Positive Health Online

This process was developed by Robert Dilts, an internationally known NLP trainer, when his guest speaker at a health seminar, an immunologist, Dr David Levi, made the remark “an allergy is like a phobia of the immune system, an overwhelming and inappropriate response to a harmless stimuli”. Robert’s response was “we can cure phobias in a remarkably short time, lets adapt it to cure allergies”. This he did successfully using bio-feedback. He should get the Nobel prize for medicine.

The counter example is something like the provocant to which the immune system responds appropriately. For example, dairy milk - soya milk, cat – dog, wool – cotton, house mites – flour, pollen – chalk dust, surgical gloves – another glove, sterilising solution – developing solution, scent – another scent, and so on.

A presupposition of NLP is the mind and body are part of a cybernetic system. We know that relaxing the body has a calming effect at a neurological level. Similarly a small change at the neurological level can bring about a massive change at a physiological level as in the NLP Allergy Cure.

We know there is a neurological element in the allergic response as illustrated by the following examples:

1) Guinea pigs presented with a provocant in the presence of an odour, after conditioning produce the allergic response in the presence of odour only.
2) The placebo effect of a replica of an allergen will bring on the allergic response, as in a patient allergic to flowers will develop the symptoms in the presence of an artificial flower if the patient believes it to be real.
3) Patients asked to imagine they are in the presence of the allergen begin to develop symptoms of stress, irregular breathing, tension in facial muscles, pallor etc. They may begin to get the symptoms.
4) Patients with multiple personalities have different allergies in different personalities.

The first stage of the therapy is to explain to the patient that the immune system is there to protect her but has made a mistake and identified a harmless substance as a dangerous pathogen. The patient is then asked to choose something like the allergen but to which her immune system responds appropriately.

Let’s assume that the patient has an adverse response to cats and chooses a dog as a counter example.
First of all I would have her imagine she is in the presence of a cat and calibrate her physiology, she may begin to get the symptoms. After changing her state I would then explain that her immune system has made a mistake and identified the dander of the cat as dangerous and the allergic rhinitis is her body’s way of protecting her. It is an inappropriate response.

I would then explain that when she is in the presence of a dog and breathing in its dander her immune system is actively identifying it as harmless.

Now she is asked to imagine she is in the presence of a dog “What would it be like for you now with a nice puppy dog beside you, imagine what it would look like, how would it feel if you could stroke it?” When I decide that she has this puppy fully in her imagination and her immune system is responding appropriately, I place my hand on her shoulder. This is an anchor for the state of the immune system responding appropriately in just the same way that Pavlov’s Bell is an anchor for the state of salivation. This state can be maintained by keeping a hand on the shoulder and used to retrain the immune system. It is simpler to demonstrate than describe but briefly involves using a dissociated image and slowly replacing the dog with a cat, but only as fast as the immune system can learn.

Success can be tested by asking the patient to imagine she is in the presence of a cat again and her physiology recalibrated. If the process has been successful, there will be a marked change from the first time she imagined to be in the presence of a cat. It must now be tested in the real world.

This process is very powerful. People have identified with a video of the process and allergic symptoms have disappeared. Demonstrating in front of a training group, a lady contacted me later and told me her allergy to house dust had subsequently disappeared.

There may also be a psychosomatic element to the allergy. This occurs when the patient gets some benefit from the allergy. An allergy to grass seed may give a man an excuse for not cutting the lawn, or the bizarre case of a woman who developed a severe rash when her husband kissed her. The counter example was her boyfriend! There were serious problems in the marriage and the cure did not last. Or an asthma attack may give an escape from a stressful situation – a conditioned response from childhood. These benefits can be dealt with using an appropriate NLP strategy.

Clinical trials have been carried out by Dr David Paul at Vail Medical Centre, Colorado and the telephone number is 001 303 476 5811.