I had my hypno gastric band 'fitted' by Paul McKenna last night...

[lynniep]

...so far so good! Admittedly its not even 11am yet, but I havent eaten my snacks which are sitting on my desk and not even tempting me! Normally I don't allow myself anything till 10am, then I pounce!

I am doing this in conjunction with weightwatchers, which Paul McKenna would not approve of, since he despises 'diet clubs' (boy does this come through loud and clear in his book).

However since I don't know the man personally, and I feel I need the WW sessions for support, I am carrying on with pro- pointing and hoping that my gastric band will provide the backup I need to not binge and eat more than my body needs.

I've been (back) on weightwatchers for several months now and failed miserably because I am both a compulsive eater and a (hopefully) reformed bulimic.

I'd like to think this will help me - and I'm willing to try it because I am now as heavy as I was just after I gave birth to DS2 3 years ago (my heaviest, unless you count when I was 40 weeks pg!)

If anyone is interested I will report back :)

Can I ask? How much less than your normal amount of food is the amount needed to feel you've had enough. I sometimes think I routinely eat twice as much as I need. And much of what I eat is on the move. Pick, pick, pick.

You sound like me! I'd say I'm eating about half as much now but

Oops too soon! Eating about half as much at the moment. We'll see how it goes, at the moment I would definitely say it's worth looking into though it's early days for me.

Oops too soon! Eating about half as much at the moment. We'll see how it goes, at the moment I would definitely say it's worth looking into though it's early days for me.

Clench good to hear from an expert...so to speak.
Hi Ladies....hope you don't mind me joining. I have been doing PMICMYT for about a year and do really well on it. I thought about trying the hypno band but when I came on this thread originally all the ladies were still doing slimming world or weight watchers with it and as I have already done PM I know that you cannot do slimming clubs or diets and do PM. A couple of your ladies have come over to our thread on PM so I decided to come and have another look. You lot don't seem to be on other diets just PM Gastric band and you seem to be doing well. I noticed that most of the original ladies are not on here and I wonder if that's because it didn't work for them as they were still doing diets while hoping that the hypno band would do the rest?? Just a thought.

very Are you still around? I hope so, I really enjoy your wisdom, and of course all the other MNetters too.

Well, I have returned from our very first family holiday with our pfb. It was ace and I had an epiphany (I hope that is the right word)!

I saw a photo of myself on my Auntie's wall from five years ago. I had lost heaps of weight and (even if I do say myself) I looked amazing. Proper knock out amazing. And right there and then, at that very moment in time I decided to never ever go on a diet ever again.

In that photo I was four dress sizes smaller than I am now and when the photo was taken I still thought I was fat. I am absolutely sick of beating myself up and jumping on and diving off the food/diet bandwagon.

I have realised more than ever that Paul is right. It is not about not eating. It is about enjoy eating for all the right reasons.

I have decided to not put any pressure on myself to lose weight and already it is making a huge difference. I noticed that this morning, almost before I even woke I started a discussion with myself about what I would eat for breakfast. I started the usual routine of 'well, I will have toast and butter and then start being good tomorrow' Then I remembered I wasn't going to ever be on a diet again stopped the whole ridiculous self destructive conversation.

I am hoping to, in a few weeks, start to look at the four golden rules and gradually use that to support my new lifestyle choice too.

Hope that I have not rambled. And that you are all feeling happy and enjoying a healthy head space.

clench that's interesting about the sugar, rotton shame about the yuck you feel after. i suppose it must be the crash after the spike IYSWIM. yes i'm glad too to hear from hypnotist! so what i'm dying to know is how come the band just hasn't seemed to work for me? i'm doing ICMYT & am happier with that than diets, but still wanted the boost of the HGB. listened to it loads of times, sometimes i doze off 2/3 way through & sometimes awake the whole time, but never felt a tightening or been full after a few mouthfuls. i'm also intrigued by you saying the havening is basically EFT: i'd been put off that by the name as i think it sounds, well, cheesey! could you elaborate further on what it is & what it does please?

