Anxiety can show in many different ways. It might come out in the way people think, speak or behave, or even what they believe about themselves or the world.Sometimes anxiety can stem from a specific event or trauma, which can create a phobic response and then become generalised into anxiety. I work with you to unpick where the anxiety stems from. It could have been a learnt fear - which we can pick up from the family we grew up in, or indeed the local culture.

Agoraphobia, which is commonly thought of as a fear of public places can instead be thought of as a general fear of any unfamiliar or new event or place. This can be the result of an accumulation of events where the brain perceives a threat, (although it could have been triggered by a one-off event), to the point where every new option becomes a frightening prospect. Panic attacks may be part of the experience.

Symptoms of anxiety may include:

• Negative thinking
• Obsessive worrying
• Continually second-guessing what will happen next
• Physical symptoms – racing heart, sweaty palms, feeling faint
• Overwhelming sense of fear
• Feeling out of control
• Making a 'mountain out of a molehill'
• Panic attacks

GAD Generalised Anxiety Disorder

If you suffer from attacks of anxiety, in Cognitive Hypnotherapy terms you are going from your every-day state of mind into a ‘trance state’. This is where your mind takes you when you are experiencing those thoughts and feelings of the anxiety. It could include negative phrases or images in your mind, and is most likely accompanied by unpleasant physical symptoms. For some people the experience of anxiety can be excessive and persistent. This is sometimes diagnosed as GAD - Generalised Anxiety Disorder. The longer you are in this trance state, the more distressing and debilitating the anxiety is likely to be, and in some cases can culminate in a panic attack.

By listening carefully to your experience of these anxieties, tracing back to the root of the problem and paying attention to the triggers I can help you to change the process which occurs when you feel these anxieties and fears, working on both a conscious and unconscious level. This work is done swiftly, to gain insights, clear negative memories and then to move on to the positives and the 'what you want instead', without dwelling on the negative state.

Most of our sessions will consist of conversational work, where we are working on a conscious level to understand what’s going on and why, and also at an unconscious level through the hypnosis recording I create for you to listen to. As each client has their own specific issue, I write and record hypnosis recordings for each person on an individual basis.