he had developed a habit over the years that had become entrenched. he was clearly unhappy without his daily two glasses of Chablis. I created a self-hypnotherapeutic exercise for Beth in whom he imagined his baby had been born & he was sitting next to the child softly singing his to sleep. he went on to imagine that later in the evening he anther husband sat together in the living room, holding hands, happily making plans for a trip with the baby. Beth did this exercise faithfully, twice a day, & it worked. he gave up wine with yes regrets. Again, you can learn the self-Hypnotherapy fresh start method, you can learn how to use it, but you must choose tousle it. You are being offered a choice—a most powerful choice. You now have to want to use the fresh start method. You have to apply it in order for it to be effective. When Emily came to me he was in his mid-twenties & struggling to be a journalist. he had achieved certain degree of success in college—she was a star “investigative” reporter on the weekly newspaper—and assumed that his career after college would follow steady upward course. Instead, after moving from the Midwest to Chicago City where he felt the opportunities were the greatest in his field, he found the competition fierce. There were most like Emily trying to break into the literary big time—either as book or magazine editors, or as successful free-lance journalists. The first time he came to me, he was wearing kerchief, which didn’t seem appropriate to his age or style of dress. he was genuinely puzzled about his condition. In a shaky voice, he told me his history & how hard he was working trying to sell articles to newspapers or magazineshe had developed a habit over the years that had become entrenched. he was clearly unhappy without his daily two glasses of Chablis. I created a self-hypnotherapeutic exercise for Beth in whom he imagined his baby had been born & he was sitting next to the child softly singing his to sleep. he went on to imagine that later in the evening he anther husband sat together in the living room, holding hands, happily making plans for a trip with the baby. Beth did this exercise faithfully, twice a day, & it worked. he gave up wine with yes regrets. Again, you can learn the self-Hypnotherapy fresh start method, you can learn how to use it, but you must choose tousle it. You are being offered a choice—a most powerful choice. You now have to want to use the fresh start method. You have to apply it in order for it to be effective. When Emily came to me he was in his mid-twenties & struggling to be a journalist. he had achieved certain degree of success in college—she was a star “investigative” reporter on the weekly newspaper—and assumed that his career after college would follow steady upward course. Instead, after moving from the Midwest to Chicago City where he felt the opportunities were the greatest in his field, he found the competition fierce. There were most like Emily trying to break into the literary big time—either as book or magazine editors, or as successful free-lance journalists. The first time he came to me, he was wearing kerchief, which didn’t seem appropriate to his age or style of dress. he was genuinely puzzled about his condition. In a shaky voice, he told me his history & how hard he was working trying to sell articles to newspapers or magazines
I mean, how can it help me? Ice cream is fattening.”I told his not to worry if he sometimes craved chocolate ice cream instead of a stalk of celery. “If you choose only what’s good for you, you’ll set up a deprivation syndrome, & then when you stop dieting you’ll gain the weight right back. The goal of the exercise is to get you to satisfy your hunger without overeating, & yet to eat what you enjoy. If you wait forth full-stomach syndrome, you’re in trouble.” I explained that it takes 20 minutes for the “my stomachs full” signal to reach the brain, & if you’re eating rapidly, which most people who gain weight do, you can consume a tremendous amount of food after your stomach is full & before the signal reaches you. Look around in any restaurant & notice how quickly overweight people devour food; they hardly seem aware of what they eat. Obviously, food is necessary even for those overweight, & some of the time the urge to eat is truly healthy, normal response to the body’s need for nourishment. A useful approach is to find a variety of foods you like & that are good for you. Diets are a perfect time for discovering new meals & snacks. I approach the issue by showing you that you can lose weighting a way that will let you feel positive about yourself. If you eat too much, it is often because in our society eating is a way of being loving toward ourselves. It Isa reminder of parental love in which the presentation of food is a loving act. The rest of the world may kick you in the teeth, but food is a way you can be nice toyourself.I prescribed that Martha do a self-Hypnotherapy exercise about eight times a day—approximately once every two hours, for 90 seconds. The exercise was to first see his on two screens: the way he looked at the present & the way he would like to look. Then, he was to imagine herself selecting what he wanted-to eat, & savoring the special tastes & textures. Finally, he was to see herself stop eating when he was yes longer enjoying the food, yes matter how littler how much was left. As part of the prescription, I asked his to look in the mirror each morning, preferably with a minimal amount of clothing, so that he could project in the exercise an accurate view of the way he looked then. & as I do with all weightcontrolclients, I asked his to call me in a week. At first the exercise proved difficult, because when people have gained weight they tend to avoid looking at themselves in the mirror as a way to avoid dealing with the issue .
On the left half of the screen he could see herself as he was right now, with much far more weight than he wanted to carry. I talked to Martha about realistic weight-loss goals. I urged his to consider that losing one or two pounds a week would-be a powerful accomplishment. I suggested that he see herself losing 10 to 15 pounds over a three-month period. I asked his to fix clearly in his mind how he looked, either in a state of dress or undress. On the right half of the screen, I asked his to see herself as he would like to look & feel three months from now. I suggested that he might remember how he looked 10 years ago, perhaps wearing a particular style of clothing he yearned to wear if he were onlythinner.Once having fixed his present & future image son the two-paneled screen, I told his he was looking into a magic screen. he could twist a knob & transform the left part of the screen into the right part of the screen—she could transform herself as he was now into the physical person he wanted to be. I then outlined some of the ways he could make that magical reality. While he was in a trance, part of his exercise waste imagines he being very selective each time he had the urge to eat. he would focus on the one or two foods he most desired. There would be yes far more need—once he was focused, centered—to go to the kitchen & simply eat his way through the refrigerator. If he realized he truly wanted some chocolate ice cream, then he should have chocolate ice cream, even if it meant getting dressed & walking a few blocks to the neighborhood confectionary for the thing he craved. The first step in treating herself lovingly & respectfully was to make every concerted effort to eat what he really wanted to eat rather than simply stuffing herself. Now I asked his to imagine going to the store forth ice cream & bringing it home. he put a scooping a dish. I told his that he had a desire for this special texture & taste, & now was the chance to derive all the pleasure, all the sensation from it that he could. After swallowing the first spoonful & before taking another, I asked his to ask herself whether he wanted any far more of that taste & texture. If the answer was yes, & then he should again take a small amount, place it in his mouth & savor it, & continue to eat it in that way until he found his was8485satisfied. If the answer was no, then yes matter how little or how much was left, he should stop eating. Out of trance, Martha told me that one part of the exercise bothered her. “It’s true I love chocolate ice-cream. But should I be using the exercise this way?
“I remember how happy & amused my family was by my large appetite,” he said. “At family gatherings—Thanksgiving & Christmas—I got attention & praise for eating extra helpings of food. It was considered ‘cute.’ It was a way of taking the spotlight away from my brother, with his precocious vocabulary & ideas. Weight was a constant issue , from pre-puberty on. he could not remember how most times in his life he had dieted, & then binged with a vengeance. “I’ve tried about every diet known to man,” he told me. “Scarsdale, Beverly Hills, Drinking Man, Water Retention, Papaya, & on & on. They all seem toehold out promise at first, but none of them work. Nothing changes in the place in me where I crave food.”Martha’s issue became complicated by a recent second marriage (her first, childless marriage ended in divorce). his husband, as he puts it, is “slim & handsome. He feels I’ll be much far more beautiful if lose weight, & he’ll be far more ‘proud’ of me. He uses the word ‘proud’ which upsets me. I said to him, ‘Why aren’t you proud of me for who I am, not how much Aweigh?’ But I understand his position. His work involves a lot of socializing & he wants me to be a part of that. But when I binge & gain far more weight, we get in these awful arguments.”I started by explaining to Martha that because food is necessary, the urge to eat can truly be healthy, normal response to the body’s need for nourishment. Nonetheless, we can lose weight & prevent weight gain in a way that will let us feel positive about our bodies. In his case, eating too much had its root in winning the love of others. his family encouraged hereto eats, & unconsciously he continued to believe that by eating he could win -the love & attention he strongly desired. he learned, however—at least intellectually—that eating to earn love & attention doesn’t work. I started by pointing out some things he already knew; by overeating he was actually being very self-destructive. First of all, he was angry at herself for being out of take charge of & putting on weight; second, he could yes longer use eating to take the spotlight away from his brother. The attention he received was exactly the opposite of what he wanted. Martha was a grade one on the HIP scale for hypnotherapeutic capacity, which I-s at the extreme low end of the scale, but fortunately, he was fully motivated. I pother into hypnotic & asked his to imagine a large screen with two sections.
