our subjective feeling of being rushed has not changed much.

    So what is it that causes burn-out?

    Different Times

    In order to create more nuanced thinking about burn-out, Treadwell identifies four different types of time:

    1. Necessary time – This is the time we spend doing things that are necessary to keep our bodies working properly – sleep, eating, washing etc.
    2. Contracted time – This is the time we spend working, that is doing what we have contracted to do with our employer or clients.
    3. Committed time – This is the time we spend doing the other things that we have to do because we have no choice – taking the children to school, cleaning our house/flat.
    4. Free time – The time that is left to us to do what we want to do – leisure activities, volunteering etc.

    These different times compete with each other, and it is often the Free Time that gets squeezed out. We now spend less time seeing their friends, visiting restaurants, going out, volunteering, and exercising than in 1974.

    So Why the Burn-Out?

    Treadwell proposes that a big contributor to burn-out is the fact that we now change activities far quicker than we did in the past. We move from one activity to another and then back again far more than we ever did. Modern technology allows us to check our messages in the middle of eating a meal, or check our social media before getting out of bed. This constant changing from one activity to another increases the stress and the likelihood of burn-out.

    What do I Think?

    I work with people how are only just coping with stress and anxiety. In each session we talk about their lives and what they could do to improve it, which all supports a therapeutic hypnosis trance. I find that many of my clients decide that they want to re-organise their lives – simplifying and restructuring so as to get as much done as they ever did, but in a better way. For example, having set times when they don’t look at their phones, stopping taking work home with them at weekends, or prioritising time spent with their children.

    From my experience, it seems to me that taking better control of your time is a good way to reduce stress and anxiety.

    If you find that you are unable to control your own stress and anxiety on your own, you may like to give hypnotherapy a go. I work in my clinic in Fleet, Hampshire and would be happy to hear from you.

    The Report in Full

    Click to access Burnt-Out-Britain.pdf

    Photo by ROBIN WORRALL on Unsplash