Hypnotherapy for other anxieties, unwanted habits and phobias

Anxieties, unwanted habits, and phobias, I help clients understand and change the patterns driving fear, avoidance, and automatic behaviour so they can respond with more calm, control, and freedom.

How hypnotherapy can help with anxiety and unwanted habits

Anxiety and unwanted habits often feel difficult to control, even when you understand them logically. You might find yourself stuck in patterns of thinking or behaviour that repeat automatically.

Hypnotherapy helps break these patterns by working at a deeper level than conscious effort alone. It allows you to feel calmer, more in control, and less driven by automatic responses.

Rather than fighting the problem, it helps change the underlying pattern that keeps it going.

You know it doesn’t make sense. You can see how you are responding isn't logical, but when it happens, your reaction is still the same.

It might be a specific situation, a place, or something you’ve started to avoid. Your body reacts quickly, your mind follows, and before you know it you’re caught in it again.

Over time, you start thinking ahead. Managing it. Avoiding certain situations or preparing for them in ways that feel necessary at the time.

That’s where it becomes frustrating. Not because you don’t understand it, but because understanding it hasn’t changed it.

This isn’t about logic. It’s about how your system has learned to respond.

You don’t need to push through it. You need your response to change.

We look at what is actually happening in the moment the reaction kicks in.

Where your attention goes, how your mind responds, and what keeps the pattern going.

Then we change that.

That might involve reducing the intensity of the response, changing what the situation means to you, and building a more neutral, stable reaction over time.

This is practical, focused work. Not just talking about it.

Outcome

A more proportionate response. Less avoidance. More freedom to just get on with things.

Common challenges
You have a specific situation or trigger that you react strongly to and find yourself avoiding things or planning around them. Your reaction feels automatic, like it happens before you can think even after you’ve tried to reason with it, but that hasn’t made a difference. You feel frustrated that you “know better” but still react the same way.
How it works
Hypnotherapy works by calming the nervous system and changing the patterns that keep you stuck in stress, anxiety or overthinking. By working at a deeper level than conscious thinking alone, it helps you respond differently to challenges and feel more in control day to day.
Hypnotherapy for new parents can help you feel calmer, more in control, and better able to cope with the mental and emotional demands of early parenthood.
What to expect
Sessions are practical, focused and tailored to your situation. We’ll identify what’s driving the pressure, work on reducing immediate symptoms, and build longer-term changes so you feel calmer, clearer and more confident as a parent.
Sessions are available in St Albans and online.

explore other types of therapy

Hypnotherapy for Career stress & anxiety

If you are constantly replaying conversations, rehearsing conflict, waking up thinking about work, or struggling to work out what comes next, this is a practical way to regain clarity, calm, and control.

Hypnotherapy for Golf & Sports Performance

For competitive sports people who want to work on the mental aspect of their game, I help improve focus, composure, confidence, and performance under pressure by working on the mental patterns that interfere when it matters most.

Hypnotherapy for IBS & health anxiety

For people whose mind and body have become stuck in a loop of symptoms, worry, and hypervigilance, I help reduce anxiety, settle the stress response, and break the cycle that keeps IBS and health fears going.

Hypnotherapy for New Parents

Dealing with the changes to you and your life after becoming a new parent.

Feel good - on the go

Vestibulum volutpat pretium libero. Etiam iaculis nunc ac metus. Fusce risus nisl, viverra et, tempor et, pretium in, sapien. Pellentesque commod. Ut non enim eleifend felis pretium feugiat.

Hypnosis can be misunderstood

Cognitive Behavioural Hypnotherapy CBH, is a modern and scientifically based form of hypnosis. CBT is the most recommended form of therapy by the NHS, combined with hypnosis it is a powerful technique to make changes in your attitudes and behaviours. It is evidence based and is designed with making positive changes in the future.
What is CBHypnosis?

CBH is a practical combination of CBT and hypnosis. CBT helps you understand and challenge the thinking patterns that are driving the problem. Hypnosis helps you actually change how those patterns feel and respond in real time. It’s not about analysing the past or “being put under.” It’s a structured, forward-focused way of changing how your mind operates day to day.

Is CBHypnosis right for me?

If you’re aware something isn’t working, but thinking harder hasn’t fixed it, then yes, it’s likely a good fit. It works best for people who are used to being in control, but can see that some of their thinking patterns have become automatic and unhelpful. You don’t need to believe in it yet, just be open to approaching the problem differently.

How is this different to talking therapy?

Talking can help you understand the problem. This is about changing it. Whilst there will be elements of talking therapy to understand the issue, the focus is less on analysing the past and more on how your mind is working now. Then how to shift it so things actually feel different day to day.

What kind of things can this help with and how quickly?

Anything driven by habitual thinking patterns, such as anxieties, stress, overthinking, internal pressure, sleep issues, confidence, performance, or feeling stuck in a way of operating that isn’t working anymore. Our brains are prediction machines, currently it is predicting negativity, through relaxation, focus and visualisation we can change what happens next.
You should start to notice shifts early on, often within the first couple of sessions. This isn’t open-ended. We’re working towards specific changes, not just having ongoing conversations. Changes can be subtle but powerful.

What does hypnosis feel like?

It is not like stage hypnosis or what you have seen on the TV or in films. You remain in control, aware and conscious at all times. If you are open to the concept of deep relaxation and focused attention then hypnosis can work for you. Hypnosis at it's best feels deeply relaxing, similar to the state we are in just before falling asleep, still awake but in a dream like state.

I've tried things like meditation, mindfulness, breathwork and other self help, how is this different? 

These approaches are powerful in their own right and are helpful in moments. This goes a level deeper by bringing those ideas together into something structured, so you’re not just managing symptoms, you’re changing the pattern underneath.