still i know what you mean! i too had dreamed of being thin & fabulous by my beach holiday but - i never thought i'd say it - i don't mind as much as i thought i would! (& i think i might be bigger than when i went to france last october, though i haven't dared try on tankinis yet!!) i think you're right it's being so much happier around food sort of takes away a big part of the anxiety & upset. it's like knowing the PM solution is for longtime, so short-term results aren't so !!!

rules hiya! nice to seeyou over here too. i too was put off by the amount of folk saying "i'll do PM HGB with WW/SW on the side" i just thought "haven't you read the book?" which was why i felt happier joining thread 11(now 12) as the folk there weren't doing two conflicting things...

yey!! mameulah i'm so glad you're back! i felt i've really connected with you because many things you've said have been for me "aargh!! i felt exactly that just a month or two ago!!"
please forgive my pause this eve i've no been able to post fir a few hrs, had to keep C&Ping you know when it goes all unconnected & then rejoins & there's a post i'd like to reply to! which was yours!
anyhoo, i'm sooo glad you had an epiphany (yes right terminology but what's a pfb?? no too hot on abbrevs i dunno!?! LOL) i totally relate to looking back to when i was thinner & still thinking i was fat - when i was 20 & 30"" waist levi's hung off my hip bones loose i still was really self-conscious about a pot belly i apparently had... if i had the body now, that i had then, then i think i'd be happy... except i wouldn't be until i had the right mindset. i'm happier now at the size i am (on the way down) because of pauling, (i know i'm on the right path) than i was at the same size when i was still expanding, IYSWIM. because i know it's something i can totally do, as you can too, unlike diets (which i just mis-spelt as dirt LOL) which i always ultimately failed at. so hurrah, well done for not just surviving family w/e but getting summat good fe it xx

I think a lot of people have used HGB along side I diet because it seems to be the answer to sticking to it. In the past I have given up on diets because I overeat, so restricting food intake seems to be the secret.

Also, everyone is looking for a quick fix. I know i have wasted far too much if my life saying,' if i lose x amount this week and then x amount every week, in 2 months i'll have lost this much and will be a size....' None of it has ever been truly achievable. What you don't realise, is that combining a diet and HGB, you are barely getting enough calories to survive!

I've done it myself, for about 2 days, and by mid afternoon I felt physically exhausted and really sick. I can understand how the ladies here doing both may have given up.

mameulah, I started dieting when I was 16, and weighed 10 stone. I eventually got down to 8 . Although i only lost 1/4 to 1/2lb a week,I don't remember it being too much of a struggle, mainly because I lived at home and mum cooked all my meals!I didn't realise at the time how great I looked!

I would die to be 10 stone again!! I know I'll never be 8st again but would love to get to 12....for starters.

very I will try and answer your questions :) Ok for anyone listening to hypnosis you should know it is absolutely ok to fall asleep while listening to it because of how hypnosis works. If you imagine that your mind is an iceberg. The top bit of the iceberg is your conscious mind which is the bit you use every day to work out what food shopping to buy, remind you to phone such and such, that sort of thing. Its the bit of your mind you are active with all the time.
The bottom bit of the iceberg is your unconscious (or subconscious) mind.
Thats the bit that deals with dreams, hopes, change.
In your normal life the iceberg is upright and you operate with your conscious mind.
In the state of hypnosis, the iceberg tilts and the unconscious mind is the bit that comes to the fore and starts listening. Which is what we want when we use hypnosis to change something. But the conscious mind is ALWAYS there, it just moves over so the unconscious mind can listen. :)
Which is why (and this is very important) no-one can make you do something you don't want under the state of hypnosis, because your conscious mind would reject the suggestion.
That's why stage hypnotism is a trick and a con, it's effective but is very manipulative. Hypnotists and hypnotherapists are a world apart.
Anyway what you need to do is listen to the cd again and just go with it's ok to drift off and it's ok to let your mind wander and not listen consciously, its ok fall asleep. Your conscious mind with always protect you and reject anything you wouldn't choose to do and your unconscious mind will soak up like a sponge the message of change, the gastric band, so you will feel like eating less and will feel full quicker. You don't have to do anything other than relax and enjoy listening to the cd.
PM also doesn't want people to follow a diet plan because this system is sustainable in itself for life. We 'dieters' generally have a crappy relationship with food and we need to address this by eating what we actually want and stopping when full. Eventually we make better choices and can relax knowing we can eat what we want. We lose the 'diet' mind set and adopt a better, healthier one.