Afterwards, I repeat most of the issues I discussed in trance. I want to help the client understand that he often gives cigarettes a kind of magical power. Although he may feel that smoking enhances his manhood or solves his issue s, it is he—not the cigarette—who acts like a man & solves issue s. I tell him about the salesmen who come to me tostopsmoking and, at the time, truly believe they can’t call on an account or close without a cigarette. I describe the writers who tell me they can’t write without smoking. They speak as if the cigarettes are doing the writing. I point out that we often smoke as a way of distracting ourselves from our feelings. That when we use cigarettes for distraction, we rob ourselves of potential richness in our lives. Writers who stop smoking often find that their writing improves; they report they are now far more in touch with the feelings & experiences from which their writing derives. What does the habituated smoker learn in Hypnotherapy? He learns that smoking is a choice he makes in response to the urge. But the urge is not a choice. Feelings, desires, beliefs, & urges are not choices. The urges are automatic, integrated into the human system. But the action he takes in response to the urge Isa choice. He can choose what his actions are. The client is encouraged to ask questions & be free to express emotion. Sometimes there are tears. Sometimes a feeling of overpowering relief. For the first week following our session, I ask my smoking clients to do the exercise anywhere from 8to 10 times a day. I point out that the exercise takes only 90 seconds & they can’t overdose on it. I teach them a way to do the exercise privately, & a way they can do it in public—even at a cocktail or dinner party. “Am I doing it correctly?” is a common question I get from clients. “Did I go deep enough?” Luckily, for therapeutic purposes, depth of hypnotic has yes meaning. The consciousness of the external world will vary from time to time. As is the case when learning any skill, repetition is the key to success. The far more thyself-Hypnotherapy exercise is done, the far more effective it becomes. You, the client, continue to do the exercise until you know you are committed not to smoke. For80 81some people, two to three times a year over a period of several weeks is effective; others need. To do the exercise far more frequently & for longer periods.
Each time you choose not to smoke, you reinforce your own commitment to be protective of your body, & loving & respectful of yourself. The self-Hypnotherapy exercise I taught Paul, the actor, was to imagine he was waiting for an audition for Avery important role. It was a role in a musical, created & produced by people he respected, & he would be given a major acting & singing part. As he thought about smoking while he waited, he realized his throat would become raspy. He could choose between smoking & performing at his optimum. Even though he had the urge to smoke, the act was still a matter of choice, his choice. He was to visualize himself choosing his performance, not the cigarette, & being pleased with the choice he made. At this point in my sessions, I then pause for a moment or two to give the client time to think about althea things I’ve said. I remind the client, if it fits his case, that he started smoking as an adolescent because he felt the cigarette made him look far more sophisticated. Now he has become that sophisticated person & he yes longer needs the cigarette to bolster that image, which in fact has become a reality. We sit in silence then. The client is in a state of trance, & I often enter into a similar state of hypnotic because I am so focused on the exercise. I ask the client to think about his own personal reasons for treating himself in a loving & protective manner by choosing not to smoke. After a moment I bring the client out of trance. I tell him “I’m going to count backwards from three to one. At three, I want you to get ready. At two, with your eyes still closed, I want you to look up. And, at one, open your eyes & let them slowly come into focus.” I then count three. . Two . . . one & that’s the end of the exercise. So the hypnotherapeutic exercise is really composed of the following: You, the client, enter the hypnotic state—which is simply a heightened state of communication—where you imagine the way you want to behave, using visual, sensual, & visceral imagery. Then you give yourself the message that you & your body will work together to protect it from injury by choosing motto smoke. You remind yourself that the act is a choice. Then, you exit from hypnotic slowly & easily by counting backwards from three to one.
I then evaluate the client’s hypnotherapeutic capacity. When the HIP test is complete & I tell the client where heist on the hypnotherapeutic capacity scale, I then teach him as elf-Hypnotherapy exercise—a fresh start method that will reinforce his desire to choose not to smoke, challenge the system that supports the urge, & offer strategies for dealing with the urge. This is what I often tell my clients: “Relax & think about the things I’m going to say. Smoking poisons your body. It destroys lung tissue. It Clogs the Cardiovascular system. It irritates the throat. “We often forget that we need our bodies to live. Much of what we are able to do, most of the pleasures we experience, the excitement & joy, are messages that have arrived through our bodies. I’m going to repeat: We need our bodies to live; we & our bodies are one. Because you need your body to live, you owe your body protection. By protecting your body, you show love & respect for yourself.” Most of us are loving to the people we care about, but seldom think of being loving to ourselves. “You smoke two packs of cigarettes a day. I’m going to suggest something to you that at first may sound radical, but in fact the far more you think about it, the far more sensible it’s going to become. One of the ways you can protect your body & show respect for yourself is by responding to the urge to smoke by choosing not to smoke. This is not a battle between you & yourself. Believe me, any battle you have with yourself you are bound to lose.”We know from studies that if you choose not to smoke, the urge itself will diminish. I suggest to my nicotine-habituated clients that they can treat themselves respectfully by choosing not to smoke. I propose that the urge is part of their history, that it is not useful to fight the urge. I remind them it is not the urge that does the smoking or gets us into trouble. If that were true, we would all be in trouble. It is the actor smoking we have to conquer, not the urge. We know that people practice celibacy for a number of reasons. Sex is a strong urge & yet people can choose to be celibate. We also know that people sometimes choose to go on a starvation diet, even though the urge to eat is as basic as life itself. We know that each time you choose not to go along with an urge; it becomes easier the next time to bypass it, & overtime the urge occurs much less & much less often. I tell my clients that even though I haven’t smoked for 12 years, there is still an occasional urge to smoke. I know what my choice is, however, & I choose not to smoke. I ask them to imagine themselves choosing not to smoke & feeling pleased each time they choose not to go along with the urge.
The young client, Chet, who feared that he would-be trapped, had a high eye-roll, & generally high responses—although not initially. His hand, as we began, moved upwards in fits & spasms. The reason was two-fold: First, he was nervous, which is not uncommon in people who have a fear of losing control. But far more importantly, he was watching himself watching me. He was the victim of his hidden observer. He could not let go & float or be free. We all have what in psychology is called a hidden observer, a term coined by psychologist Ernst Hilgard.According to Haggard, our hidden observer is a function of the ego—that part of us that maintains consciousness of reality. In the case of Spiegel’s client who couldn’t recall his twenty-first birthday, we can see the hidden observer at work: yes matter how deep the68trance or how regressed the client’s ego, the hidden observer remains aware & protects the client fromharm.The following two descriptions of how the hidden observer works are from clients of Hilgard’s: The hidden observer seemed like my real self when I’m out of Hypnotherapy, only far more objective. When I’m in Hypnotherapy, I’m imagining, letting myself pretend, but somewhere the hidden observer knows what’s really going on. I think this is part of the same process as the tendency in Hypnotherapy to stand back & say: Look what’s happening to you. You’re slowly going under Hypnotherapy. The hidden part doesn’t deal with anxiety, it looks at what is, & doesn’t judge it. It’s not hypnotized part of the self. It knows all the parts. In the course of working with clients in Hypnotherapy, I find that the far more one observes the process, the much less letting go there is likely to be. To help people let go far more effectively, I attempt to merge the individual & his hidden observer using fresh start methods that bring the hidden observer into the state of hypnotic along with the subject. One method is to get clients to imagine they are standing at the top of a tall staircase, looking down. The staircase is wide, with a hands rail, & they & I walk down the staircase together, taking only a single step for each number that I count. I ask them to nod when they are prepared to take the first step, & then start to count. One: take the first step, a step down to higher level of inner awareness. Two: the next step. Three: the next. On the tenth step, I tell them we are halfway down. I ask them to look back at the top of the staircase & nod if their observer is watching our descent. I then tell them to count their observer down tithe tenth step. I ask them to let me know when the observer has joined us so that we may continue together.
