Do you sometimes feel that life lets you down?
You’re depressed, your body revolts against you, and nothing seems to help.
One fine day, you learn about a novel therapy gives you dose of “hope-ium”, only to disappoint you later.
I know exactly how you feel because what you just read is my story. Depression gripped me for a miserable 19 years before it finally left my life.
Twenty years feeling stupid and depressed
My health took a downturn upon enlisting into the army in 2003. Poor hygiene caused me to contract a 7-week long flu that left me feeling literally stupid and in a state of low energy. My mind felt 24/7 foggy and I witnessed the beginnings of a drawn-out depression.
Until then, I always believed that the symptoms will blow over. Maybe it’s the sleep deprivation in the army, or maybe it’s the bad food. If I get enough rest, I would be fine.
But I couldn’t shake it off like Taylor Swift.
Even after leaving the army in 2005, the stupid feeling remained and no amount of sleep could satisfy my body. Later on, I learned their names: early dementia, chronic fatigue, and depression.
It’s nice to finally have a name but it got me nowhere close to recovery.
Still I had faith that it would end someday without my involvement. Just take more rest and give it more time. The body would recover.
The turning point in my life
One morning in 2012, I got out of bed to a body riddled with symptoms, feeling depressed to the bone. I was a terribly bad piece of meat.
That morning, I told myself that this was it. I was going to unravel this health mystery and reverse everything.
Skipping the gory details, I started with nutrition protocols that merely offered some relief. Feeling stuck and desperate, I reached out for alternative therapies.
The Initial Frustration with EFT Tapping
The Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) or EFT Tapping is a popular healing modality among alternative health practitioners. It was featured in a health blog that I followed.
Tapping is as simple as it sounds and it’s meant to release you from the offending emotion. You just need to tap on the appropriate meridian points on your body while focusing on the offending emotion. The emotion can be anything from depression to guilt to anxiety.
I grabbed a copy of The EFT Manual by Gary Craig and read it from end-to-end. Feeling hopeful, I began applying it to my symptoms. Before an exam, my stomach would churn like a washing machine ending with trips to the toilet.
No improvement.
Not one to give up easily, I tried it on my digestive problems and chronic fatigue.
Status quo.
Feeling deflated, I declared EFT as yet-another-fad and put it aside.
EFT Tapping heals my depression and chronic diarrhoea
Two years later in 2014, EFT appeared in my life again as The Tapping Solution book by the EFT expert Nick Ortner. The book read like a novel and offered a much clearer way of how to use EFT Tapping for depression.
Featured in the book was Lindsay Kenny’s “The Trauma Tree” framework. It illustrates why we should categorise our issues into symptoms, emotions, events, and beliefs because they’re tied to each other.
That was my a-ha moment. Previously, I thought I was targeting my emotions but I was in fact tapping on symptoms 2 years ago.
With the newfound knowledge, I wrote down 83 issues, sorted them accordingly, and immediately got cracking.
Over the next 3 months, I spent half hour every night blazing through the list. It was going for broke.
EFT heals a root cause of my depression
To be honest, I wasn’t expecting much after my first brush with EFT.
Chronic diarrhoea was one of my most bothersome symptoms. The toilet and I were best of friends because I was forced to visit the toilet 7-8 times daily. I woke up every day to a dull ache in my stomach that persisted till I slept. I used to joke that I had it worse than women who only had cramps during menses.
After tapping for some days, one quiet night, the magic happened.
I was working through my list of issues when I visited the line item “mom passed away”.
You see… My mom tragically passed away in 2006 that sank me deep into depression. Over the years, I thought I had gotten over it so I thought nothing of this item.
I did the EFT Tapping on the meridian points as I replayed the scenes from leading to her final breath.
The suppressed emotions surged forth in a stream of tears.
Even stranger, an electric pulse zipped from my “under eye” point to my tummy as I tapped on it. Every tap was deeply cathartic as it loosened the knots in my stomach.
Overnight, the 8-year chronic diarrhoea nightmare came to an end. EFT Tapping brought my depression down by 70%. I wasn’t expecting that.
Those were the happiest tears I shed.
The gates to the suppressed emotions swung wide open. As I tapped on the “under eye” meridian, I felt an electric pulse zip from that spot to my abdomen. The knots in my guts, which had plagued me for so long, loosened its grip as tears streamed down my cheeks.
Those were the most bittersweet tears that I shed.
Overnight, my chronic diarrhoea nightmare ended. It was nothing short of a miracle!
Freedom from emotional turmoil through tapping
Encouraged by the major breakthrough, I furiously worked on the remaining issues. Out of the 83 issues, five of them yielded positive results.
It might sound like a lot of work for a 6% hit rate but I don’t see it this way.
The successful resolution of the chronic diarrhoea and depression alone was enough to deem the whole endeavour a miracle. The other four are icing on the cake.
My clients recover with EFT Tapping
My success with the method led me to teach this to my clients as part of Radiant Flow’s hypnotherapy package.
I believe in empowering my clients to heal themselves. Terrible business model, I know… But making people come back for 10 to 20 sessions doesn’t reflect well on my ability as a therapist.
My clients who apply this technique are surprised how effective this technique can be for depression, anxiety, negativity and many other issues.
Tapping is not magic. It helps you release emotions trapped in your body.
Many people have recovered with EFT Tapping.
Are you ready for yours?
