I received a call from a gentleman who had been reading about selective mutism and how hypnosis has been used to resolve the issue.

He wondered whether it could help his 10-year-old son who has been suffering from selective mutism since he was three.

Selective mutism is exactly what it says. Affected persons may talk to any family member or friends. Often when they are in uncomfortable situations and are unable to speak because anxiety is so high, they cannot talk.

A member of the person’s immediate family has a tendency to be anxious. A child will pick up on this, and mutism starts. Children who experience major trauma may develop selective mutism. 

A Little Background

The child in question was born in Bulgaria, and his parents divorced when he was a year old. His father came to the United States and his mother remarried. The child was living with his mother and stepfather. Both were physically and mentally abusive to him. The divorce cost the boy his only protection, his father, and so, mutism began.

To escape the abuse, he regressed deeper inside. This, however, only heightened the abuse. His mother and stepfather insulted his inability to talk.

Frightened, the child could not even talk with his family. His mother eventually was admitted to a psychiatric home and is unlikely to ever be released. Her husband disappeared, leaving the child alone.

The boy has been in the states with his father since he was five years old. Immediately, the father, who had remarried, noticed his son not only was emaciated but malnourished to a degree. He changed his son’s diet, which brought a measure of improvement.

Complicating Chances of Recovery

The child’s traumatized condition was compounding by moving to a new country and learning a new language.

The boy is not autistic and does not have Asperger’s. He just has been frightened into silence by his treatment and what he has witnessed.

Within a short period, he adapted to his new home. Soon he felt well enough to speak with his father and stepmother. Indeed he grew fast at school. A straight-A student, he actually talks to a couple peers. But he experiences trouble talking to teachers and many students.

This was the situation presented to me.

When the family came to see me, and I spent much of the session with the child. We enjoyed a good conversation. Onesided yes, but he was willing to answer by shaking his head and writing answers more elaborate answers.

He is a bright boy with a sense of humor.

After numerous psychiatric, psychological and medical doctor examinations that were fruitless, he was enthralled when I explained why he was not speaking.

As long as he wanted to speak and as long as he gave hypnosis a chance, this was a good opportunity to soon be as normal as his friends.

I made sure the family understood the importance of ensuring that the boy received plenty of protein, a protein-rich diet of small meals every two hours.

If not properly nourished, the brain functions from its primitive fight, flight, freeze level. In the end, this creates a rapid heartbeat and breathing, causing the shakes, sweating, nervousness, irritability and insomnia.

By ensuring that the child ate protein every two hours, his blood sugar levels would rise slowly and remain at the appropriate level to ensure higher functioning critical and logical thinking. The benefit to the child is that the underlying feeling of anxiousness disappears – because of the correct nutrition.

The next step was a harder but still successful. Once hypnotized, the boy was able to reproduce the feelings of panic and anxiety he normally suffered. Upon my request, he stopped the feelings. He understood he controls the feeling. Not only could he create it but make it vanish.

This was satisfying to the child. He had not known this was possible. I had him view the trauma he had experienced, as if watching a movie from a safe, relaxed perspective.  This, too, made him feel better.

After the first session, I asked if he was willing to say the word “strong.” I wanted him to understand he is strong in enduring what he had gone through.

He wrote that he wanted to, but his mind would not let him. Could say “Ess”? He nodded, smiled and said “ess.” I asked him to say “te.” He complied. Putting both together, he pronounced the first two letters.  He was thrilled, I was thrilled. A miracle, said his jubilant father.

All of us, and most importantly the boy, believe in a short time he will be living as other kids do, speaking to whomever he wants whenever he wants.

Do not hesitate to contact me by telephone, 310.204.3321, or by email at nickpollak@hypnotherapy4you.net. See my website at www.hypnotherapy4you.net