I was asked to a cookout at a friend’s house and met Ron, one of her neighbors, at the party. At first glance, he had the look of a hollow eyed man that you see hanging around the corners downtown. His face was careworn and he had a depressed, miserable look to him. He managed a wan, toothless smile when I was introduced to him, and then he returned to picking at his plate of uneaten food.
I don’t know how the subject came up but he began telling me he went to the V.A. because he was having difficulty swallowing. They told him he had an ear infection and gave him antibiotics. That was 2 weeks ago and he hasn’t been able to eat or drink much since. He was in terrible agony every time he swallowed. He even went to the emergency room at one point because the pain was so intense that he couldn’t even drink water. I told him I could show him something that MIGHT be able to help him. At this point, I think he would have stood on his head if he thought it would help.
We adjourned to his apartment next door and I carefully explained the EFT process. We went through all the points and I tapped along with him. After telling me some of his history, of alcoholism, his wife’s suicide, some terrible war memories, PTSD, insomnia and other assorted ailments, I realized he was in need of professional help. He said he was being seen at the V.A. for his problems. (I am a former Psych Nurse, so I really understood him.)
So, as he brought up some of these issues, we tapped generally using the set-up “Even though I have this memory…” I felt it would give him some practice in the tapping procedure and it might free up some of his energy. As we tapped and he became more comfortable with the process, I decided to tap on his inability to swallow.
His eyes nearly bugged out of his head when for the first time in 2 weeks he could swallow without pain after one round of tapping. After tapping on forgiving the doctors for not being able to help him, he smiled at me and said he didn’t believe it.
His whole countenance had changed. Gone were his furrowed brow and painful expression. He said even the trembling in his hands was better, holding out a barely moving hand. He said he couldn’t write because of the “shakes” and now that had improved as well.
He was hesitant to try eating because he was afraid that the pain would come back. I explained if it did, there might be something else that he had to tap on, as I had explained earlier. He seemed to understand and went to test the healing.
He very gingerly took a sip of water and looked at me with gratitude. No pain! He smiled and decided to eat a piece of cheesecake. I could see that the pain had not returned. Even though he was essentially fasting for 2 weeks, I will never forget the look of sheer pleasure he had on his face when he took that first delicious bite of blueberry cheesecake and swallowed without pain.
Jan Luckenbach
actual filmed evidence of the effectiveness of this technique.
Thanks to Ingrid Dinter for sharing this story of a women veteran (we'll call Joanna) who has suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and her progress with Emotional Freedom Technique. This is only a part of the story, for the full article click here.
“ Joanna ” is a non-combat veteran with severe PTSD who has been on medical disability since 1993. In addition to her PTSD, Joanna suffered from severe Military Sexual Trauma (MST) and childhood sexual trauma. When Joanna agreed to try EFT, she did so out of a sense of desperation.
She was open to alternative healing and had tried many things, but nothing had truly brought her the relief she wanted and needed. I remember the first conversation with her being full of resentment and mistrust about EFT. She was willing to give it a try though, to work on her sleep issues, so we connected.
Joanna had excelled as a female in the military, being the first ever woman to join a very tough elite troop. Rescuing others from life threatening situations, she had to put her life at risk often several times a day, and it was usually the night when they got the most calls to rescue someone.
So Joanne had learned that the night wasn’t safe.
In addition to the resentment against her father, she suffered from many rapes, some by relatives of friends, and some within the military. There was so much harassment in her life, that she at some point just shrug her shoulders about it. After an accident, she was finally bullied out of her job.
So we had a lot of clean up to do.
here's what Joanne had to say after her first appointment...
“I managed not to wake up last night and slept the whole night through. YEA!! Yesterday, I noticed that I wanted to "pick-up" my old emotional trauma/baggage around the accident in 1993. I kept revisiting the accident and after our EFT session the emotional trauma/baggage was gone. Yet I kept wanting to find the old baggage because it has been with me for so long, it’s comfortable and it’s what I know and it felt awkward and exposed without it. I recognized what I was doing and did some self-talk, self-encouragement and was able to just let myself be without trying to re-find of my emotional baggage by treating myself with love and compassion.”
