Therapies

How do I choose which type of therapy and which therapist?

Many people think that all talking therapies are the same. The image of the patient lying on a couch with a Freudian figure sitting behind has become a cliche for what many people think counselling is.

Currently, there are 300 different therapies. There is a mix of scientifically backed therapies with loads of research. Then there are old-fashioned, ineffective theoretical ideas with none.

There are also gender preferences. Some men prefer to talk to another man because of the problem or the industry they are in. My background in the IT industry and publishing means I have worked in a typical male environment. The split between the genders of clients is about 50/50.

Types of Therapy

As for the type of therapy, below are more in-depth descriptions, but in short:

  • Solution-focused Therapy is future-focused, looks at goals – much like coaching – and scales where the person is at any time. We then know how far they have come and where to go next. It’s been around since the 1960s and applies to families, groups and even businesses. Recommended number of sessions between 6 – 12.
  • Hypnotherapy – allows our brains to process information in a similar way to sleep. It helps change one’s perspective and perceptions. People originally used hypnotherapy for surgical procedures before the invention of anaesthetics in the 19th century. Some treatments still use hypnosis, such as dental hypnotherapy. It tends to be used more in a hospital setting to reduce nausea in chemo patients and IBS.
  • Human Givens is a future-looking therapy, which looks at the needs of the individual not being met. Scientifically based and fully researched.
  • Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is used to help understand more deeply a problem. It uses a lot of structured logical forms to understand behaviour. Used by the NHS. Recommended number of sessions – 24.
  • Mindfulness helps stay focused and calm. It’s been a part of Eastern religious traditions for centuries. There are a vast range of mindful practices and I tailor them to each individual.
  • Neuro-Linguistic Programming is understanding how we do things and why and ways of dealing with trauma. Developed during the ’60s and ’70s and is often used in coaching.
  • Nutritional Therapy – Understanding the mind-body connection and how food and gut flora have an effect on our moods and well-being.
  • Meditation – Before I became a therapist, I regularly practised meditation from all parts of the world.

Types of Therapy

As for the type of therapy, below are more in-depth descriptions, but in short:

  • Solution-focused Therapy is future-focused, looks at goals – much like coaching – and scales where the person is at any time. We then know how far they have come and where to go next. It’s been around since the 1960s and applies to families, groups and even business. Recommended number of sessions between 6 – 12.
  • Hypnotherapy – allows our brains to process information in a similar way to sleep. It helps change one’s perspective and perceptions. People originally used hypnotherapy for surgical procedures before the invention of anaesthetics in the 19th century. Some treatments still use hypnosis, such as dental hypnotherapy. It tends to be used more in a hospital setting to reduce nausea in chemo patients and IBS.
  • Human Givens is a future-looking therapy, which looks at the needs of the individual not being met. Scientifically based and fully researched.
  • Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is used to help understand more deeply a problem. It uses a lot of structured logical forms to understand behaviour. Used by the NHS. Recommended number of sessions – 24.
  • Mindfulness helps stay focused and calm. It’s been a part of eastern religious traditions for centuries. There are a vast range of mindful practises and I tailor them to each individual.
  • Neuro Linguistic Programming is understanding how we do things and why and ways of dealing with trauma. Developed during the 60s and 70s and often used in coaching.
  • Nutritional Therapy – Understanding the mind-body connection and how food and gut flora have an effect on our moods and well-being.
  • Meditation – Before I became a therapist, I regularly practised meditation from all parts of the world.

In-depth detail of therapies offered

Solution-Focused Therapy

SFBT’s evolution started with the work of Milton Erickson and the mental research institute in the States. Essentially therapists looked at analytical practices back in the 60s and realise that it had limitations, and Erickson’s approach that you had to tailor the therapy around the individual and not fit them into an existing model meant that therapy moved more towards the client’s resources being utilised more. In 1965, they developed the Brief therapy project. With analytical therapies, there was a presumption that the problem stemmed back to a defining moment in that person’s life. This could take considerable time and did not come to any solid conclusions.

With Brief Therapy, they bypassed exploring the origins of the problem because recognising it did not lead to finding a solution. They looked at what resources the individual already had and how they could interrupt the problem cycle. Insoo Kim Berg recognised that her clients were leaving after 6 or 7 sessions. At first, she thought she was not being effective. Upon investigation, she realised that the methods they were developing considerably sped up the therapy, which previously could have lasted for years. From this SFBT developed. Steve De Shazer, along with colleagues at the Milwaukee-based Brief Family Therapy Centre, realised that looking forward to a hoped-for future that was devoid of the ‘problem’ and building upon how the client could do other things well. There are always exceptions to every problem and when the client was not experiencing the problem, what were they doing?