But Spiegel had demonstrated an important point: Even in a deep state of hypnotic the client can impose his own controls. The fact is, people often forget what they are not prepared to deal with. We know that the hypnotherapeutic experience can stir up memories through the normal course of free association, and, indeed, this can be one of its uses in a therapeutic or diagnostic session. Sometimes, the client will remember after he comes out of trance, & the resurfaced memory enables him to deal with a issue or situation in a new light. Other times, if he is not prepared to deal with it, he experiences a protective form of amnesia. Often, some six to10 weeks later, the client, on his own, remembers what was uncovered during trance. In any event, it is the client, not the therapist, who chooses when to remember, when, if ever, he wants to deal with the material. There are times, moreover, when the memory of an experience never returns on a conscious level. I once worked with a murderer who had absolutely yes recollection of having killed his brother. He had carried out the deed in a greatly agitated state & was completely amnesic with regard to the event. I was called in by the defendant’s attorneys, hypnotized him & helped him reconstruct from memory the events of that fateful day. Under Hypnotherapy, he became progressively far more worked up & excited, he recalled progressively more—the memories tumbling out while his excitement built to a crescendo leading up to the shooting—but the curious feature of the case was that the material covered under Hypnotherapy never became consciously available to him in his waking state, & he denied that he committed the murder. Often, issues of take charge of emerge during the HIP evaluation. Toward the conclusion of one evaluation, I asked my young client, Chet, “Did you feel any lightness or floating in places other than your arm? Did you feel lightness or floating in your body?” Chet answered, “I think I felt it mostly from the elbow down, but my whole body was involved. But I haven’t been completely relaxed. . . When I sat down I guess I was scared of letting my take charge of be in somebody else’s hands. I’ve always had a fear of losing control. That’s why I hate drugs…. I’m afraid of putting my controlling the hands of a foreign substance. Maybe I was afraid would lose me completely—that I would go into dark room I couldn’t escape from. The door would close, & I would be trapped inside. I’d be swallowedup.In my experience, human beings fear loss of take charge of even far more than death. Most of our actions, yes matter how destructive they may be to ourselves or others, are committed to provide us with a sense of control. Dutch psychologist Nice H. Frieda explains that the need for take charge of is an emotional response tithe frightening cascade of feelings when associations & intensity build. Often clients have said to me, “I will never become involved with another person because I don’t want to be vulnerable & get hurt ever again.” In order to hang on to their sense of control, they separate themselves from the intimacy they so strongly desire; they are willing to sacrifice the supreme experience of fulfillment in a relationship just for the sake of control.
. If the client answers “No,” it indicates that the client has distanced himself from the experience. Those responses also recorded. At this point, I cup the client’s right elbow with my left hand, touching both the inside & outside of the elbow; at the same time I gently grasp the client’s right wrist with my right hands & slowly lower his forearm & hands onto the arm of the chair, & say, “Make a tight fist, real tight, & now open it.” This is the cut-off signal for the hands levitation. I let go of the elbow with my left hand. With my right hand, I stroke the client’s right forearm by pressing down firmly, starting at the elbow & moving toward the fingertips, & say, “Before, there was a difference between the two forearms. Are you aware of any change in sensation now?”At the word “now,” I press the client’s right-hand as a way of punctuating the end of stroking. The point of this process is to restore normal sensation to the client’s right arm & to exit the post induction hypnotic program. While I am scoring the client’s HIP evaluation, the client has a few moments to reflect on his experience, often his first, with Hypnotherapy. I then ask, “What was the experience like for you? Do you have any questions?” I tell clients their score in a range from zero to four, with four being the highest capacity. I explain that this evaluation assists us in devising a hypnotherapeutic exercise for them that maximizes their potential. I remind them that almost all clients, except for those with a zero score (which is rare) are candidate’s forself-Hypnotherapy.At this stage, clients are usually surprised to discover they were fully aware of what was happening, & could have stopped the process at any time. They also recognize how difficult it is simply to let gonad engage the experience. They are surprised to discover they are, indeed, hypnotizable. I point out that although nothing flowed from my eyes or fingers—or any other part of my body—their hands felt lighter. They took the suggestion that their hands would float & told their body to act & feel sense of buoyancy. Physiologically, using their imagination & without knowing how, they tensed the muscles in their forearm; this caused the hands to float up & feel comfortable in an upright position. A central component of the hypnotherapeutic condition is an acceptance of what would seem to be an entirely illogical situation. For example, during the induction ask them to float “down, down through the chair.” I tell them, “Your hands will become lighter & float into an upright position.” Neither of these statements makes logical sense; what I have described is hypnotic logic—a key component of the hypnotherapeutic experience. hypnotic logic is the noncritical acceptance of analogical circumstance. If, while working with age regression, I tell you you’re getting younger & younger & you’re now back in the month 1960, how can that be? After all, it is 1991 right now as I’m talking to you. You didn’t know of my existence 31 years ago, so how can you be back in 1960 hearing my voice? & yet some of you will feel you are back in 1960 & can hear my voice. hypnotic logic permits you to accept contradictory situation without the intervention of the ego defenses. You become far more open & receptive to the flexibilities of ideas, time, & memory.
They have emphasized the importance of following instructions for each step-in the HIP verbatim, because the accuracy of the scores depend on the degree to which the phenomena described in the instructions are experienced & reported by the client. Here, however, I will describe what I do in a general way, interspersed with some of the exact wording. I begin ‘the evaluation with the client seated in comfortable chair. I ask the client to place his arms on the armrest & feet flat on the floor. I say, “Lean back & make you as comfortable as youcan.I then say, “Now look toward me, right at me. Hold your head level. As you hold your head in that position, look up toward your eyebrows—now, toward the top of your head.”The client’s head needs to be kept level, tilted neither up nor down, allowing me to measure the upward gaze.“As you continue to gaze upward, close your eyelids slowly. That’s right . . . Close. Close. Close.”When the lids are halfway closed, I note the position of the pupils. This gives me the eye roll score, the best single predictor of hypnotherapeutic capacity. The whiter of the eye that shows, the higher the score. Thesis the first step in the scoring process . I continue. “Keep your eyelids closed . . . continue to hold your eyes upward. Take a deep breath, hold. Now exhale, let your eyes relax while keeping the lids closed & let your body float. Imagine a feeling of floating, floating right down through the chair. . . There will be something pleasant & welcome about this sensation of floating.”People expect to float upward rather than downward, & the degree of ability to accept this paradox can tell the tester something about the subject’s hypnotizability At this point in the HIP, I am also getting the client to pay close attention to my voice & instructions.“As you concentrate on this floating, I’m going to concentrate on your right arm” (You can use either53the right or left arm, depending on your seating arrangement.)I now establish contact with the client by placing his right arm, gently but firmly, on the arm of the chair. Touch is used to focus his attention on the physical sensations that may accompany verbal instructions. Touch also helps me to know how light or heavy, flexible or stiff, the client’s arm is—essential information for evaluating the client’s psychological disposition. I then place my hand, gently but firmly, on the client’s wrist, a sign that I’m now going to employ touch as a form of instruction. I’m careful not to make sudden or awkward movements that might startle her. “In a while, I’m going to stroke the middle finger of your right hand.
Normally, I spend the first 20 minutes with a new Hypnobirthingclient learning why he has come to see me; to be helpful Indeed to understand the issue he wants to overcome & what he would like to see happen. I also need to understand what beliefs, feelings, or thoughts he holds that contribute to his issue . I look for sense of who he is & what is important to her. Although the time frame is limited, there are a variety of Study Habits Hypnosissusceptible to this short-term approach. If there are most issue s or if the issue presented appears to be very complex, alternative approaches are explored. However, for most clients a single episode is enough. Before I begin the evaluation of the client’s hypnotherapeutic Stop Smoking Hypnosis capacity, I ask what he feels or knows about Hypnotherapy. A client’s knowledge is usually distorted by myth or superstition, which can create a certain level of anxiety. Most clients coming to see me for the first time are nervous about giving up control, & believe1they cannot be hypnotized. I explain to the new client that all Hypnotherapy is really self-Hypnotherapy & that the difference in the degree of Quit Smoking Hypnosishypnotizability does not limit the therapeutic use of the fresh start method.Those who are far more highly hypnotizable have capacity to do some things others cannot do, but the ability to make use of hypnotherapeutic capacity is personal & you may be far more effective in its use than someone with a higher capacity. Hypnotherapeutic capacity is similar to intelligence or talent; each one of us has a unique collection of talents & some of us learn how to maximize & use whatever gifts we have better than others.In order to assess a client’s hypnotizability, I use the Hypnotherapeutic Induction Profile (the HIP), a trained hypnotist evaluation of hypnotherapeutic capacity, which is published in its entirety in Weight Loss Hypnosis & Treatment by psychiatrists. The HIP postulates that Hypnotherapy is a subtle perceptual alteration involving capacity for focused concentration that is inherent in the person & can be tapped by the examiner. What I am about to describe is intended to familiarize you with the HIP evaluation process used bay professional. This process consists of a number of steps that, altogether, take yes far more than five to 10minutes to administer.
