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Pain

Pain Management

The emotional causes of phantom limb pain

Important Note: This article was written prior to 2010 and is now outdated. Please use my newest advancement, Optimal EFT. It is more efficient, more powerful and clearly explained in my free e-book, The Unseen Therapist™.  Best wishes, Gary

Hi Everyone,

Here is a quality article by Jane Beard that eliminates phantom limb pain where heavy duty medications failed. Note how she gently moves her client into forgiveness.

Hugs, Gary


By Jane Beard EFT-ADV

I wanted to tell you about how EFT helped with phantom limb pain.  "Judy" suffered a traumatic crush injury in a car accident about a month before I met her.  One minute she was fine, and three hours later, they amputated her left foot.  She continued to feel the pain of the crushed foot, even afterwards, and despite heavy-duty medication. 

She described the level of intensity of her pain as a 10 out of 10, and her anger at the other driver as a 20. We began with some phrases to help her line up her energy to accept EFT, and did a few rounds on these ideas:

Even though I have no confidence that this tapping can work when the pain pills don't...

Even though the only thing that can make me happy is to go back in time and get my foot back... (this was a statement she made, and I went with it)

Even though I don't think anything will work...

Even though I am afraid I'll feel all this pain forever...

She said she felt her anger was at a 6 or 7, and the foot pain was at a 7.  So, some progress was being made.  Then we tapped on the pain, as she described it, and as it evolved.  She was clear that she didn't want to work on the shock of the accident, or her anger at the driver, so pain it was:

Even though it feels like my foot is being crushed...

Even though my foot is on fire...

Even though I don't understand how an imaginary foot can have such real pain

That was a huge one - suddenly her pain went to a one out of 10.  And she volunteered that she was ready to work on her anger about it, but that I could not suggest that we forgive the driver. Interestingly, I had not used the work "forgive" at all, so this was internally generated.  She knew what her boundaries were, and she was honoring them! Off we went:

Even though I am so mad at this driver I could spit nails...

Even though this driver cared more about her coffee than my safety...

Even though I was the only one to suffer from her negligence...

At the end of this round, she observed, "That's ridiculous.  NO ONE could cause the damage that she caused me and not feel bad."  It turned out that the other driver had been to visit her in the hospital, despite the advice of her lawyer instructions.  "But I still can't forgive her," she concluded.

Even though I refuse to forgive her because of what happened...

Even though forgiving her wouldn't fix my foot...

Even though forgiving would feel like I was letting her off the hook, and I can't do that...

I could feel a shift, but she didn't have any comments to make, so we continued.  By now, I was using the setup phrases more as tapping phrases, and plowing right through.

Even though I can't let her off the hook, I'm open to the idea that someday I might be able to...

Even though she'll never know if I let her off the hook or not, I'll know and I refuse to do it now...

Then she started crying, and said, "Why do I want to refuse to do this?  It feels so mean."

Even though I feel so mean..

Even though I hate feeling mean...

Even though it feels better to think of her as being mean...

There was a big sigh.  "Okay, I didn't mean to forgive her, but I just am, in spite of myself."  Even though I didn't mean to forgive and find myself doing it anyway...  Now she was laughing. Her pain and anger were both at 0 out of 10.  The time was up, and we talked about follow-up ways to use the tapping.

A few days later, while I was attending an EFT workshop she called back to say that she was pain free as long as she wasn't left alone in the house.  There was a great panel on pain management at the workshop, and I took a turn at the microphone to ask for advice on handling this issue, knowing I would leave the conference room for a phone appointment with Judy. Carol Look suggested, "Find the secondary gain." 

And bingo - there it was.  We went after it gently and found it easily.  She didn't know how to ask for help, and was afraid of being stuck in one place unless someone was there to help her.  We worked on that (I won't go through the whole sequence) and she has learned that feeling pain is an indication that she needs to speak up for her needs.

Jane Beard

FOR MORE EFT HELP ...

Explore our newest advancement, Optimal EFT™, by reading my free e-book, The Unseen Therapist™. More efficient. More powerful.