Denise Billen-Mejia 0:07
Welcome to Two hypnotherapists talking with me, Denise Billen-Mejia here in Delaware, USA.
Martin Furber 0:13
And me Martin Furber in Preston UK.
Denise Billen-Mejia 0:16
This weekly podcast is for anyone and everyone who would like to know more about fascinating subject of hypnosis and the benefits it offers.
Martin Furber 0:24
I'm a clinical hypnotherapist and psychotherapist,
Denise Billen-Mejia 0:27
I'm a retired medical doctor turned consulting hypnotist.
Martin Furber 0:31
We are two hypnotherapists talking.
Denise Billen-Mejia 0:34
So let's get on with the episode.
Carrie, it's so nice of you to join us today, from Arizona, Thank you.
Carrie Ann Apap 0:42
It's so great to be here with you.
Martin Furber 0:45
Yeah, greetings from England. Carrie.
Carrie Ann Apap 0:48
Thank you.
Denise Billen-Mejia 0:49
So you've been a hypnotherapist for over 20 years? Would you be willing to talk..
Carrie Ann Apap 0:56
Twenty-four years
Denise Billen-Mejia 0:56
Really? Wow.
Carrie Ann Apap 0:58
Yeah.
Denise Billen-Mejia 0:58
So would you would you like to tell us about some differences? There are already some differences because Martin practices in the UK, and you're here in America. But what have you seen over that 20 years?
Carrie Ann Apap 1:09
Well, I just see a lot of I don't know, I think it's my own growth that I see that's different. You know, there's so many different modalities to use. And, you know, I have used, you know, pretty much the Ericksonian type of thing that's the old, you know, type of hypnosis, and yet by going and attending conferences and stuff like that, I've learned a lot of new little tricks for use as well. And now I use a lot more NLP than I did at the beginning. And you know, it's all good.
Denise Billen-Mejia 1:55
What brought you to hypnosis in the first place.
Carrie Ann Apap 1:58
I had for many years. Since I was 20 years old, I experienced something called Epstein Barr Virus clinical fatigue. No one knew what it was at that time. They just they kept taking these tests, they said nothing's... we can't see anything wrong.
Denise Billen-Mejia 2:16
It really until the 80's we got...
Carrie Ann Apap 2:18
experiencing this. It could be like mono, it could be you know, all these different things. And so that was a journey. And I did learn that I was very hypoglycemic along the way. So once I stopped eating sugar, that helped tremendously. But in 1990, I finally found a physician that said, I think I know what's going on and took the bloodwork and it came up positive, and I had this Epstein Barr Virus. So and he said, there's really nothing we can do about it. He said, you know, go home, rest, eat well and stuff, you know, it might last six weeks, six months, six years, whatever. Mine was typically a six to eight week stem that I got it felt very flu like and exhausted. So I, I had a client, I was in a different business, and I had a client at that time that said, you need to read this book, my husband's read, it's really been very helpful for him. And that was Louise Hays book, you can heal your life. So it was about self talk and affirmations. And I said, Well, this makes sense. And so I started doing it felt like a lie. At first, because I was in what I call a dis-eased mindset. Every morning I woke up looking for what's wrong today, am I gonna...how's..? You know, how much energy do I have? How sore am I? You know, that was my mindset. And I, so I began to do this, like I say, this self-talk. And like I said, it felt like a lie, but I thought there's something to it. I just know there's something to it. So I continued to do it over and over and over again. And eventually, my focus was on wellness, versus a disease that was focusing on wellness. So there was a shift there. When that happened. Wonderful physicians and practitioners and nutritionists came into my life to help me heal. And I would say to myself that I was radiantly healthy, in body, mind and spirit and I would say it over and over and over and over and over again. I'd meditate I'd pray I'd go for walks and you know, I just constantly was focused on being radiantly healthy. And when people began to approach me and literally say to me, I don't know what it is, but you're just radiant I'm thinking, wow, that's interesting. And it wasn't just one or two people. It was a lot of people, complete strangers, and then people that I've known forever. No one ever told me that in my life, and yet they were using those words. So I knew there was this incredible connection between the mind and the body.
