Sheren Gaulbert lived with severe vulvar pain for ten years — bedridden, on high doses of amitriptyline, and told by a leading specialist to consider giving up work. What changed things wasn't a new medication or a new specialist. It was a self-hypnosis script she recorded herself off the back of a book she picked up in a bookshop, something a friend had dismissed as just the latest fad. That breakthrough led her to train as a cognitive hypnotherapist, and she's now a Trustee of the UK's Vulval Pain Society. We go through her full story and what cognitive hypnotherapy actually involves.

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Timestamps:

(00:00:00) Cold open
(00:00:15) Intro
(00:01:07) Sheren's story begins — law school & early symptoms
(00:03:27) Onset of pain in her early 20s
(00:04:14) Starting amitriptyline & dropping out of law school
(00:05:41) "You've already seen the best person"
(00:06:34) Told to consider bed rest & quitting work
(00:08:24) Amitriptyline climbing to 95mg over 10 years
(00:09:01) The nocebo effect
(00:10:03) Ten years of excruciating pain
(00:11:30) Isolation & finding the Vulval Pain Society
(00:12:57) Physio & trialing therapies methodically
(00:14:08) Restrictive diets & early self-hypnosis that didn't work
(00:16:09) A friend mentions "the latest fad"
(00:17:32) Recording her own hypnosis script
(00:18:34) The values-based turning point
(00:20:54) Deciding to help others
(00:22:11) Sponsor: Origin
(00:23:54) Sponsor: Pelva
(00:25:13) Man's Search for Meaning
(00:26:17) Training to become a cognitive hypnotherapist
(00:27:39) What is cognitive hypnotherapy?
(00:29:02) Predictive processing & pain
(00:33:39) The trance state, explained
(00:36:32) Debunking stage hypnosis
(00:37:32) Undoing old beliefs, EMDR & her recovery "trio"
(00:43:20) Who she works with
(00:46:18) The pain science debate
(00:49:51) What makes her hopeful
(00:52:01) "There is no shame"
(00:52:48) Where to find Sheren
(00:53:53) Outro & two-week break

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