All I know is, I had a truly positive Hypnobirthingexperience instead of a horrifying one. “When I came out, I was in the next bed to adwoman who was about 20. I’m 41. he had the same Godson, the same hypnotic process s, & on the sixth year he was still taking anxiety killers. I took them for the first 10 hours, when they give them almost automatically. Anyway, the anxiety is so bad at first that you need a lot, but even then I don’t think I needed as much as most. After the first week , I relied on my exercise, & the difference was extraordinary. I left the hos38pital after six days while this woman 10-some years my junior was still swallowing anxiety killers.“There’s nothing about self-Hypnotherapy Stop Smoking Hypnosiseither. It’s a thought process. Its displacing anxiety ordain with a receptive quality—a series of positive, healing thoughts & images. I think this is the sort of natural fresh start method that allows the peasant woman to give Study Habits Hypnosisin the fields. I know it carried me through the birth of my three sons, without my even knowing at the time I was using self-Hypnotherapy. Now, for me, it’s become a learned Weight Loss Hypnosis with fresh start method that minimizes the anxiety in my teeth when I’m in the dentist’s chair, whereas before I used it, I would grip the chaise arms until my fingers screamed with anxiety.“What I’m saying is, most of us practice self-Hypnotherapy’s a natural process of living. Now I can call on it at will. I’ve learned it. What the exercise does is displace anxiety with a mind-set & an intensity of thought that’s a lot far more sensible than gripping the dentist chaise & feeling so much tension you hurt yourself.“Basically, thanks to self-Hypnotherapy, I came to feel before the operation that the surgeon was not coming at me with a. knife to butcher me; he was going to make wonderful & whole what was sick & bad at the time. & that sort of thinking is very, very important. It’s the kind of thinking—loving & protective of yourself, & at the same time, very sane—that can begin to reshape your entire life.”Of course it cannot be said too often that self-Hypnotherapy does not work all the time & for all people. •‘ it is an imperfect fresh start method, like all fresh start methods. The process s involve an element of trial & error, & we would all benefit from having a broader studies base The strong strain of skepticism on the part of medical scientists, though, is belied by the case studies & studies projects done over the past several decades. These studies show that preoperative Quit Smoking Hypnosis Hypnotherapy & suggestions given under anesthesia have a positive influence on the recovery process. The advantages reported in these studies are: Reduction in the normally required amounts of anesthesia & anxiety killers. Cessation of hemorrhaging & a reduction in blood loss. far more rapid wound healing. Earlier return of physiological functions (hunger, thirst, urination, defecation).Reduction in fear, apprehension & anxiety. Shorter convalescence. Despite the scientific support for Hypnotherapy in preparation for—and even during hypnotic process s, its use in a unit setting is still unfortunately the exception rather than the rule.
Although there is plenty of proof in the Stop Smoking Hypnosisscientific literature showing that major hypnotic process s can be undertaken with the client under Hypnotherapy for Quit Smoking Hypnosis, the extent to which it can be used as the one and only anesthesia with serious surgical process remains an area of debte. Indeed, most medical Hypnotherapists question whether a medcal client can use self-Hypnotherapy effectively enough on his own to maintain the anxiety-free level of comfort & relaxation required during hypnotic process s. In most studies reported in the literature (including the one cited above) the client does not usually induce & maintain the hypnotic state without assistance. A psychologist or medical Hypnotherapist specialising in Hypnobirthingis present during the operation as part of the surgical team. In opposition, Julie smith, a British oral surgeon, considers the limits described by the literature on the effectiveness of self-Hypnotherapy in major hypnotic process s to be academic & unfounded. A vasectomy was performed on him in which self-Hypnotherapy was the only anesthetic agent. Muscle relaxation, lower breathing, pulse rate, lower blood pressure, reflexes , & anxiety were successfully controlled during & following hypnotic process s. Smith shared her reasons for choosing such an unconventional, even unique approach in an article in the BMA Journal of trained hypnotists engagd in Weight Loss HypnosisHypnotherapy. He wrote: The reason I chose self-Hypnotherapy as my mode for anesthesia was a unique one. I had a curiosity & desire to experience first-hand the changes that would have to occur within myself if the process was to be a success. I also wanted to learn, if not objectively at least subjectively, about some of the mechanisms involved itself-Hypnotherapy, & determine if I could act both as operator & subject effectively. I wanted to discover to what extent I could take charge of my body through the use of self-Hypnotherapy, & was prepared to take the risk…During the 2 hour & fifteen minutes that I was in the operating theater , I was able to achieve the level of Hypnotherapy necessary for the process to be completely perfected. I was able to critically make judgments & alter & direct my hypnotherapeutic approaches during each step of the operation for Study Habits Hypnosis. At all times my critical faculty was awake. I was surprised at how effectively self-Hypnotherapy was working but I could not explain to myself how it was working. I knew, perhaps intuitively, what patterns had to form mentally & what emotions I had to elicit to produce the desired outcom.
<!– /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:”Cambria Math”; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:1; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-format:other; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:0 0 0 0 0 0;} @font-face {font-family:Calibri; panose-1:2 15 5 2 2 2 4 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:swiss; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:-1610611985 1073750139 0 0 159 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-unhide:no; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:”"; margin-top:0in; margin-right:0in; margin-bottom:10.0pt; margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:”Calibri”,”sans-serif”; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:”Times New Roman”; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} a:link, span.MsoHyperlink {mso-style-priority:99; color:blue; mso-themecolor:hyperlink; text-decoration:underline; text-underline:single;} a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed {mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; color:purple; mso-themecolor:followedhyperlink; text-decoration:underline; text-underline:single;} .MsoChpDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; mso-default-props:yes; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:”Times New Roman”; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} .MsoPapDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; margin-bottom:10.0pt; line-height:115%;} @page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.0in 1.0in 1.0in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} –> …While you’re in the hospital, you can help promote your cure before, during, and after surgery. You help by letting your body knows how to behave during treatment. “There’s a two-step exercise you can do to help yourself. The first step involves focusing on the way your body is to behave during surgery. “Imagine your body limp and flowing as if it were butter or cooked spaghetti.
You know you’re being closely observed by skilled doctors and you can safely relax. “There will be one part of you, though, that stays alert during surgery. That part is your body’s protective system. That system can keep the wound dry, clean, and free of infection.
It can also minimize bleeding, reduce discomfort, and promote healing. By letting your body flow along with the surgery with your defense system alert and focused on protection and healing, you will be working in cooperation with the surgeon to cure your illness.“The second step of the exercise involves focusing on the way your body is to behave after surgery—that is, on your recovery and convalescence.
Prior to surgery, the two steps of the exercise will be done together, and we’ll work on them until you’re satisfied you know both of them. Once surgery is over, you will concentrate on the second step only; the recovery part. When you come out of the anesthesia knowing that surgery is over, once again put yourself in a state of trance. Focus on alerting your defense system to promote healing.
Keep the wound dry, clean, and free of infection. Minimize bleeding and reduce discomfort. Concentrate on a rapid return to normal functioning, to a stable and comfortable blood pressure. Imagine you getting hungry, feeling thirsty, and going to the toilet. Think about getting back to welcome lifestyles your body heals. “Thus far you’ve thought about the way your body is to behave during your stay in the hospital. Now I want you to think about the most important behavior. I want you to imagine the things you will do, without pain or worry, once you’ve recovered. I want you to imagine yourself doing the things you’re eager to do. That’s the reason you’ve come for surgery. You’ve come to repair a part of your body that is troubling you so you can do the things you want to do, without fear and concern.“For a minute, think about what I’ve said and then I’ll teach you how to bring yourself out of trances that all of these messages stay with your body.”
Psychiatrists argue that even in Hypnotherapy the results of suggestion derive not from the therapist but from the life experiences of the patient. “Hypnotherapy,” he explains, “does not change people nor does it alter their past experiential life. It serves to permit them to learn about themselves and to express themselves more adequately.