Denise Billen-Mejia 5:19
This is something I've gotten something I have realised fairly recently, people when people say psychosomatic, they always think of, it's a psychosomatic illness. And mind. Right, but mind and body is psychosomatic. That's what the word means. And if we had a feeling that oh, yeah, it's all in your head. So you can go for that. Somatic health. Yes, yes.
Martin Furber 5:44
Yeah. Psychosomatic wellness. I always quote Michael Yapko, Carrie. The expression, 'Anything you concentrate on, you will amplify'. Yeah,
Carrie Ann Apap 5:56
You bet. Yeah. Exactly. So anyway, that was kind of my story and studying the mind and the body led me to take some courses in hypnosis.
Denise Billen-Mejia 6:09
May I ask, who did you train with?
Unknown Speaker 6:12
I trained with Anne Spencer? I don't know if any of you know her? She was the founder of the International Medical and Dental Hypnotherapy Association.
Denise Billen-Mejia 6:21
Oh, okay. Yes, I know, the organisation.
Carrie Ann Apap 6:24
You know, the organisation well she was the originator and the founder of that organisation. And she owned Infinity Institute. And I trained with her for my clinical work. And then I worked with the Clinical Hypnosis Institute for my medical hypnosis.
Denise Billen-Mejia 6:53
So where did you set up your practice first? Because you weren't in Arizona then?
Carrie Ann Apap 6:58
Michigan. Yeah, I was in Michigan. And you know how it is when you first start, you just kind of do a little bit at a time, dabble, friends, whatever. And so, then I just set up a little office in my home at the time and did a little advertising here and there and people began to come and I actually started doing Hypno birthing. The Mongan method, and so when I started doing that, I worked with Botsford Hospital in Farmington, and I would I had group classes, I worked with an adjunct to Botsford hospital, actually. And so I did groups there. And I worked with theHholistic Nurses Association and the Obstectric Nurses Association. And so that's when I really stepped in to doing hypnosis when I did the hypno-birthing, and it was a major part of my work.
Denise Billen-Mejia 8:14
That's great. Now, have you seen any changes in people's attitude over that? 20 years? Because hypnosis for childbirth? Most people have been aware of it for at least 20-30 years. Yeah, it's far more common. Now, I think. And certainly, if somebody says, I use hypnosis for my babies, nobody's surprised,
Carrie Ann Apap 8:34
Right.
Denise Billen-Mejia 8:35
Have you? Is that just that ebb and flow in the same way that acceptance of hypnosis tends to?
Carrie Ann Apap 8:43
Um, you know, I think it's just the person. I mean, some people have very, I try to you know, eliminate that fantasy right away when I see my clients so that they have an idea that hey, you know, this is just a normal state of being, I'm in hypnosis all day long.
Martin Furber 9:13
Carrie, you work online, don't you as well as seeing clients face to face?
Carrie Ann Apap 9:18
I do. Primarily, I work you know, locally face to face.
Martin Furber 9:25
Yeah. No, I just wonder...
Carrie Ann Apap 9:26
if they do work online. I mean, you know, that's just been the way of things but even during the COVID thing here, we didn't get I guess, hit as badly with that, with the whole COVID thing. I would ask people I offered you know, I said I happy to work online with you or wherever, or in person. And they all said I'd rather work in person, right online. works beautifully. We all know that. Yeah, yeah. We've come to learn that.
Denise Billen-Mejia 10:07
Yeah. And you told me I think I can't remember if it was before or after we started recording, but you have you had somebody who'd seen, who was visiting your area, and then you were able to continue that relationship. because of the online,
Carrie Ann Apap 10:20
Right, he was, he was doing some work with a woman here. I don't know if she does coaching type of things, or whatever, and met her in a networking group and stuff. And she knew he wanted to quit smoking. And so she set it all up for him to see me before they started their little retreat. It was kind of...
Denise Billen-Mejia 10:48
Oh I see. Oh, that's good. So you just saw him the once in person, and then you're continuing online?
Carrie Ann Apap 10:53
I saw him once in person. And then this week, I saw him yesterday. Saw him online.
