Is there a particular hypnosis session that might work for long COVID sufferers?
My question relates to underlying aspects of my post-COVID long-haulers or long COVID syndrome.
Among many people with this syndrome, one of the biggest issues seems to come from dysregulation of the nervous system. It may be part of the cause for the fatigue and brain fog, for example.
Now, there are theories that once our nervous system gets geared up, it doesn't come back down, and other studies showing damage to the brainstem area, which might account for a problem with the vagus nerve. The body also has trouble creating serotonin, likely from gut dysregulation, as we know most serotonin is in the gut, which also may play a role in the problem. Just as a side note, it leads to a lot of anxiety and depression in post-COVID patients.
Is there a particular hypnosis session that might work for nervous system dysregulation long term? I'm not sure if this is something that hypnosis can deal with, but I figure it never hurts to ask.
This question was submitted by 'Andrew'
Mark says...
We do have, Andrew, a session on hypnosis and the immune response, and it could be helpful. Little actually seems to be definitively known about the effects of long COVID, but it does seem that long-term damage has occurred in some people who had COVID quite badly. This could be, as you suggest, to do with damage to the vagus nerve.
Now, we know that some behaviors help the vagus nerve. This thick bundle of nerves (it's not just one nerve, it's many) runs through the body and enables us to digest, relax, for our immunity to work well, and for us to feel emotionally stable, and so forth. Regular relaxation will help the vagus nerve "tone up," as it were. So when people listen to an audio session and relax deeply over time, they tend to start feeling generally calmer and I would suspect, even in some ways, physically healthier. Because, of course, stress is a detriment to physical health, and when we feel less stressed, we feel healthier in both mind and body.
So, simply some of the relaxation downloads might be really useful for your long COVID clients. We have a particular download, Immunity and Hypnosis, which is specifically geared toward helping people optimize their immunity. And there's been good research showing that hypnosis can indeed aid the immune response. That’s why we created that session - it’s based on what we know to be research-backed.
Other ways of regulating the nervous system are deep diaphragmatic breathing, which can really begin to tone the vagus nerve and help people feel calmer and more energized. The interesting thing with this sort of breathing is that it's the out-breath that really calms the person. It's not just breathing in - it's the extended out-breath that mobilizes the parasympathetic nervous system, your relaxation response. That’s why people sigh when they're stressed.
So, doing deep diaphragmatic breathing into below the belly button to the count of five, and then out to the slow count of seven - the out-breath longer than the in-breath - and everything starts to calm down. That’s what we're looking for.
Now, sometimes people who’ve been very tense - anxious types - tend to over-breathe in a shallow, dysregulated way. And suddenly doing diaphragmatic breathing can be a bit of a shock to the system. It might even cause anxiety because their system has become so inflexible that any alteration produces a stress response. So, maybe for such types, just start by doing it for 30 seconds to a minute at first, and then gradually extend the practice. That will really help the immunity and vagal response in the body.
So, there are a few things there. I hope that’s useful, but certainly more research needs to be carried out on the effects of long COVID as well.
Published by Mark Tyrrell -
May 12th, 2025 in 
