by Eden Gardner

Created on: April 26, 2009

"Picture yourself in that happy place...you feel warm and welcome. Now as I count backward from ten, you will begin to relax. Just listen to the music and relax your muscles. We'll begin with your toes. Feel the warmth through your toes, climbing steadily through the bottom of your feet..."

This is what it sounds like to sit in a chair at the office of your local hypnotist. Many people seek hypnotherapy for a variety of reasons; be it confidence, anger management, depression, childhood abuse, etc. Yet, millions claim this therapy works to treat depression, and I'm here to tell you that it most likely won't work...even if you believe it will.

I have battled depression all my life. As a child living with the psychological, physical, mental, emotional and psychosocial ramifications of severe abuse, I could never seem to conquer this monster that continued to devour me from the inside out. By the time I was thirteen years old, I had already died from alcohol poisoning and though I regained consiousness and my life was spared, I never stopped drinking. Depression was my life; I had never known anything different. I believed that this was just a part of me; what characterized me as a person. I started to believe it would be the death of me. And hundreds of times, it nearly was.

I've been on the medications, I've taken my own prescription of Perkosets and gin, I've tried meditation, spending time with my kids, using my OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder) with cleaning and writing as a means of handling my despair, and of course, there was always the paralyzing comatose vacations to my bedroom, where I would spend days fantasizing about killing myself and only emerging to use the bathroom. What an existence, let me tell you. After years of battling this beast of terrific burden, I sought the help of a local hypnotherapist, immediately believing I had found the cure. And immediately believing in the powers of the human mind to heal and restore itself. Yeah, ok...and I secretly possess the winning lotto numbers for the next $200,000,000.00 Powerball. Some people will do anything to escape intense suffering, and I was willing to take my own life to end mine. Therefore, I didn't figure I had anything left to lose. I was going to try this one last time to help myself, before death helped itself to me.

Now, I understand that there are varying levels of depression, that each person has depression for similar or different reasons, that medications work for some and not others,

• 1
• 2
• 3
• Next Page >>