Joanne had seen many casualties and people dying in very drastic situations, but the molestation topped them all. So we took several events from her childhood and, again, released the emotional intensity she felt about them.
In my experience, many Veterans and people with PTSD symptoms never feel that they arrive in the present. They keep reliving their trauma from years ago, and their minds function as if the trauma was still happening. So they feel threatened in their daily life, surrounding themselves with weapons and defense mechanisms. Joanna was no different.However, when we put the time in between, she realized that her life for the past fifteen years had been very different that the beginning of her life. She realized that she had been safe and, even though she was well prepared to defend herself, she never had to use her weapon.
So it was appropriate for her to assume that her life was different and safe now, and she could allow herself to relax.
In her email after the fourth session, she described the results of our work as follows:
“Here is my 15th day of my sleep log.
I am doing well. I went to bed after using EFT again on my sleep. I went to bed and slept well without any prescription medication to sleep. I also didn't wake up at any time during the night. I felt safer and more at peace when I went to bed than ever before. I realized that I carry over my sleep deficient. If I didn't "get enough sleep", I'd carry it over to the next day and think "I need to make up for it tonight" and I'd be anxious to "make sure I sleep enough tonight." Using EFT before I went to bed last night, I reminded myself that I have choices and that there are no rules about sleeping. I also tapped on releasing my old beliefs about sleeping and let my body be the gauge of how much sleep I get every night. I felt lighter and more at peace after tapping and went to bed. Slept soundly. Still tired and sleepy, yet somewhat refreshed. I think this EFT is working.”
Joanna realized that she had joined the army to learn the techniques she needed to keep herself safe, a direct consequence of the constant threat she lived under as a child and adolescent. So we tapped on her finding peace with that reality and claiming her power back from her past.
I asked Joanne if she was willing to write a testimonial about her healing experience, and here is her personal report:
“Ingrid,
I had already tried group counseling; PTSD awareness training; Veteran’s Administration individual counseling for many years; Transcendental Meditation; metaphysical training (including candle magic, crystal and gemstone magic, and numerology); herbology and herbal remedies; Vimala Handwriting by Vimala Rogers; astrology; Native American healing beliefs; prescribed pharmaceuticals; Western medicine; chiropractic care; New Age healing techniques such as pendulum dowsing and chakra cleansing; University of New Mexico PTSD Sleep Study and Nightmare Reduction; Veteran’s Administration Group therapy many times; nutritional education; self-help books; and almost any other suggestion by any health care worker.
“I still couldn’t fall asleep. I couldn’t remain asleep without waking up repeatedly during the night. And I was plagued by repeated traumatic nightmares every night. Sleep was my enemy and I fought it every night, waking up exhausted and tired. I obsessed about sleep because I was always in sleep deficit. I would get very distressed if I stayed up late, yet couldn’t seem to go to bed until late because I dreaded the nightmares. I wouldn’t take naps during the day because it would make getting to sleep more difficult at night. The things that I tried helped very little.
I gave EFT a chance and I was thrilled with the results. Within two sessions, I felt myself release all the associated trauma, emotions, and obsessions that interfered with my sleep. Sleep became an easy and gentle activity free from worry and fretting. No longer am I afraid of going to sleep or of even how much sleep I receive. Today I let my body tell me when to sleep instead of rigorously following a clock. Sleep today is a joy that refreshes my body and rejuvenates my soul. I wake up earlier than I used to and I need less sleep than before. Sometimes the associated old beliefs about sleep come up but now I utilize EFT to release them. Quick. Easy. Gentle. No more nightmares. No more fighting sleep.”
It was not easy for Joanna to get started and trust such a different technique and healing approach, and she can be very proud of herself for hanging in there and not giving into her fears and resentment before she allowed EFT to do it’s magic.
A statistical background:
To be able to monitor Joanne’s progress,, I asked her to fill out an informed consent form and keep a daily sleep journal. We also used two well established, standardized research tools: The SA-45 and the PCL-M, both of which are explained on my website.
