Hypnotherapy & Breast Enlargement. Please help..

[JonWhite]

Hi Kyrah.

A serious question, so please don't take offense:

On the assumption that breast enlargement is currently unproven and as such may be at least potentially exploitative, how do you view the ethical considerations? I ask because in the authoritative therapist role, I personally would not feel at all comfortable in promoting what may in the end turn out to be only my own belief.

Regards,
Jon.

 

[Kyrah]

Hi Kyrah.

A serious question, so please don't take offense:

On the assumption that breast enlargement is currently unproven and as such may be at least potentially exploitative, how do you view the ethical considerations? I ask because in the authoritative therapist role, I personally would not feel at all comfortable in promoting what may in the end turn out to be only my own belief.

Regards,
Jon.

Hi Jon,

No offense taken, and a good question. If I didn't think it worked, I wouldn't offer it. If the clients didn't think it worked, I would refund their money and either re-work the program or discontinue it. I didn't ask for compensation from the first 3 clients for breast enlargement because I was developing my own series of sessions, so essentially they were volunteers. Each client experienced a minimum of 1.5" increase that lasted at least over 6 months (I wasn't in contact with all of them after that period of time, but am still in touch with one of them and it's been about 8 years.) After the first 3 sessions, I started charging the normal fee (it's the same regardless of what the client wants to achieve.) I did the same thing with my weight loss and addictions programs because they are all multiple sessions and long term. I've had one person ask for a refund in 11 years, and that was for a past-life regression (yes, I gave it to her).

Because some people have difficulty speaking up, it's important for the therapist to do a "check-in" at the beginning of each session, asking how the client is doing, if they are noticing results, finding out if they are having problem areas, etc. The most challenging area, in my experience, is not in breast growth but in weight loss because there are many more factors involved (emotional protection, emotional eating, sabotage from family members, family of origin, culture, etc.)

There are always people who will exploit others, and it comes down to personal integrity. I know that there are hypnotherapists who don't have successful programs, or have adequate training or talent, and are offering their services without regard for the outcome, just as there are lousy dentists, counselors, lawyers, etc.

The old saying, "the best way to find someone is by referral" is true. If someone is satisfied, they'll tell other people, and if they aren't, they'll warn them away. I do no advertising other than a page on my website, yet I have a full practice by referral and clients who have already come to me.

Sorry to be so long-winded.

Regards,
Kyrah

 

[Thing]

If I didn't think it worked, I wouldn't offer it.
[...]
I've had one person ask for a refund in 11 years, and that was for a past-life regression

And you know past life regression works because...?

For what it's worth I believe that Hypnotherapy can be valuable if it's treated as what it really is, a relaxation technique. Unfortunately the few honest ones are tarred with the brush of the New Age whack jobs, and the profession is unable or unwilling to set the necessary standards in certification.

 

[Kyrah]

Thing,

If past life regression helps someone to understand, come to satisfactory terms with and resolve a past or current situation or person in their life, it works. I personally don't do them for entertainment value.

Hypnosis is, IMO, more than just a relaxation technique.

 

[Thing]

If past life regression helps someone to understand, come to satisfactory terms with and resolve a past or current situation or person in their life, it works. I personally don't do them for entertainment value.

So you don't believe that past lives actually exist, or surely you would have said so.

But you're happy with the moral implications of lying to your patients if it makes them feel better, even if it fosters and encourages delusional beliefs? Convince a vulnerable person who's already prone to believe in nonsense that they were someone else in a past life and you've helped to dull their critical faculties just a little bit more, who'and they'll be easier meat for the next set of con artists who came at them. But you got paid, and got a warm feeling so that's OK.

 

[jon]

One more thought - is there any safety data on this type of 'breast enlargement'. If it does work, wouldn't there be risks involved (from depositing extra fat on part of a subject's body, by getting their body to divert resources to growing tissue in that area, etc...)?

Kyrah - what do you tell your clients about the risks involved, in order to get informed consent?

 

[Kyrah]

Thing, you're making a lot of rash assumptions and accusations, none of which you can prove, or which I am inclined to defend to you.

Jon, to my knowledge there have been no reports of adverse reactions or risks involved, and I tell them this. I imagine if there were, they would be published in one of the trade magazines at the very least, and at most make the news. If someone did report an adverse reaction, the therapist would (hopefully) discontinue the sessions and report it to the AAPH or NGH. The only function I can think of right now that involves an element of risk is hypnoanaesthesiology, which I don't do.

