According to several
studies, hypnosis is one of the few proven techniques to help women through the
menopause.
Amanda Story
Like many women going through the menopause, marketing
director Amanda Jones often suffered hot flushes at the worst possible moment. At
one crucial business meeting, she felt so hot and sweaty that she had to nip to
the loo and dry her hair with paper towels.
Shortly afterwards, she acted on a friend’s advice to try
hypnotherapy.
“It was fantastic. Within four months, the hot flushes
had gone. It’s very difficult to say categorically that it was the hypnotherapy,
but it was very powerful and cathartic and I do believe it helped.”
Many women might be skeptical about being hypnotized out
of menopausal symptoms such as hot flushes and night sweats, which are caused
by a change in the balance of the body’s sex hormones. However, a new report
published this week suggested that of all the alternative treatments offered to
women – from herbal supplements such as black cohosh, evening primrose oil and
ginseng to yoga and acupuncture – hypnosis was almost uniquely effective in
alleviating symptoms of the menopause.
Having reviewed the results of rigorous clinical studies
on the topic, a panel of experts commissioned by the North American Menopause
Society concluded there was solid evidence that both clinical hypnosis
(hypnotherapy) and cognitive behavioral therapy were beneficial. One study showed
that women who had hypnotherapy five times a week had a dramatic reduction in
the number and severity of hot flushes.
By contrast, there was little evidence that exercise,
vitamins or ‘known’ herbal remedies, gave any relief at all.
Having had a bad experience with weight-loss hypnotherapy
20 years ago, Amanda was nervous about being hypnotized, but took the plunge
when her friend recommended Rutland-based practitioner Kim Thomas.
“The first session was about getting to know me and
clearing out my emotional baggage,” said Amanda, who is married with two
grown-up sons. “I sat in an armchair and Kim got me to imagine walking down
steps, each step taking to a deeper level of relaxation. I wasn’t asleep, but I
was very comfortable and relaxed. Then I imagined walking into a barn in the
middle of a field, and in there were all the things I wanted to get rid of.
Things I thought I’d forgotten, such as bad experiences at work from 20 years
before popped back into my head. I packed them all into a ‘suitcase’ and got
rid of them. It was a very weird experience.”
In subsequent hypnosis sessions, Amanda was asked to
imagine stepping into a cool sea or feeling a cool breeze and then coached in
self-hypnosis so that she could visualize that same body-cooling sensation when
hot flushes struck her in her everyday life, leading to actual relief of her
symptoms.
Broadcaster and journalist-turned-clinical hypnotherapist
Lowri Turner uses a similar technique with her patients. “Consciously, you may
say to yourself: ‘I really don’t want to panic when I have a hot flush.’ But
then the hot flush hits and your unconscious kicks in, making you worry that
people will see you’re sweating or red in the face,” said Ms. Turner, who runs
three clinics in north and central London specializing in hormone balance and
weight loss.
“Hypnotherapy is like a massage for your mind. It allows
you to address those unconscious mechanisms that are playing on your symptoms
and quieten them down.”
In the run-up to the menopause, estrogen levels decrease,
causing the ovaries to stop producing an egg every month. As well as
embarrassing hot flushes, this can disturb sleep and cause mood swings, vaginal
dryness and loss of libido.
However, fewer than one in 10 women seeks medical advice,
with most either grinning and bearing it or resorting to alternative therapies.
Dr. Janet Carpenter, who led the expert panel for the
North American Menopause Society, said: “Many women try one thing after
another, and it is months before they stumble on something that truly works.
This information will be critical in maximizing the selection of the most
effective therapies.”
Turner said she was not surprised by the society’s
findings. “The menopause is not an illness, it’s a transition,” she said. “It’s
not like you can just take a pill for it because it is as much about your
emotional and spiritual wellbeing, especially your self-confidence as you age
and your changing role when the kids are leaving home.”
Kim Thomas, the hypnotherapist who treated Amanda, agrees.
“Hallelujah that this is finally being recognized,” she
said. “In Japan, they don’t have a word for ‘menopause’ because middle-aged
women are highly valued. It is not seen as a negative phase, but a positive
transition in which women are older, yes, but wiser, too.”
Baylor University
Study 2012
The alternative therapy reduced hot flashes by as much as
74% in the study conducted by researchers at Baylor University’s Mind-Body
Medicine Research Laboratory and funded by the National Institutes of Health.
Only hormone therapy, which many women can’t take or want
to avoid, is more effective for treating the most common symptom of menopause,
says researcher Gary R. Elkins, PhD.
“If you compare this treatment with off-label use of
antidepressants or other non-hormonal therapies, it works as well or better,”
he says.
Hot flashes are a sudden rush of heat, followed by facial
flushing and sweating, often followed by chills and clamminess. The progression
is familiar to most women of a certain age. Hot flashes and night sweats are
the most common symptoms of menopause, affecting some 80% of women. They are
linked to declining estrogen levels, but it remains unclear just why the sudden
lack of estrogen sends the body into thermal mayhem, and why some women are
more affected than others.
In an earlier study, Elkins and his Baylor colleagues
showed that hypnosis dramatically reduced hot flash and night sweat frequency
in breast cancer patients with treatment-related symptoms.
In the 2012 study, they set out to determine if the alternative
treatment would do the same in women whose symptoms were related to menopause. A
total of 187 postmenopausal women who reported having at least seven hot
flashes a day, or 50 a week, were recruited for the trial.
Half the women were given self-hypnosis training that
consisted of five, 45-minute weekly sessions.
During the sessions, they received suggestions for mental
imagery designed to minimize the intensity of their hot flashes, such as images
of a cool place. The women were also given a recording of the hypnotic
induction, and they were asked to practice self-hypnosis at home daily. The
rest of the women had an equal number of sessions with a clinician, but
hypnosis training was not given.
Instead, clinicians talked to the women about their
symptoms and gave them encouragement about how to deal with them. These women
were also asked to listen to a recording each day at home, but their recording
simply had information about hot flashes.
The study participants kept "hot flash
frequency" diaries, and they also wore small sensors on their bodies that
recorded their hot flashes.
After 12 weeks:
·
Women in the hypnosis group reported 74% fewer
hot flashes on average, compared with 17% fewer among the other women.
·
The skin sensors showed a 57% reduction in hot
flashes among the hypnosis group, compared to a 10% reduction in the
non-hypnosis group.
·
The women treated with hypnosis were far less
likely than the other women to report that their hot flashes interfered with
their daily lives and sleep.
“Many women do not want to take hormone therapy or any
drug for hot flashes,” Elkins says. “This study shows that an alternative,
non-drug treatment can be highly effective.”
Elkins recommends that women who want to try the
treatment seek out a qualified practitioner affiliated with either the American
Society of Clinical Hypnosis or the Society for Clinical and Experimental
Hypnosis.
Gass says she would like to see Elkins’ findings
duplicated, but she adds that hypnosis could prove to be a badly needed new
treatment for hot flashes.
“This will certainly appeal to women who want to avoid
drugs and who want a treatment that has few, if any, side effects,” she says.
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