Results:
Within ten days and four EFT sessions, “Joanna’s” SA-45 score fell from 162 before the first session to 97 after the last. Her PCL-M score fell from 76 to 47 (a score of 50 and higher is considered PTSD for military personnel).
Joanna and I will have some more cleanups to do in relation to her military experiences and the chronic physical pain that she feels. But this is a great start!
San Francisco, CA (PRWEB) -- Stanford engineer Gary Craig introduces EFT, a new "acupuncture without needles" technique for helping Iraqi War Veterans gain relief from their Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
EFT stands for Emotional Freedom Techniques and involves the stimulation of certain meridian points on the body by tapping on them with the fingertips. This stimulation has been clinically shown in thousands of cases to dramatically reduce, or completely eliminate, the sting of trauma.
"Conventional psychology has been looking in the wrong place for clues to the PTSD puzzle," says Craig. "We have found repeatedly that the nightmares, sweats and intrusive memories of our war veterans occur because their war memories disrupt the proper flow of their bodies' subtle energies."
"Once these energies have been properly balanced," maintains Craig, "the war veteran couldn't get upset about the memory if s/he tried. This is also true for other emotional issues including phobias, grief, rape, depression and anger."
Susan Hannibal is a San Diego therapist and consistent user of EFT who often feels frustrated with the military's use of conventional and ineffective methods for PTSD. "One of the biggest problems facing our military today is Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder," she says, "but no one in authority wants to break new ground and use the most effective treatment available."
"Even when they don't sustain physical injuries," says Hannibal, "their lives can go into a tailspin. Traumatic memories are an underlying cause of health problems, social isolation, domestic violence, divorce, alcohol and drug abuse, and shattered families."
Everyone agrees that conventional treatments do little to help. Psychiatric drugs can dull or numb PTSD symptoms, but drugs have side effects and do nothing to address the disorder's underlying cause. Conventional talk therapy can even make the problem worse by reinforcing traumatic memories.
But Hannibal and other EFT practitioners worldwide routinely neutralize haunting memories - in soldiers, accident or abuse victims, and survivors of disasters - in record time. The simple EFT process often does its job in one or two sessions and, in some cases, has done it in minutes.
One of Hannibal's clients is Navy Corpsman Wilbur Hurley. Just before leaving Iraq, he had to deal with a young Marine's suicide. That event triggered memories of a murder-suicide Hurley witnessed as a child, and he began having vivid nightmares. Returning home, he isolated himself from friends and family and suffered debilitating anxiety attacks, flashbacks, auditory hallucinations, anger, and irritability.
Hurley's symptoms disappeared when Hannibal taught him EFT. After his first session, which Hannibal videotaped, Hurley left her office singing. "It was pretty much the greatest day of my life," he said. Even when he concentrated on the worst events he witnessed in Ramadi, he couldn't find a single memory that bothered him.
Corpsman Hurley has remained free of PTSD symptoms since his three-session treatment in December 2004.
Results like these don't surprise Gary Craig. In 1994, Craig and a colleague visited a Veterans Administration hospital in California, where they worked on-camera with six Vietnam War veterans.
"These men hadn't had a moment's peace in 20 years," says Craig. "Their lives revolved around their terrifying memories." But after just a few minutes of tapping, all of the men experienced profound release.
"Traumatic memories and phobias usually respond quickly to EFT," he says, "and the results are often permanent. EFT not only prevents post-traumatic memories from causing problems, it successfully treats memories that are decades old."
Despite the dramatic results achieved by patients at the VA hospital, says Craig, none of the staff were interested.
Today the Department of Veterans Affairs pays compensation for PTSD to nearly twice as many veterans as it did six years ago, at an annual cost of $4.3 billion. Most recent applicants are Vietnam War veterans.
"It would be wonderful if military chaplains, counselors, and psychologists learned EFT and taught it to everyone," says Hannibal, "but it's so different from what they're used to that no one knows what to make of it."
In addition, she says, there is still a bias against seeking help in all branches of the military. "It's cultural conditioning," she says. "It's unfortunate."
