Weight Loss Hypnotherapy and the SIMOS Technique

Most people who come for weight loss hypnotherapy are not short of information. They know what they should be eating. They have usually lost weight before, sometimes a great deal of it, and then watched it return.

That pattern is the actual problem, and it is not solved by another eating plan. This article explains what hypnotherapy addresses instead, and what the SIMOS technique involves.

Why diets keep working and then stopping

A diet is a set of conscious rules applied to a largely unconscious behaviour. That works for as long as your attention and willpower hold, which is why almost every diet succeeds initially.

The difficulty is that eating is rarely driven by conscious decision. It is driven by habit, emotional state, learned association and reward, none of which are consulted when you decide on Sunday evening that this week will be different.

When attention lapses, as it inevitably does, the underlying pattern is still there and reasserts itself. Nothing has changed except your energy for fighting it.

What SIMOS actually is

SIMOS stands for the surgical implant of a mental or imagined gastric band. It is a hypnotic technique in which, in a focused state, the experience of having undergone gastric band surgery is created and reinforced.

The point is not deception. It is that the mind responds to vividly imagined experience in ways that measurably influence physical sensation, including satiety, portion tolerance and the sense of fullness. Clients typically report feeling full sooner and being satisfied by less.

The procedure is delivered across a structured series of sessions rather than in one, with the imagery reinforced and the associated eating behaviours worked on alongside it.

What it works on beyond portion size

Reducing how much you can comfortably eat is only part of it. The work usually also addresses emotional eating, which is the mechanism behind most regained weight, and the beliefs people hold about their own body and capacity for change.

Someone who eats when stressed has a different problem to someone who simply eats large portions out of habit, and the programme is shaped around which of those is actually driving things.

An honest account of what it can and cannot do

This needs stating plainly. SIMOS is not surgery and does not produce surgical results. It carries none of the risk of an actual gastric band, and equally none of the mechanical restriction.

The evidence base for hypnotherapy in weight management is moderate rather than strong. Studies generally show hypnotherapy added to a behavioural programme outperforms the behavioural programme alone, which is a real finding but a more modest one than the marketing around imagined gastric bands sometimes implies.

Results vary considerably between individuals. Anyone guaranteeing a specific weight loss is not being straight with you.

Who it suits, and who it does not

It tends to suit people whose difficulty is behavioural: portion size, snacking, emotional eating, the cycle of losing and regaining. It works best alongside sensible eating rather than instead of it.

It is not appropriate where there is a diagnosed eating disorder, and a responsible practitioner will refer rather than treat in that situation. If weight gain is recent and unexplained, see a GP first to rule out a physical cause.

What to expect practically

Expect a course of sessions rather than a single appointment, and expect to be asked in detail about how and when you actually eat rather than what you think you should be eating.

Recordings for use between sessions are commonly part of the programme, because reinforcement between appointments is a meaningful part of how the technique consolidates.

Frequently asked questions