Phobias

Treating Phobias in Edinburgh,

Phobias are irrational fears or fears that are out of rational proportion.  A phobia can be one of many common types and based on primal primitive fears, such as a fear of spiders or heights. It might also be personal and based on traumatic experience, such as being afraid of loud noises or dogs, if for example you had heard gun shots or been bitten respectively.

Why do phobias occur?

Phobias are a strong aversion to whatever is the key characteristic of the fear, such as the spider, bird, wasp, noise or other key part of the situation. The mind associates this trigger or feature with extreme danger. The natural reaction therefore is to avoid and be fearful.

Treating phobias with CBT cognitive behavioural therapy in Edinburgh

CBT looks at the perception and resulting behaviour being shown. Therefore with a phobia one might examine why you find the spider (for example) scary, and address that perception. You might then experiment with different behaviours to try in response. SIT or stress inoculation therapy is a form of CBT which uses gradual challenging of the fear to learn new perceptions and responses as fear reduces.

Treating phobias with hypnotherapy and NLP Neuro linguistic programming

Hypnotherapy, and it’s off shoot NLP, can be used in a variety of ways. These include positive suggestion to change perception directly. These can be given in a variety of ways. Visualisation can be used as a very mild and easy form of SIT. Metaphor and other complex methods can be used to change perception and context. Visual and resource anchoring can be used to design the emotions desired in the situation, for example enabling the person to feel more confident and calm when confronting what was a fearful situation before. With all the variations, the key aspect is to learn a new way of feeling, perceiving and behaving. NLP has been shown to be useful in treating phobias –  more HERE

Quick fixes and phobia “cures”

In recent years various quick fixes have been marketed, usually using “EFT tapping” which is a form of distraction, and NLP which is an off shoot which uses little bits of hypnotherapy. These quick fixes rely on a sudden disruption of the old reaction spurring the person into “getting on with it”. Neither address the underlying cause, emotions, deeper perceptions or related fears. They can help some people with mild phobias or slight fears, but are not recommended by us for serious fears or phobias. If it was that easy to overcome phobias, the person would not need a few “slight of hand tricks” to do it, they would simply challenge it themselves. NICE recommend CBT based therapies for most anxiety based conditions, and CBT is the core of the method of treatment here.

What to expect when seeking help for phobias in Edinburgh

You can contact us for a free confidential email chat first before any commitment. We will also send information files on our service. If you decide to proceed you will need to book an assessment session. Here more details case history is collected and options explored. Phobia cases vary considerably in length from 4-5 sessions with milder phobias, to many more sessions in sever cases, or cases with related issues such as developmental, relationship or post traumatic issues.

Stuart is a CNHC registered hypnotherapist (CNHC is the UK voluntary regulator for complementary therapies including hypnotherapy set up with UK Government funding and support). He is CNHC registered. AR schemes or accredited registers are the schemes overseen by the Professional Standards Agency for healthcare professionals not subject to statutory regulation. Stuart trained 1993-96 in clinical hypnotherapy, psychoanalysis and stress counselling, being assessed on over 200 client cases and over 1,000 client hours (externally NVQ accredited and assessed diploma course and CNHC accreditation route via SSM). Since then he has completed extensive post graduate and CPD training including a MSc Psychology and his second Bachelor degree. Stuart then completing accreditation in Counselling, clinical Psychotherapy and Hypnotherapy with the NACHP.

Contact via the contact us page HERE

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