Someone drew my attention to an article published this past year in a respected national newspaper. It had been about a heavy woman who lost 8 stone by having a virtual gastric band fitted under hypnosis. Just what a success story for hypnotherapy! Or is it?
People are becoming increasingly alert to the virtual gastric band. Clients increasingly enquire about virtual gastric band treatment rather than hypnotherapy for weight loss. They try this in the belief that their problem can be solved by one session of hypnotherapy and that no subsequent effort on the part is required. They believe, or hope, that the virtual gastric band is a magic wand which will simply make their weight problem disappear. Only if it were that simple.
They say, don't they, that there surely is no such thing as bad publicity. I've never thought that to be true. Stories which proclaim the success of hypnotherapy are always welcome - but as long as they're credible.
Allow me to start by saying that I'm quite prepared to trust that the lady in the article did indeed lose plenty of weight. But the article makes it pretty clear that this was not attained by virtual gastric band suggestions alone but by adopting the type of radical liquid-through-to-solids diet which would be adopted by an individual who had a real gastric band fitted uncle. The article also says that she'd ten sessions of hypnotherapy and that the cost of treatment was £270. However I'd a consider the website of the practitioner in question. He charges £270 for three sessions, not ten. Put simply, his fees are £90 per session. If the lady had ten sessions then that would cost her £900. If you appear at a few of the readers' comments on the article you might find that the most recent comment hits the nail on the head. The woman lost weight because she adopted a radical diet, not as a result of some virtual "magic-wand" ;.And when she returns to a "normal" diet, how long will the weight stay off for? Probably not very long.
How are these treatments likely to work? Hypnosis can make the human body do some amazing things. Operations can be carried out using only hypnosis as anaesthetic. It's quite conceivable that under hypnosis a person could be made to feel like a procedure have been performed and a gastric band have been fitted. But when the hypnosis is terminated the client isn't left with a belly which includes somehow been shrunk by hypnosis. They might be told that they will feel like a gastric band has been fitted. But how can they know what that actually feels as though if they have never actually had the operation?
Essentially, then, the client is told that their stomach isn't as big as it used to be. It's possible that the highly suggestible client might accept that suggestion and lose weight. But how? By suddenly feeling sick when "too much" food has been eaten? By being up against a selection between feeling sickness and discomfort on the one hand and hunger on another? But people who are suggestible enough to simply accept an indication like that are also ideal subjects of conventional hypnotherapy weight loss treatments. For such people the elaborate hoax of a non-existent surgical operation is not required.
When I first learned about virtual gastric band treatments I knew that I would not offer such treatments because nothing that is based upon an overall total lie can ever work in the long-term. Reality will always win out.
As far as I'm aware, virtual gastric band treatments haven't been scientifically scrutinized or tested. I are finding no reference to virtual gastric band treatments in scientific publications such as for instance Contemporary Hypnosis or the European Journal of Clinical Hypnosis. There may, therefore, be dangers in the procedure which may have not even arrived at light. Yet I suspect that the main problem is sheer ineffectiveness. Many of my own personal clients experienced virtual gastric band treatments and are finding them to be both highly expensive and totally ineffective.
At the end of your day, there are no magic wands. There is one way, and one way only, to accomplish permanent and lasting weight loss - by making lasting changes to diet and / or exercise regime.
Shortcuts and magical solutions like the virtual gastric band are simply gimmicks. The only thing that your virtual gastric band is guaranteed to make lighter is the purse or your wallet!