The Miracle Question

It was out of this approach that one client suggested a miracle must happen before her situation got better and so the miracle question was born and this has become central to the SFBT process. By focusing on what we want instead of what we don’t want, we are much more capable of finding a solution. An example might be “I don’t want to feel lonely”. The miracle question would concentrate on what would happen if you were not feeling lonely. This then might prompt the person to find out activities they might enjoy where they meet people. This may appear common sense, but often people focus on the negative when they find themselves in such a situation.

Weight loss is another area in which the Miracle Question can uncover some interesting underlying reasons they have problems with food. So instead of “I would wake up slim”, further questioning may bring forth answers such as “I’d be more sociable”, “I’d go out dancing” etc all these then can help focus on different activities that will help the person move towards some kind of behaviour that helps.

The SFBT has transformed into a great way to supervise practitioners and the NHS uses it as part of their management strategy. The Department of Health recognises it as a benchmark of good practice. It serves as a business model, helping companies make changes when they have problems they are having difficulties solving.

I was one of the founding executive committee members of the Association of Solution-Focused Hypnotherapy between 2010 and 2015.

Hypnotherapy in Oxford

Hypnotherapy

What is Hypnotherapy?

Hypnotherapy is the name given to a branch of therapy which utilises a person’s ability to go into a trance state.

We go into a trance state regularly. It’s the daydreaming mode when the brain switches from the limbic system to the activity of the Anterior Cingulate Cortex. Often activity around the peripheral areas of the brain becomes quieter, and the person feels a loss of sensation or time distortion. Brain waves change during this process, so we become more focused, relaxed, and able to decide easier. We experience it when driving a car, watching TV or reading a book.

Being able to utilise how the brain switches mode, hypnotherapy can then suggest to the person in a trance to change the way they feel or think about themselves, or a situation, a problem, or an object.

Not

On its own hypnosis is not a therapy, it’s all the other interventions such as SFBT, CBT, NLP and mindfulness that add to the experience.

The other benefit of hypnosis is promoting REM. Sleep is essential to help deal with memory and emotion and repair our cells. When we go into a hypnotic trance, we often find we go into REM – We can often detect our eyes flickering. Listening to a relaxation CD or MP3 whilst going to sleep can help regulate sleep patterns and allow us to get the sleep we need to sort out our emotional problems.

Also see: Hypnotherapy Page

Human Givens Therapy

Joe Griffin and Ivor Tyrrell developed Human Givens Therapy as they felt just counselling does not provide solutions. It is a talking therapy with a scientific approach focusing on what individuals need to live mentally healthy and fulfilling lives.

Employing groundbreaking neuroscience and psychology understanding with successful therapeutic methods to create effective interventions.

Creating a wide range of applications, such as mental and physical healthcare, life coaching, and conflict-resolution.

It is a brief, solution-focused approach which helps people feel better and move on in their lives as quickly as possible. It must meet human emotional needs for good mental health.

See more on Human Givens Therapy page

Cognitive behavioural therapy

Cognitive behavioural therapy (or CBT) is a psychotherapeutic approach that aims to solve problems concerning dysfunctional emotions, behaviours and cognitions through a goal-oriented, systematic procedure. CBT refers to therapy based on a combination of basic behavioural and cognitive research.

Background to CBT

Siddhartha Gautama, otherwise known as Buddha, was one of the first to teach that our perception of the world comes from within, and we cannot escape the inevitable. So instead we must pay attention to the now by being in the moment and not judging, and by being kind to ourselves and others. It is concerned with cause and effect and how good and bad behaviour influences our future.

Using these ideas in CBT has developed the idea of useful and adaptive thinking and problematic or maladaptive thinking – as well as using mindfulness as a method of focusing attention away from ruminative thinking.

Socrates – the Greek philosopher – used enquiry that was insightful and purposely brings out the values, beliefs and meanings of the answers given. Open questions that find out what lies at the heart of the problem. Scientists employ this form of questioning in scientific inquiry and widely utilise it in CBT to gain insight into the reasons behind people’s actions or thoughts.

We cannot truly perceive the real world as we all have different backgrounds, understandings and influences that colour our perception. He popularised the notion of Schema, and CBT incorporates it by recognising and potentially changing patterns of behaviour over time to achieve desired results.