”Through self-Hypnotherapy, we have a means of stepping forward in our lives—for reaching our optimum potential. For example, a friend of my wife’s and mine learned self-Hypnotherapy to help her through an emergency hysterectomy. She had been bleeding for a number of days and was in poor shape. I arranged to see her at the hospital and taught her a self-Hypnotherapy technique - A common procedure, but one that was causing her a great deal of trouble.
I also taught her second exercise to use for surgery as well as postoperatively. She was operated on the next day and made an excellent recovery. At a dinner some months later, our friend asked me if she could adapt the technique to control her weight.
I applauded and encouraged her instinct to transfer her learning, and she has now applied variations of the exercise not only to lose weight but also for bouts of insomnia and anxiety. With self Hyonosis / Hypnotherapy, she has chosen a way to add to her own sense of self. Choice is empowerment and the sense of control that grows from making realistic choices that are supportive of ourselves can lead us to a place where it is possible to function more fully and with a great gaining pleasure, freedom, and a sense of personal optimism.
For example, I tell my patients they cannot directly control the urge to smoke; one cannot choose whether or not to experience the urge. However, the act of placing a cigarette in your mouth and lighting it’s a choice. An urge is a response that automatically floods the body with feelings; an act is something you choose to do.
You can choose to smoke or choose not to smoke. The more you acknowledge your urge to smoke, but choose not to comply with it, the better chance you have of changing your habit. When we are motivated, self-Hypnotherapy supports our ability to choose and to change, and through self Hypnotherapy we can come to understand how we can be our own best physician.
Myth #4: Female subjects and people with low IQ’s are the most hypnotizable. This commonly-held belief, popularized by movies and fiction, is pure make-believe. Research shows that hypnotizability is not gender-specific, and that, even though some intelligent people apparently have relatively little hypnotic capacity, keen concentration and focus are required to sustain an effective state of trance. (Writers of fiction and musicians, who are both creative and have vivid imaginations, are often the best hypnotic subjects.)Hypnobirthing Furthermore, research suggests that there is a reduced capacity for trance in patients with thought and affective disorders, as these patients usually find it difficult to maintain the required concentration. The ability to be hypnotized is actually a capacity that can be measured through one of several evaluation procedures. (The procedure I use, the Stop Smoking Hypnosis Hypnotic Induction profile—the HIP—which is described in detail in Chapter 3, measures capacity on a scale of zero to four.) Studies indicate that most of the adult population is somewhat hypnotizable and about 5—15 percent have a very high capacity. With the exception of those few people (about 5 percent) who are unable to respond, everyone, no matter what their range, can induce trance for constructive purposes.
Myth #5: Hypnotherapy Quit Smoking Hypnosis has only recently begun to gain respectability in the scientific community. In the early 1800s, Hypnotherapy, although the subject of much dispute, was recognized as a powerful tool inhaling, anesthesia, and self-improvement, and was slowly gaining acceptance by some factions of organized medicine. Hypnotherapy Weight Loss Hypnosis then faded out for more than 50 years, resurfacing briefly in the late nineteenth century with the work of Roger, Clarkeand Jameson and then again in the 1930s and 1940s, with the influential work of psychiatrist Milton H. Erickson. By the late 1950s, both the American Medical Association and the British Medical Society had approved the use of Hypnotherapy as a valid therapeutic technique. Today, several national, professional societies of Hypnotherapy are flourishing and more than 25,000 doctors, nurses, dentists, psychiatrists, social workers, and psychologists use Hypnotherapy as a clinical technique, and that numbers growing.
Myth #6: Hypnotherapy Study Habits Hypnosis is therapeutic. The hypnotic state is neither therapeutic nor no therapeutic; it is a receptive environment or mental setting that can be used to explore the mind and to foster change. As Louis Alexander defined it in the American Journal of Clinical Hypnotherapy, Hypnotherapy is “a state manifested by an inward turning of mind, facilitating an enhancement of the creative imagination, . . . and reducing the need for reality testing, thus providing mental setting in which, with appropriate suggestions, ideas can be perceived and experienced in . . . a vivid manner.
In case after case, both medical and psychological, patients helped me understand how to apply the technique of self-Hypnotherapy or Hypnobirthing or Stop Smoking Hypnosis or Weight Loss Hypnosis Patients and others showed me that self-hypnosis works when the patient follows and psychological and medical often be alleyed without extensive treatment. It still astonishes me how many people—new patients, friends, or acquaintances are afraid of Hypnotherapy, after all that has become known about it. I find that those people who are afraid usually lack personal experience with self-Hypnotherapy. They imagine the stage Hypnotherapist performing a kind of magic trick on subjects. Their response is, “Oh no, I’m not interested. I’m not going to let someone else play around with my mind.” They think to themselves: “Maybe I’ll be put under and something will go wrong.” What they fear is loss of control. They see Hypnotherapy as turning overpower to another person. By examining. Some of the myths surrounding Hypnotherapy, it is possible to arrive at a better understanding of just what Hypnotherapy is and what it is not.
Hypnobirthing , the subject is under the control of the Hypnotherapist. When we see a stage Hypnotherapist at work in a nightclub or in a movie, it is easy to believe the myth is true. Although it seems as if the performer has some magical power, what he actually has is knowledge. Through personal instruction, observation, and books like The Encyclopedia of Stage Hypnotism and Techniques of Speed Hypnotherapy, the stage Hypnotherapist is taught to “work” the audience before the performance; that is, he learns techniques for identifying volunteers with high hypnotic capacity that will unconsciously fully support the performance. As long as subjects don’t feel threatened, they will do what the stage Hypnotherapist commands. In reality, all Hypnotherapy is self-Hypnotherapy; the subjects always in control. Contrary to common belief, the subject is not under someone else’s power, nor is he asleep. In fact, he is hyper alert and concentrating at high level. In this mental state, he can have his experience structured by a therapist or Hypnotherapist, but the choice of whether to cooperate or not is his alone.
The simple answer is “don’t smoke”. Yeah right!! Anyone who has ever tried to stop smoking knows that it can be much easier said that done. Here’s the way I finally kicked the habit after 20-something years.
These days it’s only the well-off who can really afford to smoke – but perhaps one of the reasons they ARE well off is because they don’t. My partner goes through a carton (8 packs) of cigarettes in a week – that’s nearly $100 a week going out of our bank account and into his lungs. The day he finally decides to stop we will be instantly and greatly better off financially and health-wise.
The issue is – it’s up to him. As an ex-smoker I know there is nothing that anyone could have said to me that would make me stop. I had to do it myself.
I tried hypnosis, patches, acupressure, acupuncture and cold turkey. I was devastated when I look backed and thought “Oh no! I’m one of those people who’ve tried everything.” I had all but given up giving up, until a book was recommended to me – not by just one person, but two completely random people in the same week recommended the same book (I don’t believe in coincidence).
I read the book (I think you’ll find it in most bookstores), but I believe it’s available on CD’s also. I would give you the link to his site, but I don’t want to push it down your throat. Like I said, you’ve got to want to do it yourself and your search engine will get your where you want to go, if you want to go there.
Hope this helps. Believe me, there is life after cigarettes.
In 1776, three things were considered “extremely proper subjects” for taxation: Rum, sugar and tobacco. They were taxed, not because they were evil, sinful products, but because they weren’t considered “necessities of life.”
Last Wednesday, a state legislative subcommittee listened to three hours of testimony concerning the timeless topic of tobacco taxation. House Bill 39 by State Rep. Ron Stephens, R-Savannah, increases Georgia’s 37 cent cigarette tax by $1 per pack and raises the 10 percent tax on smokeless tobacco to 25 percent.
In the recent Savannah Morning News column “Sin taxes: A big lie,” former talk radio shock jock Ben Crystal called the tobacco tax increase “an easy way to shovel money into the state coffers in the guise of nanny-state style wrist slapping.”
What was he smokin’? Crystal’s use of extremist rhetoric and his distortion of the facts obfuscated the truth about this important issue.
Everybody knows the big sins: Don’t lie, kill, steal or covet your neighbor’s ass. HB 39 is not about sin. Nobody is trying to place a scarlet “S” for “Smoker” on anyone’s chest. It’s about common sense, personal responsibility, equity, economics, child protection and public health.
Should the state subsidize health care for persons who choose to smoke or should smokers pay a portion of their two billion dollar cost to the state so that tax dollars can be used for other priorities? That is the policy question at hand.