Denise Billen-Mejia 11:00
Do you have a set programme for quitting smoking? Because that tends to be handled differently by different people? Yeah. Okay,
Unknown Speaker 11:07
I do it in three sessions. Typically, now, if someone's like, red hot, and they're coming in, and they go, I want to do I know, I can do it in one session, I've maybe done it before. And and others don't say, fine, I'm fine with that. And usually, if they're that, you know enthusiastic, they're going to be fine. They're absolutely fine with that. But I typically do it in three sessions. The first session, we focus on solidifying the decision to quit, and the second session is our stop smoking session. And the third session is stress management. I'm big on teaching people to pay attention to how they feel. And to work with those emotions, you know, to guide them, they're guiding them, they're telling them this is you don't like this, it doesn't feel good. And this is where we're gonna go. This is what we really want. So that's a big thing, focusing on what they want. The big, big thing.
Denise Billen-Mejia 12:22
Do you work with local doctors? Do you have the opportunity to work with them?
Carrie Ann Apap 12:27
Yes, I have. We have a lot of naturopathic doctors here. And so there's several of those I work with and chiropractors and, you know, different medical people I work with,
Denise Billen-Mejia 12:42
Do you do childbirth stuff stilll?
Carrie Ann Apap 12:45
I still do it. It's not my focus, not my main focus. It's on my website. So people who are looking for Hypno birthing or whatever.
Denise Billen-Mejia 12:54
So you don't do you don't do groups with anyone. You just do one on one.
Carrie Ann Apap 12:58
I'm not doing that anymore. I haven't gone to the hospitals here, you know so much. In Michigan, we had, we actually had one hospital that, you know, had a Birthing Unit, and it was all natural birth and all midwives and doulas, that kind of thing. They were close enough to hospitals, so they could get there if they needed to. I mean, they were like, adjacent to the hospital, right here. So they, they would do a lot and so and I would do a lot of CEU work you know, CEUs for the obstetric nurses. Yeah.
Denise Billen-Mejia 13:33
So for the British people that's CPD.
Martin Furber 13:51
Right okay.
Carrie Ann Apap 13:53
What did you say?
Denise Billen-Mejia 13:54
Continuing Professional Development in the UK
Martin Furber 13:57
Yeah, it's just translating it for our international viewers and listeners.
Denise Billen-Mejia 14:00
We try to keep away from the 'Woo-Woo' but also the acronyms because it depends on context.
Martin Furber 14:08
So Carrie, do you deal a lot with fears and phobias?
Carrie Ann Apap 14:13
Absolutely. I love fears and phobias.
Martin Furber 14:15
Yeah, let's talk about some fears and phobias.
Carrie Ann Apap 14:18
Yeah, I'm like 99.9% successful,
Denise Billen-Mejia 14:24
So she's here she is in Arizona with snakes and spiders and scorpions. All sorts of fun stuff.
Carrie Ann Apap 14:32
Yeah, yes.
Martin Furber 14:34
what's the strangest phobia you've ever dealt with without breaching any client confidentiality, of course.
Carrie Ann Apap 14:40
We have a lot of heights because we're in the mountains.
Denise Billen-Mejia 14:43
Of course.
Carrie Ann Apap 14:44
Yeah. You know, I see a lot of that and....
Denise Billen-Mejia 14:50
Driving in the mountains? , Driving on the bridges?
Carrie Ann Apap 14:56
There's a lot of people are fearful, fearful of driving. You know? The young kids now they're not even driving until they're like, in their 20s. Really? Many young people here are like, they don't drive.
Denise Billen-Mejia 15:11
What, do they get Uber's or you have good buses.
Carrie Ann Apap 15:15
Like, yeah, like, they're in Michigan, though my grandchildren and they don't drive. It's like, you know, we're like...
Denise Billen-Mejia 15:25
Yeah, I'm 16 - Give me my license.
Martin Furber 15:26
Yeah, you need a car there, everything's so vast and spread out, isn't it?
Carrie Ann Apap 15:34
Yeah. So that, you know, driving, of course, is one of them. Failure and fears and businesses and, you know, that type of thing. And just, you know, I think a lot of people have social anxieties and stuff. So there's a lot of fears around that.