Schemas

A schema is an individual’s view of the world. It is the accumulation of knowledge to make up a framework of understanding. It is information processing that enables us to classify information and to expect events. How the person behaves is much to do with how they experienced events in the past. Because no two people will have the same experiences, no two people will respond in the same manner.

In a depressed person, their perception of themselves will be negative, “who wants to be with me, I feel miserable” so they avoid social situations because they perceive no one wants to be with them, while they feel that way, and so it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy because they have withdrawn. If people make positive remarks, they often receive a negative response such as “what do they want?” or “They’re only being nice to me – but I don’t deserve it”.

By pushing away the very thing that will make them feel better, depressed people can become more isolated and become convinced no one cares – so the cycle continues.

A depressed person is more likely to ruminate on several core beliefs, such as “I’m unlovable” for example, and this becomes a focus on negative self-hypnosis. They focus on events that support their belief and disregard contradictory information.

Modern Roots

CBT’s modern roots date to the early 20th century and the development of cognitive therapy in the 1960s. The therapeutic approaches of Albert Ellis and Aaron T. Beck gained popularity among behaviour therapists.

Today, because measured outcomes have helped show excellent results, it is currently the therapy of choice for the NHS, though SFBT is gaining ground here.

CBT has its place in psychotherapy and can be useful if a person has limited resources, such as older adults, those with serious physical illness, and children.

Also see: CBT

NLP

Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) originated when Richard Bandler – a student at the University of California Santa Cruz – and linguist John Grinder were listening to and selecting portions of taped therapy sessions of the late Gestalt therapist Fritz Perls.

They recognised that the way people used language had some effect on their behaviour. Using this model, they could come up with a whole range of complicated names of ways we use language and interact.

The pair developed more ideas when studying Milton Erikson because they realised that his use of language and the individual way he addressed each person was an effective way to tailor therapy.

Its co-founders originally promoted NLP in the 1970s as an effective and rapid form of therapy capable of addressing the full range of problems, such as phobias, depression, habit disorders, psychosomatic illnesses, and learning disorders.

Effectiveness

There is some debate about how effective NLP can be, but certainly, the fast phobia technique and the Swish have proven to be effective, certainly to myself and the clients I have used it on. Using metaphors and reframing situations can help get people to focus on the more positive aspects of their lives.

In sports hypnosis, practitioners often utilise techniques such as anchors to implant a particular feeling, thought, or action in the mind of the sports person. Ensuring that they perform exactly as they rehearsed mentally. If you watch sports events carefully, you may see a sports person move their hand or finger in a slightly odd way. This is the anchoring technique in action.

Mindfulness

Mindfulness practice, inherited from the Buddhist tradition, is increasingly being employed in Western psychology to ease a variety of mental and physical conditions, including obsessive-compulsive disorder and anxiety and in the prevention of relapse in depression and drug addiction.

Scientific research into mindfulness falls under the umbrella of positive psychology. The study of mindfulness operates on the idea that by intentionally recognising the potential of each small moment in a day, one can pursue a richer life experience that includes more novelty and less stress.

Mindfulness is not like traditional meditation, it’s active. It takes place whilst you walk or are sitting observing what’s going on around you and internally. It’s a fantastic way of reducing anxiety and so practical.

Jon Kabat-Zinn

The teachings of scientist Jon Kabat-Zinn inspire many of the mindful techniques I use. After learning them, you can apply these techniques whenever necessary. Especially good for those with social phobias, Fear of flying and other anxiety-driven problems.

Exa

An example of mindfulness could be something as simple as washing up the dishes. We often let our minds wander quite a bit and if we think about negative things we are experiencing in our everyday life, then we become down quickly. If we practise mindful washing up, then we pay attention to what we’re doing in the here and now. So fill up the bowl with hot water. Note how the water feels – too hot for your hands? Try rubber gloves. Feel how the water feels whilst wearing rubber gloves, warm. Pick up the sponge. How does that feel? The glass, not the light that falls through the glass when you hold it up to the window. The sound of the sponge as you clean around its rim.

The noise of the clinks of glass and china on themselves as you stack them to dry. The feel of the tea towel when you dry them. It’s all a sensual experience and you need to stay focused on the sensations. If you find your mind wandering quite a bit, that’s normal, just bring your attention back to what you’re doing.

Nutritional Therapy

I trained in Nutritional Therapy in 2016 to help weight loss clients and food phobics to gain a better understanding of foods needed for optimum health. I ask clients to fill in a food diary for between a week and a fortnight, so she can assess which food types may be hindering or helping a client’s gut biome. Over the past decade, researchers have uncovered a great deal of evidence indicating that gut bacteria can significantly impact our minds and body.