Hypnotherapy for IBS in London
Hello, I’m Susannah. I am a fully qualified clinical hypnotherapist and coach with over 22 years of experience supporting clients with IBS using gut-directed hypnotherapy.
I have a specialist interest in hypnotherapy for IBS and adopt a comprehensive approach with hypnosis, NLP, and coaching, to address the disrupted communication between your brain and gut.
IBS can make everyday life unpredictable and exhausting. The constant worry about where the nearest toilet is, the bloating that makes you feel self-conscious, the abdominal pain that disrupts your day, and the unpredictable bowel movements can take over your life. You might find yourself planning every outing around toilet access, avoiding certain foods, or declining social invitations altogether.
Many people with IBS feel at a loss when dietary changes, medications and supplements have failed to provide relief. If this sounds familiar and you’re looking for an alternative approach, I’d be happy to support you.
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I combine clinical IBS hypnosis with NLP and coaching to address the root cause: the oversensitive gut-brain connection. Gut directed hypnotherapy is a well-established approach that works by calming the nervous system and helping the brain and gut communicate more effectively. When you’re in a relaxed, focused state, your body is more able to settle, which can help reduce the sensitivity of the gut and ease the stress response that often makes symptoms worse.
Research shows that gut-directed hypnosis is one of the most effective treatments for IBS, with studies demonstrating that over 70% of patients experience significant improvement.
If you would like to learn more about my hypnotherapy for IBS programme, get in touch.
Common reasons to seek IBS hypnotherapy:
- Unpredictable bowel movements disrupting your daily life?
- Constant bloating and discomfort?
- Abdominal pain and cramping?
- Anxiety about accessing toilets when out?
- Avoiding social situations due to IBS symptoms?
- Stress making symptoms worse?
- Feeling self-conscious about gas and digestive noises?
- Incomplete relief from medications or dietary changes?
- Morning urgency and bathroom trips?
- Food fear and restricted eating?
- Fatigue from poor sleep due to symptoms?
Susannah Saunders
Hello, my name is Susannah. I am a clinical hypnotherapist and life coach in London with over 20 years of experience helping people to enjoy a happier, more fulfilling life. Get in touch to find out more or book an appointment in London today.
NLP, Coaching and Hypnosis Therapy for IBS
IBS hypnotherapy works by calming the oversensitive communication pathway between your brain and your gut. This approach is often referred to as gut-directed hypnotherapy or gut hypnotherapy, because it focuses specifically on the gut–brain connection.
Gut directed hypnotherapy works with the messages passing between your digestive system and your mind, helping them to communicate in a calmer, more balanced way. When this connection becomes disrupted, your brain can misinterpret normal digestive signals as threats, triggering pain, cramping, and altered bowel movements. This hypersensitivity keeps your digestive system on high alert, creating a cycle where stress worsens symptoms, and symptoms create more stress.
IBS hypnosis helps to reduce this gut sensitivity by working directly with your subconscious mind. Using guided visualisation and therapeutic suggestions whilst in a deep state of hypnosis, we can help your brain reinterpret messages from your digestive system. Instead of responding with alarm and discomfort, your brain learns to recognise these signals as normal and non-threatening. This process allows your gut to function more smoothly and comfortably.
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In the first session, we’ll explore what life without IBS would mean to you and identify your specific triggers and patterns. I will then guide you into hypnosis, where I’ll help your subconscious release the heightened sensitivity and start restoring normal, comfortable digestive function.
Every natural treatment for IBS that I provide is tailored to your needs and symptoms. I usually work with clients for around 4 to 6 sessions, and you can schedule these at a pace that suits you.
IBS Hypnotherapy and Coaching Can Help You:
- Reduce abdominal pain and cramping
- Regulate bowel movements and improve consistency
- Decrease bloating and gas
- Feel calmer and less anxious about symptoms
- Stop planning life around toilet access
- Enjoy food without fear or restriction
- Sleep better without nighttime symptoms
- Build confidence in social situations
- Reduce the stress that triggers symptoms
- Achieve lasting relief without medication side effects
How Hypnotherapy for IBS Works
When I work with someone suffering from IBS, I combine it with NLP and coaching to help reprogram the way your gut and brain communicate with each other. In my IBS hypnotherapy sessions, we’ll look at the specific triggers, thought patterns and stress responses that are activating your symptoms, and start to gently rewire those responses.
NLP is useful for identifying the anxiety and catastrophic thinking that often accompany IBS. If you’re constantly worrying about having an accident, scanning for toilets, or feeling panicked when symptoms start, these thoughts amplify your gut sensitivity. Combining NLP with clinical hypnosis, we can change these thought patterns at the subconscious level and create a calmer internal dialogue.