Denise Billen-Mejia 15:58
I've seen a lot of particularly older women, since the pandemic, because it was, it was so long with all those stops and starts again, socialising. I've seen a lot of people that want to rekindle their confidence in themselves. Right? Because it's affected by COVID.
Carrie Ann Apap 16:17
Yeah, yeah. I see fears with athletes that are after injury and that kind of thing. So it's an interesting...
Denise Billen-Mejia 16:31
Do you do much in bereavement? That's another fairly big thing.
Carrie Ann Apap 16:36
I'm actually with a woman right now who lost her son. When he was like, 14, he got cancer, and lymphoma, so it was like a seven year battle. So she was at his bedside for that whole time. It's very, very, very challenging and difficult for her and being the mediator between him and the doctors and everything was just, you know, really exhausting. And so that, yeah, so I'm dealing with that right now. Because now it's been a good long time since he has passed. That being said, it's still you know, it's a part of them. I have another neighbour who lost their son last Christmas time. 23 years old, you know? Yeah. So I do, you think it would maybe be older people that have lost their spouses or, but I'm finding that it's mothers and their children? And it's a tough thing to do. But this one woman, we're working heavily on that, and she had a lot of abuses growing up as well. We've been working through to unravel everything through.
Denise Billen-Mejia 18:08
Yeah, very solution focused, right, Martin?
Martin Furber 18:10
Yeah, absolutely.
Denise Billen-Mejia 18:11
We should focus on where we want to be.
Carrie Ann Apap 18:13
What they want to feel, I usually have them pick out just a few words. You know, I want to feel respected and, you know, at ease, or whatever their, their situation is, whatever the emotion is telling them, because it's really just telling them they don't like it. And what do they like I said, this is about us, creating some new realities your new neural pathways. And so they get their words, and I usually have them picked three or four words. And I said that's your mantra, you say that over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. The subconscious mind is gonna start leaning into that, and focusing on that, but the beautiful thing is, too, and I, I don't know how much you guys work with that, energetically, it changes things. You know, I work a lot with energy as well. And so it's the now energetically, that's where you are. So you're not only beginning to move yourself in that direction, you're beginning to attract situations to you energetically, that, you know, will match that as well. So, you know...
Denise Billen-Mejia 19:30
Again, it's again, it's the what you're paying attention that's what's going on. Yeah,
Carrie Ann Apap 19:36
Exactly. So that's how I how I work.
Martin Furber 19:40
Yeah. So would it be fair to say you do a lot of you know, you try and get your client to do a lot of future focusing.
Carrie Ann Apap 19:49
Absolutely. Or even now focusing I want them to focus now. Yeah. Oh, they say what right now? Today. How do you feel? If you feel good, just keep doing it. Then ask yourself, breathe. What do I want? How do I want to feel? Because the feelings are taken, because the thoughts follow the emotion. We all know that. And so that's the pattern interrupt instead of allowing those thoughts to attach to the negative emotion. Just observing the emotion. I mean, that's, you know, I find that is pretty much standard with almost everything and everybody I work with, I always work with that.
Martin Furber 20:40
Yeah, I mean, I tend to concentrate a lot on detaching emotion from memories. Because as you know, you know, you can have memories. Yeah, you can have a memory of something bad that's happened, but you can detach the emotion from it, you can recall the memory without all the emotions anymore. You know, I tend to do a lot of work on that kind of thing. In future focused we use a lot of scaling over here. So yeah, we may ask somebody, for example, if you're feeling five out of 10, in terms of happiness at the moment, imagine if you woke up tomorrow, when you were feeling six out of 10. You didn't quite know what happened. But something had happened in your sleep, and you're feeling that a little bit better. What would you be doing differently? And we say we always go on doing.
Carrie Ann Apap 21:31
Exactly. Yeah, exactly. That's perfect. It's along the same line.
Martin Furber 21:39
Oh, yeah.
Carrie Ann Apap 21:41
You know, it's all it all works together. I do some future pacing kinds of things, too. But you know, we have so many tools.
Denise Billen-Mejia 21:52
So where do you see... you've been in business for 23 years, you presumably are approaching retirement age? Do you see yourself...
