The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Gretchen’s Headaches

I got a call from Gretchen one Sunday evening. She and Tom had been in an accident in his little Datsun pickup, and it was going to be in the shop. He needed her car to get to his job. Could I be her ride to and from work until his was fixed? Their apartment wasn’t far from where I lived and was more or less on the way, so of course I agreed.

When I picked her up on Monday morning, I was shocked at her appearance. Her eyes were deeply bruised, more than her sunglasses could hide, and she had spidery red lines on her forehead, chin, and cheeks, where a plastic surgeon had done what appeared to be an excellent job of closing up the cuts she’d received when she hit the windshield.

“Should you even be going to work?” I asked.

“I can’t stay home,” she seethed. “I’ve got to get out.”

On the way to the office, she poured out her story. She and Tom went out Friday night and he picked a fight during dinner. They left the restaurant and he drove like a wild man, finally rear-ending another car. She was sure he did it on purpose; he swore that their brake lights weren’t working. He was uninjured. She thought it was because he knew they were going to crash and he was braced for it. He was contrite, but she wasn’t buying it.

Some parts for Tom’s pickup were backordered, so I wound up driving her for several weeks. We talked a lot. She was completely fed up with Tom and was more convinced than ever that he had tried to hurt her in the accident.

She started getting severe headaches in the afternoons. Her doctor said they were unrelated to her head injury, that it was tension. She came into my office one afternoon to bum some aspirin. She looked miserable.

“Oh, this head! Every day it’s like this—I can’t stand it.”

“You’re too tense. You’re anticipating the headaches, and that just makes it worse. And you’ve got to consider the timing.”

“What do you mean?”

“Every afternoon? Face it, you don’t want to go home and deal with Tom.”

She sighed. “I know you’re right. I think the same thing myself. But it doesn’t stop the headaches.”

“Hypnosis can be a big help, especially with tension headaches. I can teach you to do self-hypnosis, so you can treat yourself, before you burn a hole in your stomach with all this aspirin.”

“Thanks, I’d like to try that,” she said. “What do I have to do?”

“What would make you feel most comfortable?”

“I’d like to close my eyes and put my feet up.”

I closed the office door and said, “Fine, pull a chair over and put your feet up.”

She settled herself, but no sooner had I turned off my phone and sat back down than there was a knock at the door. Before I could ask who it was, Ellen opened the door and quickly surveyed the scene.

Gretchen said, “Lucky’s going to teach me how to use hypnosis for my headaches.”

“Yeah, fine. Whatever. I’ll catch you later, Lucky,” said Ellen, and left, closing the door a little harder than necessary.

“Sorry about that,” I said. “Just get yourself settled again and close your eyes. I’m going to use a different technique than you saw me use with Shayna, one that lets you see how you got into the trance state and how you can go back there whenever you want. Just follow the sound of my voice and soon you’ll be in a deep, restful relaxing state.”

I did a Dave Elman-style induction, relaxing her eye muscles. She quickly accepted the suggestion that she couldn’t open them, and I progressed the relaxation through her body, reinforcing it with additional waves of relaxation passing through her. I then gave her mental images of relaxation and deepening. My final image was of her lying on warm sand on a beautiful tropical beach, close to the water’s edge. The water was warm, I said, just as warm as the sand and the air.

“A wave washes in, covers your feet with warm water, lingers for a moment, and washes out again, taking away tension, leaving behind relaxation. The next wave washes in, midway to your calves. It feels so warm, so relaxing, and it washes out again, leaving you more relaxed.”

I’d found that this image of warm waves progressing up the body was not only very relaxing, but also subliminally seductive for women. It lent a subtle sexuality to the trance experience without being overt. I couldn’t resist using it on Gretchen.

“… and the next wave envelops your entire body in warmth, deeply relaxing warmth. It feels so good, so warm, so relaxing. You feel open to the water’s warmth, open to its relaxing power. And now the wave recedes, laying you gently on the warm sand, completely relaxed, open and receptive, deeply relaxed.”

I was pretty sure I didn’t need to do anything else; she looked like cooked spaghetti. I took a moment to study her face. The cuts had healed very well, almost invisibly. I think plastic surgeons take more care when they work on pretty young women. The bruising was gone. So was the tension that had lined her face just a few minutes ago. I shifted my tone.

“As you continue to rest and relax and enjoy the warm, comfortable feeling in this state, you can feel the changes in your body and mind. Your thoughts are just as calm as your body, untroubled, following the flow of my words. And you notice a difference. Can you tell me what it is?”