Coaching helps you explore practical strategies for managing triggers and building confidence. We’ll work on stress management techniques, identifying your specific symptom patterns, and creating a plan that supports your digestive health. All of my IBS hypnotherapy sessions are tailored to your personal experiences because IBS affects everyone differently.
If you would like to find out how I can help, let's talk
The Science Behind IBS Hypnotherapy
The gut-brain axis is the sophisticated communication network between your digestive system and your brain. In people with IBS, this communication pathway becomes hypersensitive, meaning your brain overreacts to normal digestive sensations and interprets them as pain or danger.
This isn’t happening because you’re weak or anxious by nature. It’s a learned response where your nervous system has become trained to perceive normal gut activity as threatening. When your brain detects this perceived threat, it activates your stress response, releasing hormones like cortisol and adrenaline. These chemicals alter gut motility, increase sensitivity, and can trigger the cramping, urgency or constipation that characterise IBS.
Logic and willpower can’t break this cycle because it’s happening at the subconscious level, below your conscious awareness.
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Gut-related hypnotherapy uses this understanding of the gut–brain axis to gently retrain the way your system responds, so normal digestive activity no longer triggers the same level of discomfort or urgency. Working with the subconscious part of your brain, IBS hypnosis can help your system relearn that digestive sensations are safe and normal.
Research shows that gut-directed hypnotherapy significantly improves abdominal pain, bloating, bowel movements, and overall quality of life.
Unlike medications that suppress symptoms temporarily, hypnotherapy for IBS addresses the root cause by resetting the gut-brain connection. This is why it’s considered one of the most effective natural treatments for IBS available.
Symptoms of IBS
IBS symptoms vary between individuals but commonly include abdominal pain or cramping that may improve after a bowel movement. You might experience bloating that worsens throughout the day, along with excessive gas and uncomfortable digestive noises. Bowel movements can be unpredictable, ranging from diarrhoea to constipation, or alternating between both.
Many people describe a sense of urgency, needing to rush to the toilet with little warning, or feeling that they haven’t fully emptied their bowels. Symptoms often worsen with stress, certain foods, hormonal changes or during busy periods of life.
IBS can also cause fatigue, nausea, backache, and bladder symptoms. The unpredictability of symptoms creates constant anxiety, making you hypervigilant about your body and reluctant to be far from a toilet. This anxiety can make symptoms worse, creating a cycle that feels impossible to break.
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While IBS doesn’t damage your digestive system or lead to serious disease, the impact on your quality of life can be significant. Many people with IBS report avoiding social events, struggling at work, and feeling isolated or embarrassed by their symptoms.
This is where IBS hypnotherapy can help, bringing relief from these symptoms and restoring your confidence and freedom.
The Cause of IBS
The exact cause of IBS isn’t fully understood, but it’s thought to involve a combination of factors, including gut sensitivity, altered gut motility, inflammation, changes in gut bacteria, and stress. Some people develop IBS after a bout of gastroenteritis, while others notice symptoms starting during stressful life events.
What’s clear is that the gut-brain axis plays a central role. Your gut has its own nervous system, sometimes called the “second brain,” containing millions of nerve cells that constantly communicate with your brain. In IBS, this communication system becomes disrupted and hypersensitive.
IBS hypnosis works by calming this oversensitive system and helping your brain respond to digestive signals in a more balanced way. Research consistently shows that stress and emotional factors significantly influence IBS symptoms, which is why talking therapies and mind-body approaches like hypnotherapy for IBS are so effective.
If you’re wondering how to get rid of IBS without medication, addressing the psychological and neurological aspects through hypnosis can create more lasting change that medications alone cannot achieve.
Is IBS Hypnotherapy a Quick Fix?
Whilst IBS hypnosis cannot claim to cure, research supports this approach, showing that patients who complete a full course of hypnotherapy for IBS experience significant improvement that can be maintained for years.
The subconscious mind can respond quickly to positive suggestions, especially when it’s ready for change. Many clients notice improvement after just one or two sessions. But sustainable relief usually requires consistency to fully retrain the gut-brain connection.
If you’ve been living with IBS for months or years, your brain’s response patterns may have become deeply established. With IBS hypnosis, we can start to change them relatively quickly; it takes repetition to fully reset the system and create lasting relief. Think of it like learning a new skill: the more you practise, the more natural and automatic it becomes.
That’s where regular IBS hypnosis sessions with me and home practice come in. Between sessions, I’ll provide you with personalised hypnosis recordings to listen to regularly. This repetition helps reinforce the new, calmer responses until they become your brain’s default setting.
