Medical Support for Hypnosis

Copyright Ron Eslinger

 

Hypnosis is nothing more than focused concentration or an altered state of consciousness in an alpha or theta state.  Hypnosis is a state of complete awareness of all of your surroundings. But in hypnosis you take that awareness, which goes up about 200-percent (some people say 1,000-percent), and you turn it inward. This concentrated focus enhances the ability of the subconscious mind to accept and positively respond to suggestions. The subconscious mind is not just in the brain or the head. According to research completed by Dr. Candace Pert, a pharmacologist and biochemical researcher from George Town University in Washington D.C., demonstrates the subconscious mind is a part of every cell of the body.  Every cell in your body has memory units.  Each cell has over 6,000 receptor sites or proteins capable of interacting with signals and converting those signals into intracellular activity.  Through molecular division, each cell divides into a daughter cell allowing the original cell to die.  The daughter cells replace the parent cells, however they still contain the cellular activity or memory of the mother cell.  This cell replacement process occurs every three months with the exception of skeleton cells that divide every six months.  

Studies concerning the heart have confirmed that it also has its own consciousness. The heart does not receive signals from the brain to make it beat.  It beats independently by responding to electrical impulses from the Sinoatrial Node (SA node) and the Artioventricular Node (AV node). The brain does not control the heart’s increase or decrease in speed either.  Instead, the heart responds to signals provided by the vagus nerve.  This independence affords the heart its own consciousness.  

 HeartMath, LLC (HeartMath) is a company that offers training products used in the evaluation of stress relative to heart or cardiac performance.  HeartMath techniques measure the rhythm of the heart against coherence with the brain.  I use this with both pain patients and the Anger Management Program. Like biofeedback, HeartMath lets the individual see how their thoughts change their physiology and impact the unconscious responses of their health.  Any time an individual is able to control their response to stress, they can also control 85% of the medical problems in their life.  It is a wonderful avenue for therapy.

Medically speaking, the human body is made up of five significant vital signs.  The first four are heart rate, blood pressure, temperature, and respiratory rate.  The fifth vital sign, which we will explore in greater detail later, is pain.   As with all other vital signs, pain impacts a number of functions such as emotions, behavior, long-term memory and olfactory.    The Limbic System controls these functions and is the key to understanding and working with chronic pain. 

The Limbic System sets the emotional tone of the mind and influences the endocrine system, its chemical messages, and ultimately every cell in the body.  It filters external events through internal states and creates an emotional color for each event.  The Limbic System tags events as internally important, creating priorities for you.   Highly emotionally charged memories are established through the activities of the Limbic System and are stored for future reference.

Motivations are modulated by the Limbic System, which is why motivations vary throughout the week or even day by day. As mentioned above, the Limbic System directly controls the sense of smell that promotes bonding and controls appetite and sleep cycles. As you know from physiology and anatomy, our sense of smell is the only sense that goes directly to the brain without having to route through the spinal cord first.  This direct link to the brain and specific control through the Limbic System make scents particularly good markers for memory and stress responses.

What happens when the Limbic System is not working functionally?  We run into numerous health problems when it is not functioning.  Often Prozac^® is prescribed to help those with non-functioning Limbic Systems.  External problems, such as a lack of sleep, too much stress, or chronic pain, can exacerbate the problems created by a non-functioning Limbic System. The results are devastating, leading to moodiness, irritability and ultimately to clinical depression.  In some cases, depending on the external factors, these imbalances results in posttraumatic stress disorder.  This is the essence of stress turning into distress.

 

Every day problems are more often observed and perceived as negative thinking, decreased motivation, and disruptions of our normal routines.  A non-functioning Limbic System results in a flood of negative emotions, tearing up for women and irritability in men.  So all of your negative co-workers who leave you wondering why they are negative all the time, just casually comment, “Your Limbic System is really screwed up.” That will throw them off balance.

The lack of functionality also decreases our motivation, leaving us to just want to sit and watch Television for hours on end.  We have no motivation to mow the yard (do we ever?), no desire to go to a movie or out to dinner.   These types of motivations can lead to social isolation.   Even more serious physical symptoms surface, such as appetite and sleep problems.  These changes result in either eating too much or too little, or sleeping too much or too little.    Some people experience a decrease or increase sexual responsiveness. Now I had one little problem with that but I didn’t see a problem with the increased part.

