Guiding the Client to Emotional Wholeness and Wellness
Difficulty Level: Intermediate
The client often wants to get well, while part of the unconscious mind
has clearly decided that it is not in the best interests of the individual
to improve their health or change behavior. Returning to the wounded
soldier that we have considered often in this series, it certainly seems
reasonable to nearly anyone that a part of the soldier's unconscious mind
would rebel against returning to the front lines and therefore do whatever
is necessary to keep the individual from going back to his unit. It makes
complete sense to the hydrotherapies who has worked with people over the
years and it makes sense to the individual when he can experience these
dual views of reality.
If we as the hypnotherapist decide for the client that he must go back
to the front lines or create goals for the client then the part will not
likely yield the grip on the client. However, if we let the client decide
for himself what goals he needs and wants to aspire to, then he will in all
likelihood eventually be released from the pain or suffering that he is
experiencing. (At least in the emotional aspect, if not the physical)
Many therapists do not like the idea of having to re-experience past
pain and suffering that a client lived with. They believe that
symptomatic remission can occur without discovering cause and/or without
discovering what various parts of the mind are dynamically working for and
against a healing. In one sense, the therapist with this belief structure
is correct. You can obtain immediate case gain, and dramatic gain at that,
with simple tools that do not address these issues. Unfortunately, in most
cases the gains are temporary and the illnesses, pains and sufferings,
become re-stimulated at a later date and the therapist never becomes aware
of his failure.
The therapeutic process of healing for most individuals is that
of:
(Insight) (Motivation to improve) = healing
The motivation to improve as mentioned above will often provide
seemingly miraculous healings which occasionally persist. More often than
not however, the healing proves temporary and the illness returns because
of the lack of personal insight. In order to achieve a pure insight, it is
important to examine the content of various experiences and not ignore it
in hopes the processes of healing may work on without the insight.
If a client is chronically ill from psychosomatic illness, he is
receiving some kind of secondary gain. Often it is manifested in the
sympathy received by the client from those who love the client. Sympathy
certainly is an expression of emotion that we do not want to squelch in
people. We all want attention. When we are sick, people often are more
gentle and concerned about us which is often believed by the client to be
an experience tha t will change upon getting well again. Many clients who
come to see me are afraid of getting well because their loved ones will
stop paying attention to them or be less concerned about them.
As a therapist we can encourage the client to conclude that upon getting
well people may like us and approve of us all the more. While living with
psychosomatically induced chronic illness, the client is not likely to im
prove if he continues to receive sympathy from his therapist or from his
friends, family and peers. By joining the local support group created to
create support for the specific psychosomatically induced chronic illness w
e also may create a huge roadblock to healing. The illness receives
constant validation and the bonds between sufferers often encourage the
suffering and in fact, GUILT, when an individual begins to improve.
Therefore, when joining any support group, it is important to be certain
that the groups focus is specifically on improving the health of the
individuals and not a validation of the illness itself. Having someone to
talk to that is ill with a similar illness that a client has is very
important and having the group support can lessen the suffering. However,
the effectiveness of the group lessens over time for most individuals and
the individual in most cases should seek advice as to whether to
discontinue attending meetings after some period of time. The emotional
impact of most psychosomatic illnesses can be lessened in most cases by a
competent hypnotherapist and the contact with the group can be lessened as
the emotional impact is lessened unless there is a specific benefit that is
encouraging healing for the client. We will discuss group dynamic s in
psychosomatic illnesses later.
NOTE: It is here that the difference between the experienced and unaware
therapist makes a critical difference in the healing of a client. If a
client is made out to be ill with a psychosomatic illness and is in fact
suffering from a pathological illness or disease (cancer for example) the
client will get worse in all likelihood if he is mis-handled by the
therapist. How does one then discover the specific dynamics involved in
the illness so that we may release the powerful hold on the client? A
process of understanding must first be sent in motion, then we can begin
actual therapy.
First we educate the client to the process of psychosomatic
illness.
Second we educate the client that psychosomatic illness is not
something for which we are normally personally responsible for. The
dynamics for his illness are almost certainly caused by experiences that he
had that created great internal conflict within him and that the creation
was largely accomplished at an unconscious level. He needs to know that an
illness is an illness. Whether its most significant cause was organic or
emotional needs to be irrelevant to society and only relevant to the
therapist and the client. If the client or group is attempting to prove the
illness is organic when it is not, the illness only becomes further
installed into the individual, making it more difficult to render the
healing process useful.
Third we teach the client that it is in his best interests for healing
to accept the fact that specific events and experiences created specific
pains and sufferings which he is experiencing and that upon acceptance of
this fact, he will be catapulted in the direction of healing. Once a
general intellectual understanding of the cause of his illness is intact,
then it is even more important for the client to accomplish the true
cognition of the specific cause of his illness versus the illnesses held by
others with like symptoms. Once the dynamics of illness are thoroughly
understood and honored the healing begins. The energy of the emotional
impact of the illness begins to reduce. It no longer becomes necessary to
complain about the pain experienced on a daily or hourly basis. The need to
acquire sympathy is reduced. The need to increase the symptoms to increase
the amount of sympathy is reduced. All of these kinds of internal responses
are dramatically altered by something as simple as insight and indeed this
is one of the most powerful reasons for the necessity of the return to
cause.
Once the client sees and re-experiences PRECISELY HOW he became ill,
he then discovers how to become well again.
Healing is not a one session phenomenon. According to Dr. John
Watkins, the eminent World War II hypnotherapist, who worked with the
most difficult cases in the most difficult of circumstances:
"He (the therapist) will have to decide what can be done
and what should be left untouched. He will not open up a conflict,
demolish the neurotic defenses the patient has set up to control
anxiety, and then leave him floundering at that point without
resolving the difficulty and freeing him. Attempts to give too much
insight too rapidly can even lead to suicide."
The key components to effectively understanding and then curing
dramatic psychosomatic illnesses were originally defined by Dr.
Watkins and revised here based upon my personal experience:
The analytical formula: (Predisposition) (Stress) =
psychosomatic illness
The therapeutic formula: (Motivation) (Insight) = cure
Four factors in psychosomatic illness:
Symptoms
Dynamics
Secondary Gain
Desire to improve and Get Well
Therapy
Motivate to Get Well
Develop insight
It is through the processes discussed in this series that clients with
PSI (psychosomatic illnesses) will improve. However, because of the caveat
offered by Dr. Watkins, I would not recommend the use of these techniques
to the untrained therapist. Alternatively, once having been trained in
these techniques and having had time to apprentice with an outstanding
therapist, your skill and results as a therapist will geometrically
multiply.
