Not every therapist will approach using hypnotherapy for choking anxiety in the same way. However, we hypnotherapists share some common tools. Typically we will tailor their approach too fit the patient, considering things like:
- How important is an initial trauma?
- How much is learnt thinking?
- How much is the anxiety a habit?
How important is the initial trauma?
Whilst choking you may fear for their life. This can set up a trauma which then causes you to become tense whenever eating. Overtime, the repeated anxiety caused by the trauma sets up a pattern of behaviours which maintain the choking anxiety: The question is how much is the trauma is still active, or is the problem now one of belief and habit?
Treating an active trauma.
An active trauma will be can be addressed in a number of ways:
- Eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR). – This is a well-established trauma protocol with a strong evidence base.
- Regression – In this context, regression is the act of mentally going back into your personal history to the trauma. You then reexperience it with the perspective of the survivor. Reexperiencing something which felt awful at the time but that you now know you survived can allow you to emotionally reappraise it.
- Various dissociative approaches – There are a number of approaches which allow a person to approach an emotionally powerful event whilst disengaged from it. These allow them to experience the memory at a level of emotion which allows for healthy processing.
Trauma work is challenging as such the therapist will do foundational work . Foundational work ensures that the patient is in the best position they can be.
Learnt thinking and beliefs in choking anxiety
Our beliefs about things shape our world; if you believe you are going to choke on a piece of food you will find evidence to support this belief. With choking anxiety this commonly happens in a couple of ways:
- We become hyperaware of evidence for choking. This can be food in our throat taking time to go down, but not actually doing any harm. Or we may become aware of cases of people choking in the media.
- Our anxiety causes the throat to constrict making swallowing harder. Anxiety can also make us take control of swallowing, turning something automatic (unconscious) into a deliberate action (conscious) which makes it clumsy, causing further catching of food.
Learnt thinking is almost always present at some level with choking anxiety. Usually, these beliefs immediately to eating and might be something like:
- “I could choke on this!”
- “One tough bit could choke me to death!”
- “What if its too big a mouthful; it could choke me!”
- “If I eat when I’m alone there is no one there to save me if I choke.”
The question for the therapists is how much to focus on belief change when using hypnotherapy for choking anxiety. but generally they will do some work on it.
Approaches for belief change in choking anxiety.
There are many ways in which a hypnotherapist may work for belief change, these include:
- Direct suggestions for a new focus. – Focusing the patient on an appropriate level of chewing, how much they enjoy food. These thoughts can then take up the space once occupied by the unhelpful beliefs.
- Amnesia suggestions – These can be used for the unhelpful beliefs or actions and will often be combined with the suggestions for a new focus.
- Belief change visualisations – There are various visualisations which can be used to help change or rewrite beliefs. An example is imagining writing the belief on a whiteboard and rubbing sections out and writing in new words and phrases.
- Eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR) – is a helpful technique for processing strong beliefs.
Habitual choking anxiety
The choking anxiety may have started as a trauma, but by the time use processed the trauma habits have been established. This is usually connected to the development of learnt beliefs (see above) but may present as entirely automatic. Often, the person automatically tenses up in relation to food and in so doing constricts their pharynx and oesophagus / Esophagus making swallowing harder.
Hypnotherapy approaches for habit change with choking anxiety
When using hypnotherapy for choking anxiety the therapist is likely to use any number of strategies, most of which promote relaxation to counter the tension:
- Systematic desensitisation – The therapist guides the patient through a series of food situations whilst helping them to relax.
- Relaxation suggestions – These can be used to promote a counter response.
- Eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR). – This can sometimes be used to process bodily responses.
- Anchoring techniques – A hypnotherapist using various approaches can establish a conditioned response for relaxation. This can be used by the patient to relax themselves whenever they are engaged with eating.
- Various visualisations – There are many different visualisations which can be used to encourage the relaxation and dilation of the throat.
Hopefully this blog has given you an idea of how a hypnotherapist might approach helping someone with a Choking anxiety.
The author
Dr Matt Krouwel PhD is a hypnotherapist who works in Birmingham (UK) and has memberships of both the NCH and BSCH. He has extensive professional experience with functional disorders of all kinds, especially those relating to eating, such as; IBS, Emetophobia, ARFID and Choking anxiety.