She swallowed. “My headache. It’s gone.”

If it hadn’t been gone, I would have worked on it with more imagery and deeper relaxation. But she’d grabbed onto the trance state as though I’d thrown her a life preserver, and the expectation of relief from the headache was probably as powerful as the relaxation itself in getting rid of it. I didn’t have to make any direct suggestions about it diminishing or being gone, which was good.

I then told her that she could induce this state herself by saying “Gretchen, deeply relaxed” to herself, or I could say it, and the effect would be the same. I then told her that I would count her out of the trance, and that she would be able to do the same whenever she wanted to awaken. I also told her that I would rehypnotize her to reinforce the reinduction trigger and that she would practice it too.

“… one, wide awake, feeling refreshed, feeling good all over.”

“Mmm, that was nice.”

“How do you feel?”

“Refreshed. Good all over.”

I smiled inwardly at how often I heard my own words echoed back to me at this point.

“And the headache?”

“Gone.”

“Good. And as we discussed while you were in hypnosis, you’ll find yourself much better prepared to manage the coming evening with Tom, and you won’t dwell on it. Tension will just roll off.”

She got a little trancey-looking as I used the same phrases I’d used earlier. I love playing with this time when they’re fresh out of the trance, with the lines between hypnosis and wakefulness still blurry. It’s a good time to reinforce therapeutic suggestions.

I continued, “And your mind has learned to associate the phrase we just discussed with the feeling of being in a deep trance. As I say it, you’ll find yourself back in that deep, relaxed state, just like flipping a switch…. Gretchen, deeply relaxed.”

She sighed, closed her eyes, and sank back into hypnosis. I repeated the trigger, added a few deepening phrases, and told her that she was floating down, deeper and deeper, and that she would tell me when she was as deep as before. I used some of the open and receptive language from the beach image and watched her nipples harden, making inviting bumps on her blouse, then relax. I wondered for the umpteenth time what governed these little salutes and whether women were aware of it happening, but it was nice to be able to study her small, but shapely breasts without embarrassment.

She said “Okay” quietly, and I reinforced the trigger. I reminded her that it would be her turn to hypnotize and wake herself and that the results would be exactly the same as when I hypnotized her. I counted her up again, and she greeted me with a pretty smile.

“Wow, that really works! I was out like a light!” She stretched, and her nipples said hello again.

“Okay, your turn,” I said. “Remember when you awaken yourself to envision the same sense of well-being, alertness, and feeling good, unless, say, you’re using it before bed and you want a good night’s sleep.”

“You can use it for that?” She pondered a moment and answered her own question. “Sure, why not.”

I promised to give her a good book on self-hypnosis, saying, “Now that you know how it’s done, you’ll be amazed all the things you can do with it.”

“Cool. Now all I have to do is say ‘Gretchen, deeply relaxed’ to myself? Do I have to say it out loud or to myself?”

As she said it, she already looked a little trancey, so I said, “As you can see, it’s already working. You can say it silently; it doesn’t matter. Repeat it while you think about what it feels like, and watch what happens. While you’re in there, just remind yourself that you can do this whenever you like.”

Her eyes closed and she slumped. A minute or so later, she opened her eyes. It took her another moment or two to come fully out of it, She gave me a big grin.

“Outrageous! I love it! And I feel so relaxed, so mellow. I can definitely get through this evening—and all the others.”

She left my office, leaving me to ruminate on what a shapely bottom she had as it retreated down the hall.

The next day, my boss called me into his office. He closed the door. Uh-oh.

“I’ve, uh, gotten a complaint about you hypnotizing all the women in your department, and I think maybe it should stop,” he said.

“Tony, you know that it’s all above-board and innocent. And I certainly don’t just hypnotize women. You know I got Ed to stop smoking.” Ed was our accounting manager. I actually had no interest in hypnotizing men, but did enough to avoid suspicion.

“I know, but the party involved said it was intimidating and scary.”

“Ellen said that?”

He looked away, then looked back. “She seemed pretty pissed off.”

“You know I put her on warning.”

“So you told me. What’s her beef? Did you try to hypnotize her?”

I laughed wryly. “No, I wouldn’t hypnotize her on a bet. Sometimes when you hypnotize people who have a screw loose, it gets looser. I think she’s that type. I limit my practice to smoking, nail-biting, and sleepless nights. She needs a lot more than that.”

Tony nodded. “I’ve got no problem with that. But you just watch it where she’s concerned. She’s out to get you. Word to the wise, and all.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“Women,” he said.