Sorry just came back to this thread and realised I hadn't answered the question on EFT/Havening.
Ok I am an EFT practitioner. I wasn't originally, I learned it free because the originator of EFT wanted the world to be able to use it so it was his gift to the world as it were. You can find out how to do it if you like here:
www.emofree.com/

Anyway I had been using it on myself very successfully and as a therapist wanted to be able to use it on my clients so I did the courses and qualified.
It works because on our bodies are Meridian points, which are energy points. They are what acupuncturists, reflexologists and are acupressure points. If you think of them as conductors of energy. When we have a phobia for example we experience a negative reaction in energy, you will probably feel the feeling of fear, sweating, you'll feel it physically. Its like there is a 'kink' in the energy somewhere.
So EFT uses tapping on the meridians while thinking (so physically feeling) about this fear or phobia and realigns the energy therefore removing the kink. So the energy runs smoothly and our reaction to the phobia is reduced, and we keep doing this until its gone and you can think about the 'phobia' with no reaction to it.
I'm sure someone else will be along and say thats all wrong but thats how my brain understands it and it works very well for me :)
Havening is a newer technique but works along the same principles and is probably quicker.
Anyway you don't always need to understand how something works in detail to know it works and if it works then it works :)
Hope this helps

very just had a thought. If you were a client of mine I would use EFT/Havening on you before you next settle down to listen to the cd, to remove any blockages or negative associations you might have about it not working. Sometimes we have them with various different things, and they just need removing. Its perfectly natural and the end goal is just to get the best out of this. You're doing really well without the cd but it won't harm to boost your success :)

wow thankyou clench that's very interesting & enlightening! i had wondered if i was staying too awake for it too work IYSWIM, because everyone else for whom it had worked fell asleep really quickly. i like the iceberg analogy, i'm good with visuals, so seeing as i stayed up 'til stupid o'clock last night and am now totally pooped i think i'll try havening first & then listen at bedtime, hoping to zonk more quickly & let the iceberg tilt! thanks again & my apologies for mistakenly calling you a hypnotist, rather than hypnotherapist. i didn't realise the difference sorry

very I have a confession.....I listened to gb tape......havnt told the others yet. hehe

very please don't apologise! A hypnotist and hypnotherapist both use hypnotic techniques. The only difference is a hypnotherapist uses them for therapeutic reasons rather than entertainment. That said I've known hypnotherapists call them self hypnotists occasionally. I've always thought of a hypnotist to be the stereotypical bow-tie wearing, comb-over types and curiously the therapists i've known who called themselves hypnotists were of this type!
Anyway try the havening and do the cd later and let's see if that makes a difference xx

clench glad i've not offended you & you're not a comb-over type LOL! i suppose it's the associations that go with the name: i'm a massage therapist (not working just now as SAHM) but if anyone said i was a "masseuse" i'd be picturing dodgy "massage parlours" with "extras" IYKWIM! cheers for the advice though, i'll post with update tomorrow.

rules oooh you're a mischievous minx eh?!! good for you. i don't see any problem as you'll still be doing the four rules, just with a turbo boost as it were! let us know how you go.

fairy IKWYM about mapping out your planned weightloss & never doing it! so gutting. i've even put projected weights in my diary which just served to remind me of yet another failure!
but i'm not sure i fully understand about the diet & HGB combined: did you mean doing both helped them to stick to the HGB ie. four golden rules, or to the diet? i did curves diet before & found that because i was familiar with the counting/portions thing, after i stopped that & started the four rules, when i'd finished eating & was satisfied, i'd check back & mentally count what i'd eaten & it'd often be the same as what i was "allowed" on the diet, however i felt much more satisfied by it & happier because i'd chosen to eat that much rather than being restricted to that amount - HUGE difference in my psychological state! so if you meant HGB would help them stick to their diet ISWYM, but also it strikes me as being totally unnecessary to continue the diet counting?
i thought i was an overeater too, but it turns out it was unconscious eating & the psychological struggle i had with restriction which caused this. just a thought, but if you've been dieting since you were 16, do you think this may be the caee for you too?

very, my overeating has definitely been caused by nearly 20 years of dieting, and not knowing how to listen to my body. I have followed plans that have allowed me to eat unmeasured amounts of 'free' foods, or eat certain foods until I am satisfied. I was convince I didn't have a full signal, but I do, I was just too busy stuffing my face to hear it!!

