Overcoming toxic relationships

Overcoming a toxic relationship is challenging, but it’s absolutely possible. Here’s a guide to help you heal and move forward:

1. Recognizing the Toxicity

• Identify patterns of manipulation, gaslighting, control, or emotional abuse.

• Acknowledge the effects on your self-esteem, mental health, and overall well-being.

2. Setting Boundaries

• Limit or cut off contact if possible.

• Say no without guilt. You don’t owe explanations for protecting your peace.

3. Seeking Support

• Talk to trusted friends, family, or a therapist.

• Join support groups for emotional validation and guidance.

4. Healing and Self-Care

• Focus on self-love and rebuilding your confidence.

• Engage in activities that bring you joy and peace.

5. Breaking Trauma Bonds

• Recognize cycles of abuse and emotional dependency.

• Replace unhealthy patterns with healthier relationships and self-worth.

6. Learning and Growing

• Reflect on red flags and what led to the toxic dynamic.

• Use the experience to strengthen your boundaries in the future

How to cope with ADHD and over thinking and anxiety

Decision-making with ADHD can be especially tricky because of analysis paralysis, and anxiety. When faced with choices, the ADHD brain often:

🔄 Overthinks → Gets stuck in loops, fearing the "wrong" decision
🤯 Gets overwhelmed → Struggles to prioritize or filter options
⏳ Procrastinates → Avoids making a decision until the last minute
💭 Forgets → Moves on, then later realizes the decision still needs to be made

Coping Strategies for Decision-Making Anxiety

1. Reduce the Number of Choices

Too many options = paralysis. Try:
✅ Setting a limit ("I’ll pick from these top 3 options.")
✅ Using a decision filter (Does it align with my values/goals?)
✅ Asking ‘What would I tell a friend to do?’ (Easier than deciding for yourself!)

2. Time-Limited Decisions

• Set a decision deadline (“I’ll decide by 3 PM.”)

• Use the 2-minute rule (If it takes less than 2 minutes, just pick one.)

• Flip a coin—not to decide, but to see how you feel about the outcome!

3. Avoid Overanalyzing

• Perfection is a trap → Most decisions don’t have a single “right” answer

• "Good enough" is often good enough → Done > perfect

• Think of decisions as experiments → You’re gathering data, not locking in forever

4. Use External Tools

📊 Decision Matrix → Make a simple pros & cons list or rank options
📝 Write down past decisions → Helps prove to yourself that you’ve made good choices before
📆 Automate/reduce decisions → Meal planning, outfit templates, or checklists reduce mental load

5. Body-Based Decision Making

• Gut check → Notice how your body reacts to an option (tightness vs. relief)

• Movement-based clarity → Walk while thinking, doodle, or fidget to help focus

• Take a break → If you're spiraling, step away and come back fresh

6. Externalizing & Support

• Talk it out → ADHD brains think better aloud (voice notes, friends, or coaching)

• Ask for outside input → Sometimes, a different perspective simplifies things

• Create "default" choices → If no strong preference, go with the simplest option

If you found this helpful but need more help then you can contact me or shop around for the recordings on this website for more help.

How to cope with Sexual Anxiety

Before I write any more on the topic of Sexual Anxiety, please bare in mind that that this post is for those who are in safe, loving relationships but whom may be affected by past trauma or certain anxious tendencies that have affected your sex life or your sexual performance.

Some people experience Sexual Anxiety when they are in controlling, toxic, and abusive relationships. They may also experience it when the relationship is breaking down or simply not right for them. Its a complicated subject and one that requires a lot of self inquiry.

So I would recommend that you take the time to reflect on what is written here and work out what is going on in yourself and your relationship in order to work out the next course of action.

What is Sexual Anxiety?

Sexual Anxiety is an offshoot of Generalised Anxiety but it can relate to very specific trauma, It can also stem from shyness, social anxiety, the way you perceive your body and a severe lack of self confidence.

If you think about it, to have sex is to be vulnerable.

The person or people that you chose to have sex with will know all of you. The stretch marks and the wobbly bits. Not to mention the fact that they will be able to see parts of you from angles that not even you have seen yourself. Its a very revealing experience.

Those of us whose bodies have been the object of judgement, or those of us who have had our personal boundaries violated by other human beings in cases of sexual abuse can feel the most powerful negative human emotion that exists. SHAME.

How does Sexual Anxiety relate to Shame?

Shame is so powerful. Its powerful because it is linked to death.

Prehistorically, if a group rejects us, we lose our access to food, shelter, security from predators and the ability to mate. In the wild a lot of pack animals die if they are rejected by the group and cannot find another one relatively quickly.

Shame is about rejection.

So to take our clothes off, without instagram filters and to perform is a vulnerable thing to do and you could be rejected. This is why men who experience sexual anxiety often experience either premature ejaculation or erectile dysfunction. The ability to perform is tied up with a mans sense of masculinity and his ego.

Women tend to freeze, have difficulty expressing their needs sexually and can have difficulty reaching orgasm. A lot of women who I work with have a tendency to no feel anything and just let their partner get on with it.

