Tim Maude Hypnotherapy

Tag: hypnotherapy

  • Sleep and Anxiety – the Ongoing Conflict

    Sleep and Anxiety – the Ongoing Conflict

    Increasing anxiety can mean you sleep badly – sleeping badly can increase anxiety. On the other hand lowering your anxiety can improve your sleep – and improving your sleep can help reduce anxiety.

    Many people who have anxiety and stress issues will recognise the experience of waking up in the night and then finding it difficult to get back to sleep – with all those anxious feeling and worries going through their head. And this compounds the real problem, because regular nights of good sleep helps sort out anxiety.

    Sleep Phases

    When we sleep, we go through phases – some of the time we have deep sleep and at other times we are sleeping very lightly. These are important in order to keep your body and mind healthy. One of the stages of sleep is known as REM (rapid eye movement) – the stage when we dream. REM sleep accounts for around a fifth of our sleep patterns, although most people rarely remember much of it.

    During REM sleep, our brain consolidates our memories. It looks at things that have happened recently and processes them, getting rid of unwanted stuff and reconfiguring the rest. You may have heard the expression, “Sleep on it.” If there is something that is worrying you – put it aside and look at it again in the morning and you will view it differently. Why? Because during the night, while you are in your REM sleep, you process that bit of memory and so a lot of the emotion is taken out of it.

    How Sleep Helps with Anxiety

    So a good nights sleep will give you around an hour and a half of REM sleep in which to process all your worries and regrets so that they don’t look so bad the next day. This means that the fight-flight-or-freeze centre of the brain is less likely to be triggered and less likely to generate as much anxiety.

    And I know that it’s all very well telling someone with anxiety, “just get enough sleep,” but that doesn’t help when you wake up in the middle of the night worrying and cannot get back to sleep again.

    Sleep Tips

    There is no one answer that can guarantee a good night’s sleep. What works for one person may not work for another. So the trick is to have a go at different things – just see what works for you. Remember – if what you are doing at the moment doesn’t work, then try something else.

    Let’s start with some “don’t”s

    • Don’t try to go short on sleep and catch up on the weekend
    • Don’t drink alcohol just I order to help you get a good night’s sleep
    • Don’t drink caffeinated drinks before bedtime

    And some “do”s

    • Do have a wind-down routine before bedtime
    • Consciously relax every part of your body as you lie in bed
    • If you have anything that’s worrying you – write it down so that your brain doesn’t have to keep reminding you to deal with it

    Sleep is so important to our lives, and these few tips do not do do it justice. I will come back to fully exploring sleep tips another time.

    If you have problems coping with your anxiety and stress on your own and are looking for some help, then you may wish to consider hypnotherapy. I work out of my clinic in Fleet, Hampshire helping people get their lives under control and reducing the symptoms of stress and anxiety.

    Photo by Kate Stone Matheson on Unsplash

  • The Perfectionist’s Dilemma

    The Perfectionist’s Dilemma

    Being a perfectionist is a noble ideal, but be warned … it can feed your anxiety. Anxiety comes from too much stress, and too much stress can come from always seeking an unobtainable life.

    A perfectionist wants everything to be perfect; their home has to be perfect; their job has to be done perfectly; their life has to be exactly as they want it to be. And of course, in one way, it’s good to strive for the best. You will never get the best results if you don’t strive for them.

    The problem comes when we don’t get the perfect life we want … and, by the way … we rarely do. We may strive for everything to be just right, but there is always someone who spoils it (not out of malice, it’s just that they don’t have the same longing for perfection). Or maybe you run out of time or money to get it to the perfect state you want it to be in.

    Imagine the couple preparing to get married. They want a perfect wedding. They spend months saving and planning, booking rooms, planning guest lists and all the other things that go to make a great wedding. It is already stressful, trying to get everything ready by a fixed deadline. And when the great day arrives, something goes wrong – maybe it rains during the formal photography session outside in the rose garden, or Uncle Jack turns up late and interrupts the wedding vows. The frustration just adds to the ever increasing stress levels. And the stress can lead to anxiety.

    And so we have the perfectionist’s dilemma: Ever striving to achieve unobtainable perfection leads to stress, disappointment and anxiety, whereas making do with a lesser goal does not achieve what you really want.

    The solution to the perfectionist’s dilemma is to accept the simple fact that:

    Good enough is good enough.

    You can still strive for perfection, but you need to accept that it will not always be achieved. And if you don’t achieve it, is what you have achieved good enough … good enough to work … good enough for you to be satisfied? When you can accept that it is good enough, life becomes calmer and you are less likely to become anxious.

    If you struggle to control you anxiety and want help, you might want to see what hypnotherapy can do. I work from my clinic here in Fleet (or over Zoom if you live further away). Contact me when you need help getting you life back together.

    Photo by Alvaro Reyes on Unsplash

  • The Clinic in the Garden

    The Clinic in the Garden

    I sit at my desk, here in my hypnotherapy clinic, having taken all of 10 seconds to walk over from my house. The sun is shining and I can look out at the garden and see the leaves need clearing from the lawn. They can wait until the weekend because, right now, now I am waiting for my next client.

    My client has not been here before, so I go out to the road to greet him. We shake hands and walk back to the clinic in the garden. The clinic is a purpose-built room, where we can talk confidentially. He gets the nice comfortable chair, while I sit in my office chair. He looks at the pictures on the wall, and the garden through the window, but mostly he looks at me, wondering what will happen next.

    I ask him how I can help and he tells me all his problems. I listen to what he has to say, but what I really want to know comes in the next question … “You have told me about your problems … now what do you want instead?” You see, I am not really interested in where the problem came from; what I am interested in is how he wants to be when it’s all sorted out.

