Can�t Get Child Hypnotized

Question

My 9 year old client is coming back this week. She is fearful of mom and dad leaving her, at any time. The school calls because she is upset missing her mother, and wants to go home. Mom is really frustrated and, of course, wants to resolve it. However, I was unable to get her into hypnosis during our first visit. Do you have suggestions?

Answer

First of all, set aside any idea of the traditional hypnosis methods of induction.

For a young child, some possibilities, off the “top of my head”:

1. With her eyes closed, she pretends to blow up a balloon. (Exhaling the breath relaxes the body, automatically.)

2. She pretends to sleep (Do you have a cuddly stuffed animal she could hold, to make that easier?)

3. She pretends to put the animal to sleep (or doll), with the suggestions that the sleepier (the animal or doll) gets, the sleeper she gets.

4. She pretends to be her favorite animal, who is sleeping soundly in the sunshine.

5. She holds a pendulum (which can be as simple as a metal ring or nut hung on a string), and makes it go back and forth, and round and round, with her own imagination; then feels it get heavier and heavier, pulling her arm into her lap, at which time she’ll “fall asleep”.