MAY 2004, VOLUME 32, NUMBER 1, Abstract 6
Hypnosis and Smoking
Pamela Rosewarne, Psychologist
This study reports the use of hypnosis with a young woman who was seeking to resolve her smoking addiction. Early in treatment it became clear that she had unresolved grief, loss, and anger concerning her sexual abuse as a young child by her father who had died many years previously. This experience had hindered her emotional development, current emotions and lifestyle, and contributed to her low self-esteem, negative feelings of self-worth, and subsequent smoking addiction. Hypnosis was incorporated into an extensive period of counselling, and was effectively used to enable this client to cease her smoking addiction, to conclude her unresolved grief and anger, and to use her newly found peace as a means of ego-strengthening, confidence building, and promoting positive future expectations.