Hypnotherapy for IBS in London & Online
My private London hypnotherapy practice was founded in 2003. I have been awarded the Senior Qualification of Hypnotherapy Practice (SQHP) from the General Hypnotherapy Standards Council (GHSC) and the HPD from the National Council for Hypnotherapy (NCH).
For more information on how I use hypnotherapy, NLP, and coaching to help you find natural relief from IBS in my London hypnotherapy clinic or online, get in touch. We can talk through your symptoms, and I can explain how I can best support you.
If you would like to find out how I can help, let's talk
FAQs
What is gut directed hypnotherapy for IBS?
Gut directed hypnotherapy is a specialist form of IBS hypnosis that focuses on the gut-brain axis. It uses relaxation, guided imagery and targeted suggestions to calm the nervous system and improve the way your brain and digestive system communicate, helping to ease pain, bloating and bowel symptoms.
How is gut hypnotherapy different from general hypnotherapy?
Gut hypnotherapy is tailored specifically to gut-related conditions such as IBS. The language, imagery and techniques are designed to soothe the digestive system and reduce gut sensitivity, rather than working on more general issues like confidence or performance.
What do you mean by gut directed hypnotherapy?
Gut directed hypnotherapy is another way of describing hypnosis that targets the communication between the gut and the brain. By working at this level, we can help reduce the overreaction to normal digestive sensations and support a calmer, more settled gut.
Is gut related hypnotherapy suitable for all IBS subtypes?
Yes. My gut related hypnotherapy sessions can be adapted for IBS-D, IBS-C, IBS-M and IBS-U. The overall aim is to calm the gut-brain axis, but the focus of our work together is tailored to your particular symptom pattern, triggers and goals.
How many IBS hypnotherapy sessions will I need?
Everyone is different, but I usually work with clients for around 4 to 6 sessions. Some people experience relief more quickly, while others benefit from a longer programme to fully retrain the gut-brain connection.
How does IBS hypnosis help with irritable bowel syndrome?
My hypnotherapy for IBS works by calming the oversensitive gut-brain connection. It helps your subconscious mind reinterpret signals from your digestive system, so normal gut activity no longer triggers pain, cramping or altered bowel movements.
Can hypnotherapy help me get rid of IBS without medication?
Yes. Depending on the severity of your condition, it’s possible to get rid of IBS without medication. Hypnotherapy for IBS offers a medication-free approach that addresses the root cause: the oversensitive gut-brain connection. While medications can temporarily manage symptoms, gut-directed hypnosis helps retrain your nervous system to respond differently, creating lasting change without the need for ongoing medication or its potential side effects.
What does an IBS hypnotherapy session involve?
Each gut directed hypnosis session begins with a conversation where we explore your symptoms, triggers and how you’d like things to be different. I then guide you into a deeply relaxed state and use therapeutic suggestions, visualisation and gut directed techniques to help your subconscious release the hypersensitivity and restore comfortable digestive function.
Is online IBS hypnotherapy as effective as in-person?
Yes. Many clients find they relax more easily in their own home, which enhances the effectiveness of hypnosis. All you need is a quiet, comfortable space and a good internet connection. IBS hypnosis works best when you feel safe and at ease.
Can hypnotherapy help me get rid of IBS completely?
Research shows that gut directed, IBS hypnotherapy provides significant, long-lasting relief for the majority of people with IBS. While we can’t guarantee results or promise a permanent cure, studies demonstrate that over 70% of patients experience substantial improvement, with benefits maintained for five years or more. Many people find they can return to normal eating, socialising and daily activities without IBS controlling their choices.
Do I need to follow a special diet alongside IBS hypnotherapy?
While some people find certain dietary changes helpful, hypnotherapy for IBS works by addressing the root cause – the oversensitive gut-brain connection – rather than just avoiding trigger foods. We’ll discuss your individual situation and any dietary patterns you’ve noticed, but the goal is to help you enjoy food more freely without fear or restriction.
Will I lose control during IBS hypnosis?
No. Hypnosis is simply a focused, relaxed state where your mind is more open to helpful suggestions. You’ll remain in full control throughout the session, and you can bring yourself out of it at any time if you want to. Most people describe it as a calming, peaceful experience similar to daydreaming.
What if I've tried everything else and nothing has worked?
Many of my IBS clients come to me after trying multiple medications, diets and supplements without success. Hypnotherapy for IBS works differently because it addresses the underlying problem rather than just managing symptoms. Research shows that it can be effective even for people who haven’t responded to conventional treatments.
Contact me today to book a session
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