Within the Limbic System, the Amygdala deals with reward and fear. The input is the sensory input that signals danger.  But as many have experienced, just viewing a frightening event can result in reflex reactions.  How many of you have sat in a theater and watched a scary movie? You have your popcorn in one hand and your Coke in the other hand.  All of a sudden somebody jumps out behind a corner on screen and your Coke goes one way and you drench your wife, and your popcorn goes the other way and you sprinkle your neighbor corn kernels. The Amygdala System sees the screen and reacts.  It does not realize the event is not actually happening to you.  So your body responds as though you are a part of the event. 

The Amygdala system is a great system, but unfortunately it is stupid.  I say stupid in the respect that it magnifies everything.  It sends out a warning to the body, starting the adrenalin, the catecholamines and the cortisol flowing.  Under many circumstances, it starts the flow of hormones and chemical we simply do not need for these little stresses.  The Amygdala System forgets to save itself for the huge, big stresses.

The Amygdala System perceives all events as truth.  It does not distinguish between a television show, a bad memory, or a real event.   The little hairs on the back of your neck that stand on end as you read through the latest Stephen King book is a perfect example of the Amygdala System activating your autonomic nervous system.  To the Amygdala, all events are real because it is not able to evaluate truth from perception.  In a similar manner, it does not matter whether the event is positive or negative.  The Amygdala System still responds.

Although the ultimate output is also controlled by the autonomic nervous system, the flight or fight process is already activated.  This is the problem. In short bursts, the Amygdala System responds like a champ and our bodies can handle the activation.  It is only when the stress responses become constant or over long periods of time that these responses start causing problems with our body.  If an individual is walking around under stress all of the time, that person is in a constant activated state of flight or fight.  All (or a majority) of their blood is circulating through larger muscles, the arms and the legs.  This robs other areas of the body of blood flow and oxygen on a regular basis.

The hippocampus is the next major player within the Limbic System.  It controls memory, a very important function as you age and begin to have difficulty with memory.  There are three types of memory working (short-term) memory, declarative memory, and procedural memory.  The hippocampus is critical in cementing declarative memory, but plays no role in the working memory or the procedural memory.

Types of Memory
Working Memory	Completes short-term functions like adding, speaking, and following directions.	Does not become permanent memory.
Declarative Memory	Composed of facts, figures, and names.	This information is stored by the hippocampus.
Procedural Memory	Composed of actions, habits, and skills.	This information becomes reflexive.

The working memory is similar to the RAM of a computer or a temporary file. The information stored is used as needed.  Then the cache is deleted to make room for more temporary files. So you wonder why you run to the store to buy a loaf of bread, but when you return home you wife says, “Okay. Where’s that loaf of bread?” You just forgot it, because you start thinking about other things and the temporary file was deleted.  Other examples of short-term memory include addition of number, composing sentences, or listening to directions. You use it and then you have no need to remember it anymore.

My wife always reminds me to write down more details when asking for directions. Somebody gives me directions, but because I failed to create a picture image with their words and I did not write the instructions down, I realize the information has vanished. 

Declarative memory is similar to the hard drive of a computer; composed of all the facts, figures and names you have ever learned.  For example, I have a difficult time with names.  I recall my experiences with someone long before I can recall their name.  As an acquaintance approaches, I start thinking to myself, “Oh God. I can’t remember their name. What’s their name? What’s their name?” and finally out loud, “Honey, what’s their name?”  I have such a difficult time that I depend on my wife to remember names for me.  When we see someone we recently met, she speaks first and says their name.  It is so helpful and then all of my memories about that person start flowing.

One time I was put in a position where I had to remember 50 names and give all of those names to my commanding officer. I could have actually written them down but I wanted to look impressive.  I established a system.  Every time I introduced myself to one of the people in my platoon, they gave me their name and I repeated it back to them.  The final reporting day came and my commanding officer asked,  “Well, where’s your list?” I answered, “It’s in my head.” She was not too confident, but I did remember each name.  There is solid proof that I can remember names, I just need reinforcement.  The details you have learned in the past are present in your memory today. You can bring them back through repetition and reinforcement.