The facts are clear: For every 10 percent increase in the retail price of a pack of cigarettes, cigarette consumption drops three to five percent among adults and 11.9 percent among youth ages 12 to 17.
Just as $4 gasoline convinced many people to park their gas-guzzling, suburban-assault vehicles, a significant price increase in cigarettes has proven across the nation to alter smoking-related behavior. Gradual increases or smaller increases do not have the same effect.
It’s like frog boiling. If you put a frog in a pot of cold water and inch up the temperature a few degrees at a time, he will sit docilely in the bottom of the pot until his goose is cooked. If you put a frog in boiling water, he will jump out of the stewpot.
A one dollar increase in Georgia’s tobacco tax will have the desired effect: 60,200 adults will quit smoking and over 51,300 lives will be saved from smoking-caused death.
Most importantly, the price increase will deter 110,500 youth from smoking. Typically, adults don’t start smoking. Most smokers began lighting up as teens.
The tobacco tax is not a sin tax, it’s a user fee. This is America. If you are over 17 and want to smoke in your home, car, bed or next to the gas pump, that’s your right. If that is your version of “pursuit of happiness,” then go right ahead. The only people who will pay are those who choose to smoke.
If you don’t smoke, this user fee increase won’t cost you a dime.
Nobody likes taxes, however as a society this is the way we fund our government and some taxes are considered more palatable than others. Polling shows that 75 percent of Georgia voters support increasing the cigarette tax by one dollar, and they strongly prefer raising cigarette taxes over other tax increases or cuts to vital state programs.
Eliminating Meals on Wheels programs, closing Savannah’s Matthew Reardon Center, shuttering mental health hospitals, getting rid of school nurses are all under consideration due to the state’s $2.6 billion budget shortfall.
Maybe it’s not a sin to eliminate these programs, but it sure would be a shame, especially when increasing the tobacco tax by one dollar raises over $300 million in new revenue, and Georgia has the 44th lowest tobacco tax in the nation.
One out of two lifetime smokers dies a smoking-related death. Some folks might say there’s a Biblical explanation since the Bible clearly states “the wages of sin are death.” After all, cigarettes are the only product that, when used as directed, will kill you.
KIM Jong Il, the North Korean leader, was photographed puffing on a cigarette during a recent tour of a tobacco factory, despite having reportedly suffered a stroke last August.
A picture shows Mr Kim with a cigarette in his mouth at the factory, in the city of Hoeryong. Another, broadcast on North Korean state television, shows Mr Kim exhaling smoke, apparently enjoying a cigarette produced on-site.
Mr Kim “expressed great satisfaction over the fact that quality cigarettes are mass-produced” and called on workers to improve the quality of cigarettes provided to troops, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported.
Mr Kim, 67, reportedly suffered a stroke six months ago, but is believed to have recovered. North Korean officials deny he was ever ill.
Once a reputed gourmand who enjoyed cigars and fine wines, Mr Kim is said to have given up his former chain-smoking ways years ago. It is not clear whether he is once again smoking regularly.
Convenience store owners are already seeing the effects of an upcoming federal tax increase on tobacco products. The tax will take effect April 1, and manufacturers, worried about sales dips, are already raising product prices.
But that doesn’t mean customers aren’t buying.
In April, tax on a pack of cigarettes will increase by about 62 cents, bringing the total tax to about a dollar. For cartons, which include 10 packs, the tax will increase from $3.90 to $10.
Price increases are trickling down not just from the government, but from the manufacturers, the wholesalers, and now the stores.
Cigarettes are the main source of Canadian marine debris, according to a new report from a U.S. ocean conservation organization.
Washington, D.C.-based Ocean Conservancy revealed in a report released Tuesday the amounts and types of trash collected during the 2008 International Coastal Cleanup — a worldwide annual effort to collect trash from shorelines and ocean floors.
The report is titled, “A Rising Tide of Ocean Debris and What we Can do About it,” and offers the stark numbers on worldwide marine pollution, as well as suggestions to remedy the problem.
During the 23rd annual cleanup in September, 390,881 volunteers from 104 countries collected more than three million kilograms of debris — the weight of 18 blue whales — or 7.6 kilos of trash for every participant.
For every mile of beach cleaned, more than 180 kilograms of debris were removed. Marine life often suffered as a result of the pollution, with 443 marine mammals found entangled or trapped by marine debris — 268 among them were found alive and released.
Cigarette butts were also the most collected type of debris worldwide. Plastic bags were the second most-collected item internationally, but food containers came in second in Canada.
Although cigarettes and cigarette filters were the most collected items, shoreline and recreational activity in Canada created the most garbage, including straws, shotgun shells, beverage bottles, cups, plates, toys and shoes.
The reports’ results did not exclude inland waterways, where the same types of items were found in the same proportions.
Of the 104 countries that participated in the coastal cleanup, Canada ranked third in participation, with 34,320 volunteers. The U.S. was first, and the Philippines came in second.
,,,has been smoking Camels since she was 13 years old. She used to buy cartons at a time but with cigarette prices going up, now she can hardly afford a pack without using coupons.
“It’s breaking us up bad,” she said. “I’m trying to smoke less, but I don’t want to.”
President Obama signed legislation on February 4th, increasing federal taxes on tobacco to its highest prices yet.
Beginning April 1, cigarettes will go up from 39 cents per pack to $1.01 per pack. Large cigars will be taxed 40 cents a piece, up from 5 cents. Pipe tobacco will be increased from $1.10 to $2.83. Even chewing tobacco will see an increase, from 19 cents per pound to 50 cents per pound.
The major tax increase is used to fun a 32.8 billion expansion of the State’s Children’s Health Insurance Program, which will provide coverage to an additional 4 million children.
Those employed in the health care industry support the tax, believing that it will lead more smokers to quit. According to the Coalition for a Tobacco Free Louisiana, with each 10 percent cigarette tax increase, 7 percent of youths and 2 percent of adults quit smoking
One of the ultimate ironies, relating to lung cancer caused by cigarette smoking, is to see the male model icon for the tobacco industry’s “Winston” print advertising die after a long bout with multiple types of cancers including lung cancer. Smoking takes another life. The long-term health care costs to society based on known carcinogenic effects of cigarette/tobacco smoking are staggering, but cigarettes continue to pollute the lungs of young and old in the US and worldwide. Alan Landers, who was the Winston male model in print advertising in the 1960’s and 1970’s also sued the tobacco industry under various claims for leading him down the cancer path of disaster. However, he died before any resolution of his Florida suit against the tobacco purveyors-several having employed him as their exclusive print icon touting Winston cigarettes.
First, Alan Landers was diagnosed with cancer in his lung. He later developed further lung cancer in the left lobe, than later had heart related surgeries.
Landers was not survived by any of his parents nor did he have a wife or child surviving him. Under Florida law, where his case against the cigarette industry was pending, this created legal obstacles to his suit going forward. It is unclear what the status of the suit will be after his death. When cancers are caused by known carcinogens, the civil justice system often provides a remedy. Cigarettes constitute one of the small category of known dangerous, cancer causing consumer products freely distributed in the United States, which are known to be strongly associated with cancers, including lung cancer. For example, our government (Food and Drug Administration/FDA) will normally prohibit sale of a carcinogen in a product strongly associated with cancers. Cigarettes continue their “grandfather” status despite the massive toll on our healthcare system and on human health.
(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) The association between tobacco smoke and cancer deaths beyond lung cancer deaths has been strengthened by a recent study from a UC Davis researcher, suggesting that increased tobacco control efforts could save more lives than previously estimated.
The epidemiological analysis, published online in BMC Cancer, linked smoking to more than 70 percent of the cancer death burden among Massachusetts men in 2003. This percentage is much higher than the previous estimate of 34 percent in 2001.
“This study provides support for the growing understanding among researchers that smoking is a cause of many more cancer deaths besides lung cancer,” said lead author Bruce Leistikow, a UC Davis associate adjunct professor of public health sciences. “The full impacts of tobacco smoke, including secondhand smoke, have been overlooked in the rush to examine such potential cancer factors as diet and environmental contaminants. As it turns out, much of the answer was probably smoking all along.”
Leistikow used National Center for Health Statistics data to compare death rates from lung cancer to death rates from all other cancers among Massachusetts males. The assessment revealed that the two rates changed in tandem year-by-year from 1979 to 2003, with the strongest association among males aged 30-to-74 years.
