Abreactions??

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Permalink Reply by Greg M on February 25, 2009 at 8:29pm

The way I understand it, an abreaction is the vivid physical and emotional reliving of a highly emotionally charged and usually unpleasant event. In other words, the memory is re-experienced in a way that fires all the synapses and releases all the hormones in nearly exactly the same patterns and sequences as occurred the way the event originally unfolded in realtime. Depending on the physical and emotional makeup of the client in the NEW moment, those physically and emotionally different baselines can cause what you describe.

It's an extremely fragile moment for the client, and can involve great risk for the untrained and/or incompetent therapist as well, BUT it is a golden yet often unexpected opportunity for a trained or mentally prepared creative, adaptive therapist with a strong constitution. If you find yourself in this situation, show no fear to the client whatsoever. They need you to be calm and strong; a pillar of unconditional support. Remind them that you are there to help them, they have lived through the moment before and survived, and this time through they'll get to find out something very helpful and valuable (this is but one example - your choice of framing for the moment will depend on the event they are experiencing, of course).

The absolute worst thing one can do when dealing with a client in abreaction is to shut down the session and run away in fear, but it's still preferable to bungling things. Remind yourSELF that the client's subconscious mind knew this was coming along in the timeline and chose YOU to have this happen with, even if you don't feel up to it. Have faith in both yourself and your client and do your best. Learn from the experience.

Properly handled abreactions are the birthplace of therapeutic miracles, but I still wouldn't go sniffing for them.

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Permalink Reply by Pattie Freeman CH.t, MST on February 26, 2009 at 1:38am

I had witnessed a abreaction at a Fair Hypnosis Show during the induction a volunteer started to shake and swing her arms violently throughout the show. The hypnotist instead of dismissing her and talk to her later..,she kept her in the show and thought it was cute of what she was doing as she explained to the crowd what was happening. She would jump up and started swinging her arms and when she would tap her and tell her sleep she would collapse instantly then in a few she would start it again. The only thing that bothered me she looked like a fish out of water and I was afraid she was going to hurt herself and the hypnotist showed no concern This was not normal...I had never experienced it myself but, I have heard many have....

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Permalink Reply by Fable Goodman on February 26, 2009 at 2:26am

When the conditions are right, a safe abreaction can be one of the most powerful clearing/healing process.

Years ago I was trained in, and used to practice regularly a hypnotic process called Psycho Muscular Release Therapy, which was developed by the famouse british Hypnotherapist Peter Blythe.

This modality works by creating a safe situation for a designed muscular catharsis, of retained physical tension, and its emotional counterparts
At it's mildest level, the client may experience minot physical tritches in the muscles. The sort of thing most of us have seen in clients at some time or another. Similar to the sudden jump you get sometimes when drifting off to sleep.

This is a natural discharge of physical tension known as Myoclonic spasms, (not to be confused with an abreaction).

The technique uses a series of specific suggestions to encourage this, and trigger off a chain reaction of movements, where any movement in one part of the body can trigger of a movement in another part of the body, so that each part of the body is doing exactly what it needs to do to let go of the tension. This can lead to what has the appearance (to the untrained eye) of a 'grand mal epileptic' fit. (again not to be confused with Abreaction).

as the body is letting go of the tension, the emotions, and feelings behind the tension are encouraged to come out. this can lead to spontaneous regression to and release of the thing that caused the tension in the first place. (this is the abreaction!)

The technique uses a beautiful double bind loop of suggestions, to ensure it's success.

Don't try this at home unless fully trained!

However, these sort of reactions can occur without encouragement, if the situation just happens to be right for the subject, and when it does, if the hypnotist is not used to, or expecting it, it can bring up all sorts of fears for the therapist, which are then dumped on the subject.

Of course Mesmer used to have these sort of cathartic parties going on all the time, with whole crowds, going into convulsions, so there is nothing much new in the world.

LOve and hugs,

Fable

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Permalink Reply by Michael Ellner on February 26, 2009 at 5:25am

Convulsions were more common back in the days when shrinks and therapists were manically regressing their patients and uncovering sexual abuses that never happened.

To put it in perspective -- I had 4 clients spontaneously convulse during a session in 28+ years of practicing hypnosis and each situation was easy to handle - I am confident that you can easily utilize and add value to what ever pops up in your home-office.

Soooo, in the very unlikely chance that one of your client ever convulses -- I suggest that you consider that his or her abreaction is EXACTLY what was needed.

The healing starts as soon as your client laughs, cries or passes gas. Everything signals improvement and can be reframed as cathartic if you help your clients see it that way....

A) Believe in yourself
B) Believe in your Client
C) Trust “it”
(You Do remember how much fun you had the last time you did “it” don'tcha?)

Wheeeeeeeee!

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Permalink Reply by Fable Goodman on February 26, 2009 at 6:05am

"The healing starts as soon as your client laughs, cries or passes gas"

I so much agree with this!

"Free your arse and your mind will follow! " (or was it the other way round? either way up, it's good medicine.)

Love hugs, and tongue firmly in upper cheek,

Fable

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Permalink Reply by Michael Ellner on February 26, 2009 at 7:02pm

Eureka!

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Permalink Reply by Greg Johnson on February 26, 2009 at 8:27pm

I've never experienced this with a client, but a very close friend got incredibly inebriated once just over a year ago, and started venting about his childhood. He had been very very badly sexually abused. He began abreacting as he talked about it, and went into hysterics, then twitched, convulsed, shook, hyperventilating. Thought I was going to take him to the hospital. It's not just something that happens in the hypnotic state... :-(

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Permalink Reply by John Kelly on February 27, 2009 at 2:17am

That sums it up nicely....ab-re-action could be any negative re-action that the client may have.( that may include a whole state dependent memory see Ernest Rossi The Psychobology of Gene Expression)....has anybody heard of reactive ambiguities...or even ab-re-active ambiguities...perhaps that is when they burp or pass gas.....may be sometimes words are inadequate to describe the healing process...from ab-re-action to responsive action as a phase transition or Trance formation! ( on the ligher side of things)

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