All your experiences are in your memory as well.  Unfortunately some experiences are negative.  Recalling those moments sends shivers up and down your spine.  Other memories are happy and make you smile.  A young mother can recall a really funny thing her toddler said that day.

During nursing school, I took a course in pediatrics.  Recently, when I attended the 75^th anniversary celebration of the university hospital and ran into former classmate. As we sat chatting about college and careers, a memory from 35 years ago just popped into my head. I recalled a child who was kind of a failure to thrive, about a four or five-year old.  I sat next to this young girl trying to coax her into eating her lunch. All of a sudden the intercom system blared,  “This is the Lord speaking. Drink your milk.”  And she just grabbed her milk and started to eat.  My former classmate even remembered the little girl’s name, Jenny.  I had not thought of Jenny for 35 years, but sitting next to my classmate brought back the memory and the amazement of that one moment. 

We do not know where the hippocampus stores all of these memories. However, we do know cortisol, a stress hormone, impacts memory.  Once memories, which are also electrical impulses, enter the hippocampus, they become hormones or neurotransmitters. Cortisol degrades these memory hormones.  As a result, the perfect memory as a single unit or file is instead fragmented. During recall, you are forced to fit together a piece of the puzzle here and a piece of the puzzle there and put it back together.  Some hypnotic processes help a person bring the pieces of a puzzle together to remember how they are supposed to feel, replacing the new memory of pain or stress.  Hypnosis brings memories back together.

Our procedural memory recalls reflexes. Reflexes are actions, habits or skills that are learned simply because we do them all the time.  Smokers have a procedural memory of smoking to handle stress, unwind or socialize.  As a nurse anesthetist, my procedural memory monitored every move as I set up my protocol.  If someone comes in and moves one syringe here or here, what do we do? Urrrr.  We are obsessive-compulsive because these procedures benefit the patient, the process and us.  They provide a safe and rewarding experience for the patient. 

One of the first procedural memories you may remember was learning to drive a car.  When I was learning to drive, most drivers learned on a standard shift or standard transmission. So remember the first time you are sitting there and you are thinking, “Okay I’ve got my right foot on the brake. I’ve got my left foot on the clutch. I’ve got to take my right foot, put it on the gas and lift my left foot up at the same time.  The next thing we hear is thump, thump, thump and the car stalls in the driveway.

The next step is to take the car to the road. So now we are driving down the street and we see a red traffic light. Oh God, there’s a red light. I have to take my right foot off the gas and brake with my right foot. I have to put my left foot on the clutch.  Oh please don’t stall. Please don’t stall. That is the first week.

What happens during the second week? Well guys, you have one arm around your wife or girlfriend and you say, “Here, change the gears for me.” The process becomes natural, a reflex condition.

Great athletes become great athletes because they also have reflex conditions for the things they need to do.  As I am listening to NPR one day, the guest is a man in his sixties. He holds the Guinness Book of World Records for the most consecutive free throw shots. How many free throws do you think he made? He made ten thousand consecutive free throws without a miss. Some athletes make millions of dollars a year if they can make five out of ten free throws. As the story went, this record holder stopped because the court had scheduled a ball game and he could no longer continue his shots.

During the interview, the radio host asked, “Sir, what are you thinking about when you’re shooting?”

He replies, “Young man, you can’t think. If you think, you’ll miss.”

That is really the truth of it. How many golfers go out to the green, up to the water hole and automatically take out the water ball.  You have already decided the ball is going to end up in the drink.  Sure enough, it goes in the water.         

Well, it works the same way with pain. Individuals with chronic pain have created a reflex condition. They have already decided when they wakeup in the morning, their back is going to hurt.  So I emphasize to them, the first thing you do when you get up in the morning is lie. You are going to lie to yourself.  You have been doing it for years on everything else anyway. Tell yourself, “Self, I feel better today. I feel better today.” Although I certainly care if the person is in pain, the idea is to recreate the procedure memory through reinforcement and repetition of a correct memory.  We use words make a difference and foster this correction. We have to create procedural memory by doing procedures or saying words over and over and over again.    

To be Continued