 

[casebro]

Shhh. I'm trying to relax. I will become one with my inner being, and communicate with my Chi, via Quantum pathways, to my personal body parts, They will be so happy to hear from me, they will stand up and cheer me on! Of course, nobdy else will be able to observe any of this happening, ummm ummm, isn't it a rule of Quantum physics that you can't measure something without affecting it? yeah, thats it. Everybody has heard of laws of physics....

Damn, I almost had it. All those negative waves shriveled my organ back to it's normal size. But it did work, I just can't prove it.

This lesson was free, to all my JREF friends. Next lesson, $50. Or, for $75 to my Pay Pal account, I'll make your breasts grow remotely, just by thinking about them. Send pics, in several poses. Who knows, maybe a little energy will overspill, and my own organ will grow while I concentrate on the pics...

 

[Thing]

Thing, you're making a lot of rash assumptions and accusations, none of which you can prove, or which I am inclined to defend to you.

What's to prove? You've admitted giving past-life regression therapy. Either you believe it or you don't. You're either a crackpot or a fraud, pick one. Either way, you're colluding in a delusion that is likely to damage them.

Remember, it's possible to damage someone and still have them believe you've helped them. But if you can live with yourself doing what you do then that's just peachy.

 

[Kyrah]

You know, I thought this was such a silly question at first I didn't realize Thing was serious. Of course I believe in past lives and past life regression, I wouldn't do it if I didn't. Doh. Hundreds of millions of Buddhists, Shinto, Native Americans and others believe in past lives and past life regression, and over the centuries Tibetan Masters, Shamans, Priests and other practitioners have accessed them through various forms of self-hypnosis. Of course, I'm sure you, in your infinite wisdom, know more than all of them combined. All you have to do is tell them that they're either a crackpot or a fraud and they will flock to you by the millions, to worship at your altar of self-righteous ignorance.

And, since you have absolutely no clue whatsoever how I personally do this, you're in no position to make any kind of assessment. Just a wild guess based on your own imagination, which obviously isn't worth squat.

 

[Kyrah]

I just read that part on "subconscious resistance". This gives kyra a reason to blame the client/victim if her hypnotherapy doesn't work (as it won't, ever). Nice out. Very convenient. Kind of evil, even.

But, if you can convince enough people to BELIEVE it worked, with the usual non-evidence of proven measures of actual tissue increases and variable controls (eating, exercises), then you'll keep your little racket going. Heck, tell them exercise is BAD for them, and over-eating is good. Their breast sizes will increase for sure.

The more I think about this, the more disgusted I get.

Eos is being deliberately obtuse in order to allow her Inner Brat full rein. Read it again. Now ask yourself: if parts work is used in sessions to successfully eliminate subconscious resistance, why would it be later used as an excuse? Think really, really hard. That's right. It wouldn't.

How convenient - and utterly childish - to completely ignore all the facts and studies provided, to do no research on her own, to pose an obviously wrong assumption on how this must happen and then fly into a snit because it is wrong. She obviously has no education, training or experience in the mind-body connection or the hypnotherapy field, and has no intention of making an informed decision. Oh yes, this is someone's opinion which must be valued.

While we're at it, let's also ignore the fact that even without hypnosis, there are plenty of women in their 30s and 40s who, without being pregnant or gaining weight or going into a wild hormonal frenzy, have had their breasts grow back to pre-op size despite the claims by plastic surgeons that this "can't happen." How thrilled they will all be to know that their new DDs are just a figment of their collective imaginations, all because Eos says so. And, because she speaks from a position of training and experience in the mind-body connection and has just been holding out, she will now explain in simple terms how and why this can and does happen, why it isn't harmful to the body, and exactly how the process is replicated through hypnosis. Oh, wait. She doesn't know; she just likes to make a lot of noise and find targets for some of that latent anger.

There's nothing wrong with being a skeptic until you have the facts and statistics, until you have an opportunity to educate yourself. To have a collection of resources handed to you and then deliberately squinch your eyes shut, stick your fingers in your ears, and sing, "Lalalalala" isn't skepticism, it's immaturity.

Think what you want, believe what you want, decide what you want.

