hypnotherapy edinburgh

Tara’s journey to finding self-love and love in a new man – 10 years on they are still together and happy as ever.

Tara initially came to me with a number of problems including negative thoughts, low self-esteem, lack of confidence and limiting self-beliefs she held about herself.

In just 4 sessions Tara has completely turned around her life. This is Tara’s story, as told in her words…

After going for counselling sessions years previously and feeling that it had achieved absolutely nothing I decided after a lot of soul searching to give hypnotherapy a try.

I went to Sara a little fearful and with a huge list of worries/concerns/problems. I did wonder how she could help me with all the negative feelings I surrounded myself with. I had a huge feeling of self loathing and low self esteem. How could she help me when I told her I would look in the mirror and feel disgusted at how unattractive I looked and I genuinely felt like I was not good enough for anything or anybody.  I felt sad a lot of the time; I had a massive sense of feeling a failure, why was I getting everything wrong? and why was life so hard?  It was such a horrible place to be but I had felt that way for so long it almost felt normal.  I ALWAYS thought the worse and my cup was always LESS than half empty. How could Sara help me?

I felt a lot of anxiety about what people thought about me, how I came across and whether I was liked or not. I assumed I was disliked so this made me feel awkward around people. I also dreaded going out socially and would sometimes cry in the bathroom and then make up excuses not to go to events, even with good friends. I became an expert at avoiding social gatherings or leaving them early.  Why did I hate things that everyone else looked forward to so much? Was I mad? Some sort of lunatic? I didn’t want to feel like this, I took no enjoyment in it but I couldn’t stop myself either.

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I felt I was constantly comparing myself to other women and this created huge feelings of jealousy and bitterness towards nearly every female who crossed my path.  It didn’t matter if it was a friend or a stranger but I quite often felt eaten up by jealousy. When I felt jealous I felt I was creating a monster within…..it scared me.

I always saw the absolute worst in men and had a massive mistrust in them. My motto was “all men are unfaithful pigs”. Through some terrible relationships I found it very hard to let go of the past.  A past that made me feel very unhappy. But in the same breathe I had a massive fear of being alone and having no partner even if it was a very bad partner. In hindsight I can now see I was willing to be treated very badly if it just meant I had a boyfriend.

I felt slightly embarrassed explaining these many anxieties but Sara couldn’t have made me feel more at ease.  I was worried what she would think of me, did she think I was talking rubbish and needed to get over myself but I couldn’t have been more wrong.  She was so warm and friendly and assured me she had heard a lot worse and nothing I had told her had shocked her.  But the best thing she said was she could help me with every single thing I had mentioned.  Whilst this was music to my ears I did feel a little uncertain, how could this be possible?  I seemed to have so many things wrong with me, how could she help………?

WHAT DID I WANT……

Sara asked me ideally what I wanted from the session(s) and I told her I wanted to feel good about myself, happy, confident and attractive. I wanted jealousy to be a thing of the past! I wanted to feel happy for people who seemed to have it all and not feel bitterness towards them. I also wanted to trust men and believe in finding true love!  I wanted to feel like I deserved good things coming into my life, that I was worth it! I wanted to believe that people could see the good in me and actually like me.  I wanted the negative inner voice to disappear and to stop feeding me with constant fear about literally everything. I wanted to look forward to social events in my diary and get excited like everyone else seemed to do.

 
 
 
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WHAT WE DID NEXT…

In total I had 4 sessions but I felt a massive shift in my behaviour after just 1.  In the first session we worked on passed destructive relationships including a physically violent one, a broken marriage which was mentally torturous and a very jealous ex-boyfriend.  It was because of these relationships and being told relentlessly how horrible, ugly, nasty I was I had started to believe them. This went back over 20 years and after having all those years around destructive men I felt this was all I deserved; I didn’t deserve to be in a nice relationship.  I was subconsciously giving out a very negative signal, so horrible and nasty men kept coming into my life.  I didn’t have the courage to leave these men when I realised it was not a healthy place to be in but I stayed for years and put up with it, hiding it from family and work colleagues, pretending everything was ok and I was fine.

Sara asked me to think about the worst 3 things I could possibly remember and asked to scale my worries from 1-10 (10 being the most anxious) and I gave all 3 experiences a 10, as in the most scariest and painful.  Then through hypnotherapy she took me to my “virtual safe place” and processed these memories at top speed, so all the time I felt completely relaxed.  I appreciate this may sound a little odd but under Sara’s instruction it seemed to make total sense.

At the end of the session I was asked to scale them again and I felt they had gone down to a 2-3. I felt very different, very calm and relaxed. A little emotional at the release, but that soon passed and then I felt vibrant and alive and happy. I also had the best night’s sleep ever that night.

Sara also explained the importance of breathing properly, something so simple but absolutely vital especially when feeling anxious and worried. I realised that the first thing I did when I felt stressed was to start breathing in a shallow way but as soon as I consciously started to breathe properly, after Sara taught me how, I automatically felt calmer.

We went over things the following session and the scale went to a 0………………I couldn’t have felt happier and when Sara asked me to think about the 3 events that I had previously felt so traumatic about I literally felt nothing.  No fear, no anxiety, no knot in the stomach, not feeling sick and shaky, nothing.  The icing on the cake being that Sara explained that once this had been dealt with in my sub-conscious it was impossible to go backwards so I would never feel those fears about those events or people again. To say I was happy was a massive understatement.

Every session we worked on the things that had been troubling me and after every session I felt amazing, happy, light (as in a weight had lifted off my shoulders) and I had a massive sense of inner calm. When Sara asked me how I felt I just couldn’t stop smiling saying I felt free from all the negative things that had been weighing me down for so long.

Thinking back to before my first session I was a little concerned beforehand that maybe I couldn’t be hypnotised but it just happened. I closed my eyes and just listened to Sara’s voice, it was so relaxing and so easy. Post-session I felt really rested and left Sara literally buzzing with a twinkle in my eye and a skip in my step.

 
 
 
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POST SESSIONS…

I now wake up feeling excitement not dread.  I don’t go to bed worrying or wake up with a grey cloud above my head.  I have a sense of calm, I feel happy, and I look forward to things. I feel more confident and I’m definitely much calmer and then completely out of the blue I met a man, a very lovely man and 6-months on it continues to be the best relationship I have ever had.  He ticks all the boxes and I trust him, not something I ever thought I could say about a boyfriend.  Family and friends have all noticed a massive change in me.  Everyone says I seem so much happier in myself.

This experience really was life changing for me, and it couldn’t have been done without seeing Sara.