Just imagine a mum watching her son at the age of 18 months going for a swimming lesson then to be brought back to reality by screaming and a flurry of activity as that child was brought lifeless out of the pool. Luckily, Eddy survived and so did the trauma of this experience. For 18 months after this, now at the age of 3 1/2, Mum and Dad were struggling with washing his hair, splashing his face and FEAR of water until…
They met me (Stuart Walter).
I was travelling with my family around Australia when I met this family in an adjoining caravan. The mother had stopped smoking a few weeks earlier and as we chatted about hypnotherapy she mentioned that her son was angry due to a ‘blockage’ in his bottom, with previous toilet visits involving discomfort, pain and blood. As a result, he was consciously avoiding going to the toilet and wider behavioural changes were a consequence of this toileting avoidance. His worried mother asked if I there was anything I could do and with this I developed the first of my stories, The Baseball Player. The following day the mother came to me with an amazed look on her face… her son (then 3 1/2) had gone to the toilet and there was no comment of pain and everything was back to normal. The Meta4Kids concept was born.
It was only a few minutes later as she was marvelling at how simple and efficient the meta4kids story was in resolving toileting issues that another opportunity arose. The mother turned to her son and asked if he wanted to go for a swim… the response… “Don’t let my die mummy! Don’t let me die! Being fully aware of the intensity of his response, the mother provided me with the background. For the past 18 months her son could not have his face splashed with water, no hair washing and no swimming. At the age of 18 months, he had slipped into the pool during a swimming lesson and the long-term results were intense to say the least. With my heart in my mouth and tear in my eye (thinking about this and my own son), I created the second story ‘Fly and Be Free’ and I delivered this to Mum.
The following day as we returned to the caravan after a day out, we passed our neighbours walking back from the swimming pool. A look of amazement on Mum’s face, followed by a shrug of the shoulders and a smile as her son excitedly told me a story of how “we just went swimming and I dived under the water and splashed and… and…”
The meta4kids stories were born!
And this story ‘Fly and be Free’ is now just one of the 20+ stories in the Meta4Kids collection… short stories for long term change.
Meta4Kids
