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Sally's office is now open in West Linn, OR. Office hours are by appointment. |
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First visit, please allow 2 hours to sign a consent to treat and to give a health history. Please call or email to set up an appointment. $150 first individual visit(1-1/2 to 2 hours long) **Hypnotherapy sessions and workshops maybe tax deductible for yourself, your spouse, and your dependents. Please contact your tax professional for details. Visualization & Hypnosis In Diabetic Amputation I was working in a community setting, with a man with out of control diabetes. He was experiencing a lot of stress, had a poor diet, lack of exercise and as a result, his blood sugars were all over the place – routinely high requiring his standard dose of insulin plus a sliding scale. He was an accident waiting to happen. He started with a simple, ingrown nail on his big toe. Soon, the toe turned black, then gangrene set in. The large toe was amputated. The wound was redressed every day by nurses, but the wound was not healing. It was getting worse. The leg to the knee had turned an ominous dark color. We continued to change the dressing, but his prognosis was not good. Unfortunately, over the years, I have seen this same scenario all too often- a poorly controlled diabetic faced with the amputation of a limb. One day, while changing his dressing, the patient ask, “What do you think about my foot?” I looked at the wound. It was not healing. After a month of dressing changes, there was little improvement even though his blood sugars were now controlled. The leg also remained dark in color, was quite warm to the touch, all the way up the leg, to just below the knee. The patient said the entire leg throbbed constantly with pain. I
ask, “ Do you
want me to be honest with you?” He
said yes. “Honestly, I think there is a good chance you could
lose your leg.” The patient looked very sad. He said, “I
know, the doctor wants to cut my leg off up to the knee. I wouldn’t
let him to do. I don’t want to lose my leg.” In a community
setting, while doing dressing changes, it is not possible or appropriate
to do a full hypnosis session to control pain, manage and promote
healing of a wound, increase circulation and decrease anxiety and
stress. A traditional one hour hypnosis session, in a quiet environment
can do all that and more. But, I have found that I can teach a
patient a very quick visualization that can achieve great improvement,
even I
quickly explained that I had had good success with visualization
with
other patients facing amputation
in the past. This can also work well with a variety of other patients
to control pain, promote healing, and
decrease
stress, as in cancer,
multiple sclerosis, chronic pain, and Burger’s Disease to name a few..
I explained my theory concerning the body’s invisible electrical system,
about phantom pain and Kirlian photography and why I thought the visualization
worked. Bottom line I explained, “it can’t hurt you and it might
help a lot. It might seem like hocus pocus, but the body has an amazing ability
to heal itself, if we can just learn to channel that energy. It is said we only
use 10% of our mind.” I ask,” Are you willing to try it?” The
patient replied with a somber face, “I don’t want to lose my leg.
I’ll try.” In less than 5 minutes, sitting in the chair with his eyes closed, I taught him how to “send healing to his toe, foot and leg, and to improve circulation. He opened his eyes, and much to both of our wonder, the leg was immediately improved. The leg and foot was now a pinker color and it was cooler to the touch. He looked at me in amazement and said, “It stopped hurting!” “Okay” I said, “continue to practice this visualization I just taught you as often as you can throughout the day.” Over the next month, the dressings continued. The patient said he was faithfully practicing his visualization and the improvement was noticeable. The amputation wound was pinker in color and was slowly closing. The leg would sometimes be darker in color, but then pink up again. The leg remained cool in temperature and the best part, the patient’s phantom pain never returned, and he STILL had his leg. The man was delighted. His blood sugars remained controlled and his progress was evident. Months down the road, he still has his leg, he is still doing his visualizations, and he is a very happy man walking around with two legs..even playing basketball the last time I talked to him.” I have seen visualization and hypnosis work “magic” in case after case, be it an addiction to drugs, cigarettes, food, or alcohol, and with a medical or psychological root cause. I am hopeful to see the possible doorway to preservation in any pending amputation, be it medical, traumatic, or combat, and to be able to teach control or elimination of phantom pain. The possibilities for our returning Iraq/Afgan vets could be tremendous and for many chronic problems as in diabetes and cancers. I am very excited to see the blending of Western, Eastern and alternative medicine that can bring the best of all worlds to the patient for optimal healing. I believe we are on the cusp of a wonderful new frontier in healing. I am excited to be a part of that! By Sally Jane Mitchell Copyright 2008 Sally has 29 years in the health/psychology fields and is a member of the National Guild of Hypnotists. She practices a form of Therapeutic Touch as taught at the University of Colorado, Denver, CO, and the Sutter Cancer Institute of Sacramento, CA. She has extensive experience teaching drug and alcohol, dui, domestic violence, anger and stress management to individuals and groups of all ages. Sally is available for appointments at her office in West Linn OR. Please call Sally for an appointment at (503) 867-0322. |
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