Carrie Ann Apap 22:01
I tried that already.
Denise Billen-Mejia 22:05
So where do you see yourself going? This is a comfortable size practice for you? Do you want us to sing out for everybody call Carrie and get a session? Carrie online? Are you are you are you comfortable with that? Or do you, Do you see yourself doing anything, adding anything else to the way you practice?
Carrie Ann Apap 22:25
I think, isn't it? Like I said, I think it evolves. I think we learn we evolve. We have our own personal experiences that take us along the way. And do I want to be the rock star of hypnosis? No. Not at this time. Yeah. You know, I've got enough.
Denise Billen-Mejia 22:47
I got other things to do tonight.
Carrie Ann Apap 22:49
I enjoy my time. My own time. So you know, I, in fact, I don't advertise at all. I've got like Google things going, and I've got my social media, but I don't really advertise. And I used to advertise a huge amount.
Denise Billen-Mejia 23:11
But how long have you been in Prescott now?
Carrie Ann Apap 23:14
I've been in Prescott since 05
Denise Billen-Mejia 23:18
Oh, so you've had lots of time to have established a base?
Carrie Ann Apap 23:21
Yeah, yeah. See?
Denise Billen-Mejia 23:24
Most of it is word of mouth referral now?. Now, oh, you should see Carrie, I saw her 20 years ago...
Carrie Ann Apap 23:29
You know, my friends say the physicians that are involving, I think it's really good to get aligned with you know, physicians that are, see the value of hypnosis. Of course, a lot of physicians see the value of it with smoking? Yeah, so, you know, smoking or weight loss. So that type of thing. So, in those cases, what I do to build that relationship with the physician, is I asked for permission, I send a letter to them, and let them know that I'm working with their patient. Especially if they, they've recommended it's not a big deal. So thank you very much for the recommendation, but you just you know, and this is what we're going to do and so, you know, then they see oh, wow, this has been helpful, it's been successful and then we'll recommend,
Denise Billen-Mejia 24:36
Do you do a lot of weight loss?
Carrie Ann Apap 24:38
I used to, I'm not doing so much weight loss anymore. I don't know why. I mean, I do it. I used to advertise big time for weight loss. And of course that brought a lot of a lot of clients and for that have a lot of success with it. I just, I don't do it as much I do it. You know, people call me to do work with weight loss and we do it. That being said, I probably do more smoking. I probably see people for smoking, vaping is another big thing. Yeah, you have a lot of vaping going on now,
Denise Billen-Mejia 25:27
Do you see many younger people. I mean, like adolescents who are vaping, that kind of thing.
Carrie Ann Apap 25:33
I've not you know, they haven't. They're still invincible you know. Those were the days! It's like, you know, I'm gonna conquer the world, or whatever. So I do, I see young people whose parents I've maybe worked with in networking groups with, and they're having problems with socialisation, or you know, things like that.
Denise Billen-Mejia 26:04
College anxiety. Yeah. Leaving home for the first time.
Carrie Ann Apap 26:10
Those are the kinds of things that you know, I work with, with young people and of course, athletes, I do work with athletes.
Denise Billen-Mejia 26:21
Do you do? Do you work with the aches and pains of it? Or do you work, the performance enhancement? That sounds like steroids, but that's not what I meant.
Carrie Ann Apap 26:30
I work mostly with performance enhancement. Now, what sometimes comes with that if someone has had a severe injury, say they're playing football, and they have a really bad injury, maybe an ankle injury or something. And they have to be in a wheelchair for a couple of months. And you know, and now it's a year later. And they, you know, want to play football, but they have a lot of anxiety about going yeah, of course. So injury types of things. Yeah, I do, as well.
Denise Billen-Mejia 27:09
It helps helps that your husband is a coach.
Carrie Ann Apap 27:14
Well, that kind of introduced me to that area, because like I say, I created the masterful athletes programme for his ballplayers in his team. And when I came here a friend of mine's husband was the head wrestling coach, and he was using visualisation and different things like that with his, with his wrestlers. And so he approached me, he said, I wanted, I want to create a programme. And so we did that together. So our programme was used on it.