 

[Thing]

You know, I thought this was such a silly question at first I didn't realize Thing was serious. Of course I believe in past lives and past life regression, I wouldn't do it if I didn't. Doh. Hundreds of millions of Buddhists, Shinto, Native Americans and others believe in past lives and past life regression, and over the centuries Tibetan Masters, Shamans, Priests and other practitioners have accessed them through various forms of self-hypnosis. Of course, I'm sure you, in your infinite wisdom, know more than all of them combined. All you have to do is tell them that they're either a crackpot or a fraud and they will flock to you by the millions, to worship at your altar of self-righteous ignorance.

And, since you have absolutely no clue whatsoever how I personally do this, you're in no position to make any kind of assessment. Just a wild guess based on your own imagination, which obviously isn't worth squat.

I'm sorry to hear that you believe truth is decided by a majority vote. Or did I misunderstand you again?

As you must surely know, religious belief in multiple lives does not necessarily entail belief that any information can be passed from one life to another. If it can't then it's an untestable proposition, and it could stop being true and no-one would know the difference. But you purport to be able to retrieve information from past lives, which is quite a claim and needs quite a bit of evidence to back it up. Do you have any? I don't doubt that it's possible to make someone sincerely believe that they've remembered something from a past life but it's also possible to make people sincerely believe that they've been abused when they haven't. So, how do you know you're getting past life information? Have you ever revealed any information this way that the patient couldn't have known any other way and that was subsequently independently verified?

 

[MelBrooksfan]

And, since you have absolutely no clue whatsoever how I personally do this, you're in no position to make any kind of assessment. Just a wild guess based on your own imagination, which obviously isn't worth squat.

Well, then. Why not enlighten us as to your method of manifesting this wild delusion born of your own imagination?

 

[casebro]

Well, If Kyra is supossed to be a psychologist, he's food for the argument that psychology is NOT science. Or at least that Kyra is no scientist.

Lessee, he claims that he can cause breast growth, but says he has not ever taken any measurements.

Now he claims that religious belief in past lifes is actual fact. I suspect the invisible pink unicorn told him so. I know because the FSM was privvy to the conversation.

 

[JonWhite]

Hi Kyrah.

... If I didn't think it worked, I wouldn't offer it. If the clients didn't think it worked, I would refund their money and either re-work the program or discontinue it.

That's actually the problem I have with it. You think it works and after 6 to 8 sessions your clients share your beliefs, but there still remains no empirical evidence that it genuinely has produced actual, permanent change. It seems a circular reinforcement - you believe in it, they believe you, you believe their belief, etc.

I personally feel that there must be a baseline against which a technique should be judged as effective and that is according to current, valid scientific research. The AJCH studies I've so far seen are not (and don't even claim to be) proof. Perhaps studies giving such proof may happen, perhaps not. In the meantime is it not better to take the more cautious position until proven otherwise, lest the technique does actually prove to be exploitative after all?

Simply improving self-image is not the issue.

Regards,
Jon.

 

[JonWhite]

Hi Kyrah.

Of course I believe in past lives and past life regression, I wouldn't do it if I didn't. Doh.....

Again, I'd hold this up to the same criteria as above - there really is no current evidence that past lives are indeed genuine in any way. Bridey Murphy, etc have been pretty roundly debunked.

I'd also take the opposite view, in that actually believing in past lives and passing that belief on could potentially be more harmful than not. There may perhaps be some merit in the notion of using an intellectual and emotional "past life" construct as a metaphor for clients to express issues too painful to directly discuss in regard to their current, real life. The inherent danger with giving the notion that such past lives are anything other than such an exercise could far too easily create problems, particularly with the ease with which false memories can be installed which they may then continue to hold within normal day to day life.

An interesting study:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WD0-4JKRTR0-1&_user=10&_coverDate=03%2F31%2F2007&_rdoc=15&_fmt=full&_orig=browse&_srch=doc-info(%23toc%236752%232007%23999839998%23639312%23FLA%23display%23Volume)&_cdi=6752&_sort=d&_docanchor=&_ct=18&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=6cf5b7d9a2a0504230b43ee48d5dfb6e

Shouldn't the therapist (in hypnosis or any other field) ensure not to promote what may well be nothing more than their own beliefs?

Regards,
Jon.


(P.S. Casebro: Kyrah's a she not a he.)