Smoking is a known cause of most lung cancers, and the study authors concluded that the very close relationship over twenty-five years between lung and other cancer death rates suggests a single cause for both: tobacco smoke.
Leistikow, whose research is dedicated to uncovering the causes of premature mortality, said, “The fact that lung and non-lung cancer death rates are almost perfectly associated means that smokers and nonsmokers alike should do what they can to avoid tobacco smoke. It also suggests that increased attention should be paid to smoking prevention in health care reforms and health promotion campaigns.”
research from the University of Exeter reveals for the first time, that changes in brain activity, triggered by physical exercise, may help reduce cigarette cravings. Published in the journal Psychopharmacology, the study shows how exercise changes the way the brain processes information among smokers, thereby reducing their cravings for nicotine. For the first time, researchers used functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to investigate how the brain processes images of cigarettes after exercise.
The study adds weight to a growing body of evidence that exercise can help manage addiction to nicotine and other substances. It backs up previous studies, which have shown that just one short burst of moderate exercise can significantly reduce smokers’ nicotine cravings.
Ten regular smokers were asked to cycle at a moderate pace for ten minutes, after 15 hours of abstinence from nicotine. They were then given an fMRI scan while they viewed a series of 60 images. Some visuals featured cigarettes and would normally induce cravings in a smoker. On a second occasion, the same group was given an fMRI scan and shown the same series of images without having undertaken exercise. They were also asked to report on their cravings for nicotine during both phases of the study.
The brain images captured by the fMRI show a difference between the two conditions. After no exercise the smokers showed heightened activity in response to the images in areas of the brain associated with reward-processing and visual attention. After exercise the same areas of activation were not observed, which reflected a kind of ‘default mode’ in the brain. The smokers also reported lower cravings for cigarettes after exercise compared with when they had been inactive.
The researchers do not know exactly what caused the difference in brain activity following exercise. One suggestion is that completing exercise raises mood (possibly through increases in dopamine) which reduces the salience or importance of wanting a cigarette. Another possibility is that exercise causes a shift in blood flow to areas of the brain less involved in anticipation of reward and pleasure generated by smoking images.
Previous research by the University of Exeter has suggested that exercise can reduce nicotine cravings. Results from a series of studies show that smokers report reduced cigarette cravings after exercising. This study showed that exercise can reduce cravings when smokers are faced with images that have been previously shown to cause lapses in smokers trying to quit. This is the first time that anyone has investigated brain activity during this process.
Kate Janse Van Rensburg, a PhD student at the University of Exeter, lead author on the paper, said: “Our findings add to a growing body of evidence suggesting that exercise can help people give up smoking. This strengthens the argument that moderate exercise could be a viable alternative to many of the pharmaceutical products, such as nicotine patches, for people who want to give up smoking. A ten or fifteen minute walk, jog or cycle when times get tough could help a smoker kick the habit. There are of course many other benefits from a more active lifestyle including better fitness, weight loss and improved mood.”
NEW YORK -(Dow Jones)- Altria Group Inc. (MO) plans to raise prices on Marlboro and several other cigarette brands by 71 cents a pack, a move expected to help the cigarette maker’s profits.
The pricing change - described by Citigroup analysts as “extremely bullish” for the domestic tobacco industry - pushed Altria shares up 5% early Thursday.
Altria, however, plans to cut prices for Copenhagen and Skoal the smokeless tobacco brands it acquired through its purchase of UST Inc. by 62 cents per tin.
Altria had been widely expected to cut some smokeless tobacco prices as UST’s premium brands had faced tough competition from cheaper competing products before the acquisition. The lower prices could boost volumes of Altria’s smokeless brands and make them more attractive to consumers.
Altria’s move to lower smokeless prices could mean fresh competition for Reynolds American Inc. (RAI), which sells smokeless tobacco products like popular discount brand Grizzly through its Conwood unit. Altria is also discontinuing UST’s Rooster smokeless tobacco brand.
The cigarette price increase is far more important than the smokeless price cut, Citigroup noted, as cigarettes contribute about 80% of Altria’s profit.
As the tobacco industry’s dominant player, Altria has “lifted prices by more than, and sooner than, expected,” the Citi analysts noted. An Altria spokesman said the list price increases on cigarettes are primarily intended to cover the costs of a federal excise tax increase that goes into effect later this year.
The U.S. tobacco industry has been seeing a drop in volumes amid higher taxes and bans on smoking in public places. Analysts had widely expected those volume declines to accelerate this year after a 61 cent per pack federal excise tax increase on cigarettes goes into effect in April. Higher prices for cigarettes would potentially help cigarette makers shore up their profits in the face of those volume declines. Citigroup expects Altria’s competitors Reynolds and Lorillard Inc. (LO) to follow up with their own price increases on cigarettes. Both companies declined to comment.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Food and Drug Administration would gain new power to regulate cigarettes and other tobacco products under legislation passed by a U.S. House of Representatives panel on Wednesday.
The proposal, which passed 39 to 13 but must still win approval by the full House and Senate, would authorize the FDA to oversee the controversial, multibillion-dollar tobacco industry, including its advertisements and product designs. The FDA already oversees drugs, devices, most foods, cosmetics and animal drugs.
“Regulating tobacco is the single most important thing that we can do right now to curb the deadly toll of tobacco,” said House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Rep. Henry Waxman, who introduced the bill. A similar measure by the California Democrat passed the House last year but stalled in the Senate.
Giving the federal government authority over tobacco products would help curb smoking, which can cause a number of expensive and preventable health problems such as cancer, heart disease and other lung disorders, Democrats said.
full story at: http://uk.reuters.com/article/usPoliticsNews/idUKTRE5237AL20090304
The Irish Cancer Society is renewing its call for increases taxes on cigarettes as the Government prepares to introduce a new emergency budget in the first week of April.
The organisation says a €2 increase in the price of 20 cigarettes could raise €400m in taxes.
It also says price increases during the current recession could force thousands of people to give up smoking in an effort to save money.
Nicotine Replacement Patches? Gum? Pills? There are many stop smoking “products” on the market that you can choose. So why should you consider hypnosis?
1) Hypnosis is a “process”, not a “product”
Hypnosis permanently changes your attitude towards smoking. Its power comes from your desire to become a non-smoker. Hypnosis literally “switches off” any thoughts of smoking.
Patches and Gum do the opposite - by using these products you are subconsciously saying “There is something that I need in a cigarette, therefore I need to substitute the cigarette with something else.” You may replace one habit with another.
2) Hypnosis is Healthy and Safe
You re trying to rid your body of toxins … so why would you replace the nicotine in cigarettes with the nicotine in gum or in patches? Nicotine is a poison?
3) Hypnosis is Fast and Easy
Using Hypnosis you can be a non-smoker in one hour or less. Patches and Gum often require weeks or months of treatmene
4) Hypnosis is Permanent
Because Hypnosis permanently changes your attitude towards smoking you have very little chance of relapse at any point in the future. You become a non-smoker.
With other products this mental change has not taken place and therefore you are at best an “ex smoker” continually having to consciously fend off and fight the urge to smoke. Making a relapse more likely.
When the shift to becoming a non-smoker takes place with Hypnosis one no longer has to battle against cigarettes. They will simply fade away as an “enemy”.
5) Hypnosis may be Tax Deductible. Patches and Gum are not.
If you are US taxpayer, you can deduct the cost of smoking cessation programs from your taxes.
From the IRS website (http://www.irs.gov/faqs/faq-kw139.html)
Are expenses for smoking cessation programs deductible?
You can include in medical expenses amounts you pay for a program to stop smoking. Unreimbursed amounts you pay for participation in a smoking cessation program and for prescribed drugs designed to alleviate nicotine withdrawal are expenses for medical care that are deductible subject to the 7.5% of adjusted gross income limitation if you itemize deductions on Form 1040, Schedule A (PDF), Itemized Deductions.
However, you cannot include in medical expenses amounts you pay for drugs that are designed to help stop smoking that do not require a prescription, such as nicotine gum or patches.
6) Hypnosis is more effective than Patches or Gum
Hypnosis has a 70-80% success rate for those committed to becoming a non smoker. Because the burdens on the patch or gum user are so great, those manufacturers can only boast a 50-60% success rate.
Furthermore most reputable hypnotherapists will offer a guarantee (see http://www.freshstartmethod.com/guarantee.php )of effectiveness stating that if you do not become a non smoker, you do not pay.