5 Signs that you might be suffering from Sexual Anxiety

• Difficulty looking your partner in the eye or meeting their gaze

• Feeling numb or ‘freezing’ during sex or even when a partner just wants to feel close

• Having a sex drive or fantasizing about sex but not actually doing the act with your partner

• Being overly concerned with how you look or act during sex

  Avoiding sex altogether even though you realise you have a desire for it

  Sex is such a vital part of a relationship and it plays a significant role in your overall health that’s its important to address what is going on so that you can get over the things that are holding you back and flourish in your intimate relationships. That’s why I have set up specific hypnotheraputic methods for sexual anxiety and you do not have to see me face to face to benefit from it. You can benefit from sessions remotely, or in recordings that are sent straight to your device.

  To feel confident again you need to deal with the root cause of why it happend in the first place.

  Hypnotherapy can be used as a way to understand yourself better, to calm down your flight or fight response and to help you to regulate your emotions so that you can enjoy yourself again.

If you would like to try hypnotherapy as a way to deal with the cause of your anxiety. Then wherever you are, please get in touch.

Mossman - Pacey Paradox, Male Fertility and Hypnotherapy

Mossman-Pacey paradox and male fertility

Scientists have recently discovered what they call an evolutionary paradox in men. Some men are literally damaging their fertility to look good with the use of steroids. Self esteem in men is incredibly important. Regardless of their sexual orientation or identity men have a need to perform. It helps them to feel that they can adequately satisfy their partners and increases their sense of masculinity.

There are a growing proportion of men who equate muscles with the ability to feel as though they can perform, be attractive and attract a partner. This has turned them towards increasing steroid use. However, the steroids that they are taking are causing them to become less fertile suffer erectile dysfunction. Paradoxically this leaves a man feeling and even becoming less attractive to their partner due to an inability to perform.

How does this relate to therapy and how can Hypnotherapy help?

Well, the bottom line is that men are no different to women when it comes to self esteem, confidence and the need to find a partner.

In fact men are often considered to be incredibly sensitive in this area.

When you look good, you feel good. Who doesn’t want to feel good? Steroid use boost this and the way someone looks in the mirror can distract them from the dramatic and sometimes long term use of steroids.

Is there any good news?

Men can learn to increase their sense of self esteem by resolving the issues that lead to their insecurities in the first place. Perhaps it was a previous relationship? Maybe it was an overly critical father? Did someone cheat?

Resolving those issues and instilling a greater sense of self can prevent a person becoming obsessed with their body and therefore the steroid usage.

Hypnotherapy can help to resolve the underlying issue and break habits.

If you are looking for online therapy, therapy in Brackley, Banbury or the surrounding area then please get in touch.

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You don't have to live with Chronic Anxiety

When I was in my 20’s and really suffering with horrendous anxiety symptoms. There were things that helped me and things that definitely didn’t

When I was in the stages of my anxiety where I was actually functioning forgetting about things with alcohol, staying up late and distracting myself with my friends was my go to. I would have a social engagement every night. I would not recommend this because, not only with you become absolutely knackard but your emotional resilience starts to crumble. You get spikey, grumbly, aloof etc etc etc.

Until eventually, the adrenaline, cortisol cocktail becomes so exhausting that the most frightening anxiety symptoms appear.

• Exhaustion

• Headaches

• Feeling like you’re not really there

• Body Zaps

• Pounding Heart (Heart Palpitations)

• Chest Pain

• Nausea

The list goes on and on.

Of course this means that rather than being the social butterfly that I was before, I retreated.

A life of bed, naps and telly.

I spend a good two years like this. I spent an unbelievable amount of money trying to get rid of it. One person said my Chi was off and stuck a load of acupuncture needles in me.

I went to see a therapist who said it was down to hidden childhood trauma and she spent a load of time analyzing which chair I was sitting on so that she could work out my toxic personality.

Another therapist said stress was trapped in my body and did extensive massage ( I must admit this did feel good). It worked until I left the massage table and had to go to work the next day.

It went on and on.

Until one day, I went to see my doctor about something entirely different, he asked how I was and I said how much I tried to get rid of the way I felt mentally.

He looked at me and smiled ‘ My dear, you wont get rid of it until you stop trying to.’

The truth is no one can get rid of anxiety. Its natural. In fact the stress hormone Cortisol actually plays a part in waking us up in the morning. Without it, we simply wouldn’t.

Its biologically wired to serve us. Its there for us when something is a miss. Its that little feeling that you cant ignore when you are on a date with a someone a bit off.

Anxiety kicks in to ensure that you are alert enough to see the pedestrian on your driving test. It kicks in again when it looks like you are going to be made redundant and ensures that you are actually concerned enough to look for another job.

Quite frankly, without it, you would be a mess, or maybe even dead!

The problem its become to dominant in your life. Instead of sharing your body with the other necessary hormones, its become too excited.

It stays up late giving you insomnia when it doesn’t need to.

It jolts into action when you don’t want it to.

It sends your heart on a marathon when you could actually do with binge watching some calming nature programmes.

So, I hate to say it to you but if you’re anxiety has gone a bit wild, you are going to have to spend some time re training it. Like a dog.

However, trust me, it will calm down. And so many of us in the modern world have managed to turn this little insignificant hormone into an absolute three headed beast.

If you try and get rid of something that is completely natural to the body you will merely create tension and that tension will create stress and that stress will create anxiety.

Easier said than done because, of course, anxiety is horrible. So horrible in fact that you would be insane not to want to get rid of it. But you must let it be there, you absolutely must.

Its about teaching it to be appropriate and this is where hypnotherapy comes in. I can help you teach it to become appropriate, to teach it to become a great friend instead of an absolute monster.

If you want some help then please do get in touch.

Call me on 07525051263