    The Hypnotherapy Clinic in the garden

    I get some more background information, and then start to explain what is actually going on in his head. I get out a diagram of a human brain and show him the different parts and how they interact. I explain what stress does to the brain, and how the brain naturally deals with it. I show him the part of the brain that is probably giving rise to the problems he has. Understanding the mechanics of the brain, even in the simplest terms, is the first step to moving on.

    And then I ask him if he would like to try a bit of hypnotherapy – just for relaxation, you understand; just so you get a feel for what it is. I show him how the seat goes back and he can put his feet up. He lies back and just listens as I start talking. I notice his breathing slows as he relaxes and drifts in and out of a light trance, until at last I come to the end. He sits up with a smile on his face.

    And so ends the initial consultation. He understands a bit more about it all and has an experience of what hypnotherapy is all about. He can now decide if this is right for him, and whether to book in for a series of session. And I have enough information about him to prepare for when he comes next week.

    I shake hands again as he leaves. I sit and type up my hand written notes. As I put the paper notes through the shredder, I go through, in my own head, what to do when he comes back next week.

    The real delight for me at the end of the day, as I make my 10 second commute back to the house, is all the people who thank me for what I have done for them. And maybe I shouldn’t take delight in that – because really, they have done it all themselves – I just went along for the journey.

  • Police trailing hypnotherapy for anxiety

    Police trailing hypnotherapy for anxiety

    I am really pleased to see Northumbria Police trialing Solution Focused Hypnotherapy to assist with officers and staff with anxiety and depression – and getting an 80% success rate. This is a brilliant example of an independent review of the techniques I use in my clinic every week.

    https://www.peterboroughmatters.co.uk/news/23145061.police-plan-mental-health-hypnotherapy-scheme-roll/

    Photo by Ehimetalor Akhere Unuabona on Unsplash

  • A glass of wine to take the edge of it?

    A glass of wine to take the edge of it?

    Are you one of the many people who have a glass of wine or a beer after a stressful day, just to “take the edge off it”? Be warned that for those of you with anxiety, alcohol may actually make the situation worse.

    Alcohol is a depressant – this doesn’t mean that it makes you depressed; it means that the parts of your brain and body stop working as efficiently as usual. We all know that that part of your brain that puts a brake on stupid behaviour is suppressed – so you start to loose your inhibitions. After a few drinks, your ability to speak clearly and at the right volume becomes effected. And you probably know all the other things that happen to you. It’s all because alcohol winds back the functioning of some parts of the brain.

    If you drink regularly, the brain gets used to the effects of the alcohol and starts to change in order to compensate. This means that when you don’t get a drink one evening, the primitive part of your brain recognises that something is different from usual, and starts to enter the fight-or-flight mode. If you are used to having a glass of wine when you get home from work, you might notice increased tension on the day when you don’t get a drink – that’s the primitive part of the brain starting to engage.

    Alcohol also has an effect on the chemicals in the brain, in particular it decreases the production of a neurotransmitter called GABA. One of GABA’s roles is to regulate the other neurotransmitter chemical so as to decrease anxiety and other mental health issues. This is one of the reasons why alcohol can lead to emotional and mental health issues.

    Surprisingly, alcohol does not help you get a good night’s sleep. Alcohol may make you sleepy, but it acts more like a sedative than natural sleep. This means that the dreaming phase of your sleep does not work properly, particularly during the early parts of the night when the alcohol is still active in the bloodstream. As dreaming is one of the main natural ways the brain has to deal with the stresses of the day, this has a big negative impact on anxiety.

    How many drinks you have and how often is up to you. You need to make your own judgement. The take home message from this blog is simple – a glass of wine may take the edge of the stress you are under, but it will not do anything for your overall anxiety levels, and may make them worse.

    Photo by Terry Vlisidis on Unsplash

  • Don’t Think of a Pink Pineapple

    Don’t Think of a Pink Pineapple

    I see many clients in my clinic, and the first thing I ask them is, “What can I do to help?” Most clients usually start by telling all their problems – everything that is wrong with them. It could be their anxiety, their worries, their obsessions, their fears, and all their low moments.

    The next question I ask is, “So, what do you want instead?” It is this question that stumps some of my clients. They just want to get rid of the anxiety, depression, fear, anger, or whatever it is they don’t like about the way they are. But they don’t always think of how they would like to be instead. For example, if they feel anxious when they wake up, I want to know how they would like to feel when they wake up if they weren’t anxious.

    This is the first step in the change process, because it is a very simple fact that when someone thinks a lot about their fear, anxiety, anger or whatever, their brain just gets more stressed and the
    fear, anxiety, anger or whatever gets stronger.

    The brain is not good at processing negative statements. If I tell you, “Don’t think of a pink pineapple” then the first thing you think of is that pink pineapple. That is because your brain finds it difficult to process the “Don’t” part of the statement.

    So if you start to tell yourself, “I don’t want this anxiety/worry/harmful behaviour”, your brain will probably think about it some more, making it more likely to happen. And that is why it is really important to ask yourself, “What do I want instead?”

    This is the crux of all solution-focused therapies, and you can do it yourself. If there are circumstances when you have anxiety, ask yourself, “How do I want to feel in these circumstances” and then imagine yourself being like that.

    For example, if you feel anxious about answering the phone, ask yourself, “How do I want to feel when I answer the phone?” You might answer, “I want to be confident answering the phone.” You can then focus on being confident answering the phone, instead of focusing on not being anxious.

    If you cannot manage your anxiety on your own, you may like to consider getting help. In my clinic in Fleet, I help people with anxiety. I use solution-focused hypnotherapy to help them get back in control of their lives and get rid of the unwanted symptoms.

    Photo by Alex Gruber on Unsplash