CHILD’S NERVOUS HABITS

QUESTION:

Del, I have been working with an eleven year old girl who pulls out her eye brows and eye lashes. She was doing great for about 4 weeks, then reverted to previous behavior. She also has a number of other nervous habits.  Her mother believes school is too stressful. When we  were successful I used your scripts and some OCD techniques. Do you have any other suggestions?

ANSWER

        My volume, Great Escapes, Vol. III, has several scripts on nervous habits, including one on hair or eyelash pulling; all were made for a teenager, but could be adapted. The last one was made for a girl who said she wanted all her hair to be real even, so kept plucking it.  Not necessarily the reason for others, but there is often some reason for the habit.  Sometimes the client knows what it is, and sometimes you just have to ask the deeper mind to locate the imprints that are causing it and changing it to something more helpful. (If you don’t have Volume III, the individual scripts are probably on the store under “Individual scripts” and can be downloaded for minor costs.) 

     You could have her imagine her favorite animal (or pet) and that she is pulling out its hair one at a time; then ask her how it looks and what she feels about it.  Is this how she wants to look?  Is this what she wants for herself?  

        Milton Erickson probably would have encouraged her to list all her habits and do them every day until she gets tired of them, then get rid of one at a time until there are no more nervous habits left. I had a young boy came to me with a great number of tics and nervous habits, but when I suggested that this would be a helpful way for him to stop, his mother was adamant that it would only make it worse. Problem with working with children?  Parents!