Martin Furber 27:54
Carrie, have you ever helped anybody with nerves for things like public speaking for example?
Carrie Ann Apap 28:02
Sure, well, yeah. And that's a fear, isn't it? It's fear of getting in front of people, you know, and speaking, and, you know, feeling comfortable about that. Of course, again, when using a lot of visual things, like you say, seeing themselves, you know, in that situation, you know, the, the mind loves those pictures and symbols, and all kinds of things like that. And so, when they repeatedly and repetitively do that and see those pictures, then they're there. They're there, they step onto that field, and an auditorium in front of a podium, or whatever it is. And they're on. It's like, you know, they their body and their mind and everything respond the way it wants to, because they've seen it, as much as I did used to that situation.
Denise Billen-Mejia 29:04
And their brain assumes that must have happened because it saw it.
Carrie Ann Apap 29:07
Yeah. It believes it.
Martin Furber 29:11
Yeah, you know, as we all know...
Carrie Ann Apap 29:13
People don't always realise...
Martin Furber 29:16
They don't realise that the brain can't tell the difference between imagination and reality, necessarily.
Denise Billen-Mejia 29:21
Your intellect can, but your brain itself no. Yeah, do you just segwayed completely, poorly, not what we're talking about right now. Do you use audios with your clients? Do you do a session and then send them a recording?
Carrie Ann Apap 29:39
I do, if I move you can see some of my equipment equipment over there. Okay.
Because I, the subconscious likes repetition. Yeah. Hmm. So whether we give them something to repeat over and over are we use an audio it's the same thing You know, they need to have that repetition so that you can to change new neural pathways, some of these habits to emotion and fears or whatever have been there for a very long time. So we need to introduce new neural pathways and create new pictures. I do.
Denise Billen-Mejia 30:24
What's the, what's your usual interval between sessions?
Carrie Ann Apap 30:29
If I'm doing a programme it's typically, I do it once a week. Okay. I see them every week. Or every other week. I mean, some people are a little bit different. I'm fine with every two weeks or someone has to go on a vacation, not has to, wants to go on a vacation.
Denise Billen-Mejia 30:48
Yeah, with me if they're going on vacation that I bring it forward. I'm usually two weeks, but that one week if they're going to be away, because I don't, I don't really want it to go longer than two weeks. That's great. How many clients do you see on average a week do you think?
Carrie Ann Apap 31:04
I typically will do maybe three a day and I work maybe three days a week. Sometimes I have to work more, spread it out and different things. So that would be like about nine, maybe nine clients a week or so.
Denise Billen-Mejia 31:18
That's a nice time - you can still go for lunch. You can still do things.
Carrie Ann Apap 31:26
Right. Exactly. I go for lunch. I hear now. I work with them. Typically, my appointments themselves are an hour, an hour and a half a lot of times this one woman like I told you that I was working with the grief of her son. Those sessions have been going even a little longer. So I give myself time. Between my sessions. Yeah,
Denise Billen-Mejia 31:53
I have a big buffer in between.
Martin Furber 31:55
Yeah, me too. I cannot believe that time has gone so quickly. Carrie. Yeah, we need to thank you for coming on here.
Denise Billen-Mejia 32:06
Well, we'll chop it up a little bit. So it's a bit it's a bit shorter for the braodcast.
Martin Furber 32:09
Yeah, I can't believe that time is gone. Carrie, thank you so much for coming all the way from Arizona.
Carrie Ann Apap 32:17
It was my pleasure. Thank you for the invitation. I'm so glad to be here.
Denise Billen-Mejia 32:22
Do you have any parting words for our listeners? Other than think positive thoughts.
Carrie Ann Apap 32:28
Yeah, and yeah, absolutely. Focus on what you want.
Denise Billen-Mejia 32:40
We hope you have enjoyed listening. Please remember, this podcast is designed to give you an insight into therapeutic hypnosis, and is for educational purposes only. So remember, consult with your own healthcare professional if you think something you've heard may apply to you or a loved one.
Martin Furber 32:56
If you found this episode useful, you can apply for free continuing professional development or CME credits. Using the link provided in the show notes. Feel free to contact either of us through the links in the show notes. Join us again next week.