As far as HGB and dieting- For me, I thought it would make dieting easier. I thought that the band would restrict the amount I could eat. This would make it easier to stay within the 'allowed' amounts, something I have always struggled with.

In reality, as you know, the band worked so well for me, that I had a very small appetite. The low fat diet didn't give me enough energy and felt really rubbish. So it was more of a hindrance, hence why I decided to just follow the diet.

very Lovely to hear from you again and glad you feel the connection too!

I am loving this thread, it is so positive and informative, everyone really is sharing good vibes.

I am not sure if this is helpful in terms of HGB-ness or Pauling it but I am LOVING not being on a diet and knowing I never ever again will be. It is like a switch has flicked.

I am amazed at how I hardly ever think about food, naturally wait until I am more than hungry until I decide to eat and have more energy than I have for months/years. And how accepting I am of the body I have.

In the next few months I will certainly dip back and re energise the Paulness but at the moment I am so enjoying not being able to fail because I haven't set myself some ridiculous challenge.

It is frightening to realise how dominated my whole life has been by an unhealthy attitude to food and my self image.

Has anyone else got any positive experiences to help keep me/us! motivated.

Also very pfb = precious first born!

I should finish the book today and will fit my gb later. Feel a bit nervous, what if I'm someone it doesn't work on?

I agree with the poster above regarding giving up high-fat/sugar foods two weeks before...if I could do that then I wouldn't be overweight.

Hi everyone,
I've just bought the book and DVD today from amazon, so should have it soon.
Can anyone give me an idea of what to expect?
Has it/is it working for you all?
Any tips?

Fairy....was reading some of your posts. With regard to your problem being that after listening to the gastric band hypno tape that you hardly ate anything......well this has been happening to a lot of people over the last 6 or 7 years. People who did original PM found that if they really did it well and were totally honest and did it to the letter that they didn't eat much at all. BUT one of the reasons suggested is that if you have a reasonable amount of weight to lose then your body will be using stored fat as fuel. But although you said you gave up because you missed food, I would have thought that you were doing it perfectly and would have gone on to lose the weight you had kept at it. It would seem (and forgive me if I am wrong here) that you missed the emotional aspects that food provides for you. If you are hungry, really really hungry, you will know it and you will eat. But if you need food for emotional reasons then you will not feel true hunger but will feel cravings and could eat all day every day without ever feeling satisfied.

Ive been a Paulette (I Can Make You Thin) girl and have only recently inserted the band, but I have to say it is definitely working. I listen to it every day and I am pretty amazed at the way I am with food. I have not been an overeater for years and only really eat when im hungry and eat what I want etc anyway but since inserting the band I am truly noticing a big difference in my attitude to what I eat , when I eat and how much I leave on my plate and how full I feel. I am making healthy choices above all else but still having a bit of chocolate or cake if I really want it. But instead of eating a whole biscuit I seem to have a bit or two and leave it. WOW is all I can say. The thing with it is you HAVE to really ground yourself in everything in the book first. You have to understand and apply the 4 golden rules every time you think of eating. And the band......well its like the icing on the cake.......its some inner voice that says "Ill have a banana" ( when normally you might grab some chocolate) and "Ive had enough" when you have only had a couple of mouthfuls.

(sorry that post was in answer to yaimee

rules, you're absolutely right. I have used food as a crutch for far too many years. My first GB attempt, I didn't use havening at all ( didn't even watch the DVD) so I think that's why I felt so peed off towards the end.

Back on track now, glad you are finding the HGB working for you.

I want to lose 2 stone, but probably need to lose 3, so I've plenty of stored fat available for fuel!!!!!