And thats not something you’ll see on a box of nicotine replacement products!
Overweight teenagers run the same risk of an early death as people who smoke regularly – and the risk increases substantially with very fat adolescents.
Teenagers who are clinically obese have the same risk of premature death as someone who smokes more than 10 cigarettes a day. An investigation of 45,000 men whose health was monitored for 38 years has found that being overweight at the age of 18 is equivalent to being a regular smoker in terms of the overall risk of dying relatively early in life from preventable diseases.
Men who both smoked and were overweight as teenagers were likely to die even earlier than those who fell into just one or other of the risk groups. But the study did not find any evidence to suggest that smoking and obesity combined to produce even greater risks when found together.
Martin Neovius of the Karolinksa Institute in Stockholm, who carried out the study published in the British Medical Journal, said: “It shows the importance of measures to reduce obesity in adolescents. A lot of people are dying from preventable deaths.
“I think we should be looking at what we can learn from the anti-tobacco campaign in terms of obesity. There are some who argue that being overweight – but not clinically obese – is harmless. No, it is not harmless because we found that a being an overweight adolescent is equivalent to smoking up to 10 cigarettes a day.”
Overweight is defined as having a body mass index – a measure of body fat based on height and weight – of between 25 and 30, whereas being obese is defined as having a BMI of more than 30. Being overweight at 18 increased the risk of an early death by just more than a third, while being obese more than doubled the risk. The risk of premature death also increased with the number of cigarettes smoked, with heavy smokers at more than double the risk of dying relatively early in life compared to non-smokers.
The study also found that men who were seriously underweight at 18 also had a higher risk of a premature death and this risk also increased with the number of cigarettes they smoked.
Exposure to second-hand smoke may increase the risk of developing dementia, according to a study by British and American researchers.
While scientists have long suspected a link between smoking and cognitive impairment, the study is the first large-scale attempt to link second-hand smoke to increased risk for cognitive impairment.
In a study in Thursday’s online British Medical Journal, researchers with the universities of Cambridge and Michigan tested saliva samples of nearly 5,000 non-smokers over age 50. They were looking for cotinine — a product of nicotine that can be found in saliva for about a day after exposure to smoke.
Participants were also assessed for brain function and cognitive impairment.
The study found people with the highest cotinine levels had a 44 per cent increased risk of cognitive impairment, compared to people with the lowest cotinine levels.
The researchers argue the link between second-hand smoke and cognitive impairment could be explained, given that heart disease increases the risk of developing dementia and second-hand smoke exposure is known to cause heart disease.
In an accompanying editorial, Dr. Mark Eisner from the University of California said while the serious negative health effects of second-hand smoke like cancer and premature death have been established beyond doubt, there is still a lot to learn about the scale of illness caused by second-hand smoke.
“Emerging evidence suggests that parental smoking may impair childhood cognitive development,” he writes. “Later in life, second-hand smoke may cause cardiovascular disease and stroke, which are themselves linked to cognitive decline.”
Children who are allowed to watch R-rated movies are more likely to smoke, say researchers who analyzed data from a four-year study of more than 1,200 Massachusetts youngsters.
“We don’t know why this is so. It may have to do with a parenting style that is permissive of activities that are not age-appropriate. Or it may be an outcome of all the smoking scenes in R-rated movies,” lead author Chyke Doubeni and colleagues at the University of Massachusetts Medical School said in a news release.
The participants were in the sixth grade when the study started in 2002 and were interviewed 11 times between then and 2006. The students were asked a number of questions about their access to cigarettes, whether smoking was allowed in their home and whether they were allowed to watch R-rated movies and videos.
Among those who were allowed to watch R-rated movies, smokers were nearly three times as likely and nonsmokers were almost twice as likely to say it would be easy for them to get cigarettes, compared to youngsters who weren’t allowed to watch R-rated movies.
The findings are published in the Feb. 21 issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
According to Doubeni, the study shows that parental permission to watch R-rated movies is one of the strongest predictors of children’s belief that cigarettes are easily available, about as strong as having friends that smoke.
“We do know that kids who believe it is easy to get a cigarette are at risk of smoking,” Doubeni said. “Our prior research has already shown that kids who perceive cigarettes as readily accessible are more likely to end up as regular smokers.”
“Parents need to be mindful about the movies their children watch for a variety of obvious reasons,” added co-author Dr. Joseph DiFranza. “This study points out one more reason for not allowing children to watch movies that are not appropriate for their age.
MIAMI (Reuters) - A Florida jury ruled on Thursday that a smoker’s death was caused by his addiction to cigarettes, a legal setback for cigarette giant Philip Morris in the first of potentially thousands of cases to go to trial.
The jury in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, decided in favor of Elaine Hess, the widow of longtime smoker Stuart Hess, who died of lung cancer in 1997 at age 55. He had smoked for 40 years.
The Hess trial was the first of about 8,000 cases filed following the Florida Supreme Court’s landmark decision in 2006 to throw out a $145 billion jury award in a class-action lawsuit filed in the early 1990s by Miami Beach pediatrician Howard Engle on behalf of thousands of sick smokers.
“The message here is that justice is slow sometimes, but it comes,” said Alex Alvarez, an attorney for Elaine Hess.
The ruling came in the first phase of what could be a three-phase trial. Lawyers for Hess were initially required to show that Hess’ death was caused by addiction to cigarettes.
“We showed that. The next phase is to decide (compensatory) damages and our entitlement to punitive damages,” Alvarez said, adding that the jury can assign a percentage of liability to the tobacco company and to the smoker.
Lawyers for Elaine Hess argued that Stuart Hess tried but failed to quit smoking because he was addicted to nicotine. Philip Morris lawyers argued that he could have quit.
“The Hess trial is not over,” Philip Morris USA, a unit of Altria Group, said in a statement. “The jury has decided only the threshold question of whether the plaintiff can proceed in this case as a former member of the Engle class.”
As a hospital teaching-physician I hear lots of medical histories of children admitted for breathing problems like asthma, pneumonia and bronchitis. When the question of whether either of the parents smoke comes up, many respond defensively, “Yes, but I only smoke outside.”
Parental smoking is a serious health problem for millions of children, regardless of where it’s done. Each year more than 126 million people are exposed to secondhand smoke and 50,000 people lose their lives from it. The fact is that there is no safe level of tobacco smoke exposure. As a result, smoking bans in many public places have been put into effect, much to the dismay of many smokers.
Anyone with an intact sense of smell knows when someone else has smoked in an enclosed space. It’s one reason some hotel rooms are designated as non-smoking, and some rental cars reek of cigarette smoke long after anyone lit up inside them. It’s just as easy to tell when a person has been smoking, as they carry the telltale odor on their person after they leave the designated smoking area.
Although cigarette smoke may appear to be only a gas, in reality it’s also composed of millions of pieces of fine particulate matter. In other words, it’s more like dust. And these tiny smoke particles eventually come to rest on surfaces within whatever area they’re blown into (not to mention your lungs). This could be a car, sofa, floor, dinner table, or bed. It also includes hair, shoes, skin, and clothing. Just smoking for one day leaves those toxins deposited there well into the future. These particles don’t simply evaporate or blow away.
The term coined for this toxic blanket is “thirdhand” smoke. Many smokers and nonsmokers have presumed it is relatively harmless, but that’s not so. In fact, its danger has been proven well. There are 250 poisonous gases, chemicals, and heavy metals within tobacco smoke. Eleven of these smoke toxins are designated group 1 carcinogens, the highest cancer causing potential known. Also, some recent data in rats suggests that tobacco toxins are the leading cause of sudden infant death syndrome and act by suppressing the respiratory drive.
Just take a closer look at a few of these poisons: carbon monoxide (like in car exhaust), cyanide (like in chemical weapons), toluene (found in paint thinners), cadmium (used to make batteries), chromium (used to make steel), lead (which can cause brain damage), ammonia (found in household cleaners) and even polonium-210 (a highly radioactive carcinogen).
Thirdhand smoke is more dangerous to infants and small children. Children take in twice the amount of dust that adults do because they breathe faster and they’re usually closer to dusty surfaces. When the difference in body size between adults and children is factored in, children get about 20 times the tobacco toxin exposure of adults. Just holding or hugging an infant or child after smoking outside will expose the child to these substances. My point is that any smoking threatens the health (and maybe the very life) of your children, no matter where you do it. Stop smoking for their sake, and your own.
