Hypnosis

I sense you are a skeptic, as I was, so I feel this requires some discussion.

I think television has given us a very warped view of hypnosis. It's not at all like anything I've ever seen on television and to say I was a skeptic myself was an understatement.

I was wearing a FitBit during my sessions and it actually registered that I went to sleep, though I wasn't sleeping, I remember everything.

I remember the session where I had my breakthrough. She had me describe a past trauma over and over again - what happened and how I felt - until I could do it without the emotion that was there when I began.

I honestly don't know what the purpose was. I only know that I was able to get there.

What I wasn't prepared for was going home afterward and feeling like I'd been gutted. Literally feeling like the pain of the past that I'd never dealt with was brought to the surface as raw and fresh as when it occurred.

I was in the most excruciating emotional pain, it mimicked the death of loved ones. I allowed myself to experience it and process the pain I'd avoided in the past. It was 24 hours of hell.

But when it was over, that pain was gone.

To this day, two years later, even when I try out of sheer morbid curiosity, I am unable to access the part of me that had been so gripped by the events of the past that had me stuck.

I can remember the event, I can remember being stuck, but I can't self-destructively go back to that even when I've tested the waters.