The EFT basics can be learned by anyone by downloading the free EFT Manual from Craig's website at
http://www.emofree.com/downloadeftmanual.asp
USA TODAYHe finished his tour and returned home, struggled with headaches and memory loss, went back to Iraq and survived another bombing in February that aggravated his symptoms.
Only after arriving here at the Army's Landstuhl Regional Medical Center with an ankle injury in February did a new and aggressive screening program finally identify Joiner's brain injury and lead to treatment. "I'm just in shock that somebody is figuring out what's wrong with me," says Joiner, 26, who says his gratitude for the treatment outweighs any bitterness over the delay in diagnosing his injury.
The Pentagon debated for years whether to systematically screen troops for brain injuries such as Joiner's. A recent study by RAND Corp., a research group, says such injuries could have affected 320,000 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans. Uncertain how aggressively to identify a wound that is still largely a mystery, the Pentagon initially resisted calls to screen all service members coming out of the battlefield. Under pressure from Congress, the Pentagon in March ordered all military branches to screen for traumatic brain injury (TBI).
By then, doctors at this key Army hospital — through which all war casualties pass on their way home — already had begun to check each of the wounded for a brain injury in an effort that could set new standards for whether such troops ever return to duty.
This is wonderful news for current troops coming out of combat. Perhaps veterans will be able to avail themselves of this technology also in the future. It certainly will help reduce the stigma of PTSD and brain trauma related injuries. Which in turn will lead to better awareness, which in turn will lead to broader search for effective solutions.
One of which is Emotional Freedom Technique. Some of the things I like about EFT are: you or your soldier can start using it TODAY! it's really inexpensive, it brings quick relief, it is drug free, it is so easy to do. And it can reverse these unseen injuries.
Side effects? Well more energy, more joy, more freedom to live a normal life, more engagement in the present, less depression, less fear, less anger, better sleep-I could go on and on but you get the idea!
thanks for the photo by foreignobsessed
One thing many returning vets feel is an isolation from everything familiar, everything they left behind, and everyone they left behind. Being with other vets can help ease the pain but it doesn't start the healing process. 
by Jennifer Litz
Del Rio LIVE!
Pat Dugan was a reconnaissance marine corporal in Vietnam for 19 months, starting in 1966. He’s now a passionate voice for veteran help that resounds throughout West Texas. “I am seeing one of the biggest mushroom clouds,” Dugan says of times ahead for Iraq/Afghanistan veterans. “’... there are no front lines in this war. You can be [in a non-combat service] and get your butt blown off the road there with anyone else. Everyone’s sitting around waiting for an explosion to go off, and they send you back and back for more tours.”
When these vets do come back home—or in between myriad deployments—they’re still fighting—for their benefits. “In Del Rio, for example, we’ve got people with problems,” Dugan says. “And they have to travel 150 miles to get help [at a VA clinic]. And then when you get up there, I’m not being mean, but when you go up there and apply to get help, you get some VA muffin that’s not a veteran, and they put you through mental gymnastics like you wouldn’t believe. [Vets] don’t want to be humiliated and go through that process.”
Bracing against a blasting wind that reminded him of his native Kansas, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates spent a day at Fort Bliss touring a mental health center, watching a demonstration of the Army's newest technology, and meeting with soldiers and community leaders.
Gates had high praise for a Fort Bliss center designed to treat soldiers suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and return them to their units -- a center he said would serve as a prototype for the Army.
"They are doing some amazing things here in terms of helping soldiers who want to remain soldiers but who have been wounded with post-traumatic stress disorder," Gates said of the Restoration and Resilience Center. "I think it's an extraordinary program. ..... And one of the things that I will carry back to Washington with me is the question of whether we can replicate this at other posts around the country."
During a morning press conference in front of the center, Gates also formally announced a change in government policy he said would allow soldiers to seek help for PTSD without hurting their careers.
Getting help for PTSD related to the "combat environment" will no longer be a reason to deny security clearances, he said.
The Fort Bliss center is also looking at finding ways to help soldiers in combat zones deal with stress, Gates said, adding that those techniques "are clearly worth additional attention as well."
