Anna had been in pain all day. She was on prescription pain killers, and had been for several years. However, the pain killers that morning provided relief for about 1 hour, and she could only have one every 4 hours. That was 3 hours too many every 4 hours for several days a month... She had tried several treatments over the years, and at this stage her doctor was only refraining from hormonal treatment due to her being so young.

I saw her mid afternoon, she had taken pain killers about 2hours before and they were still easing the pain, "the longest they did ever work" according to Anna's own words. This didn't make the use of EFT easy, since the pain was partly hidden. Yet, Anna could still feel it in her lower belly and she rated at it a 2 on her 0-10 SUDS.

Even though I have this 2 pain in my lower belly, I love and accept myself. 

The pain didn't bulge much at first. So we had to go again "even though I still have this pain in my lower belly, I DO love and accept myself.".

After the second round, things started to happen, however very slowly. As we were talking and tapping, the pain started to move back and forth, so we started chasing the pain happily around : lower belly, lower back, side of the hips, middle belly, middle back just above the waist line, mostly staying around a 2 on the SUDS or even worsening to a 3 at some stage. Maybe it went to a 3 because the pain killers action was disappearing? And as Anna put it, maybe she couldn't feel the back pain or the "middle belly" pain at first because the lower belly pain was more important? We'll never know. But eventually, all pain subsided. 

As we kept talking, it appeared that Anna also suffered from eczema. She had it as a very young child, so bad that when she was 4, she had to have her arms bandaged and wear mittens to prevent her from doing further damage. She got several treatments from skin specialists to healers or reflexology (for this and other issues). When she was 8, it completely went away, but then it came back as she was getting into secondary school. She did realise that her eczema was getting worse with stress. Nowadays, she only had a few spots on the back of her thighs, but she had scratched them during the previous night, and she could feel them right now, more as a discomfort, than a pain. As I wondered out loud if it made her feel angry or sad, she nodded knowingly on the anger. That was excellent since we knew immediately what to tap for :

Even though I'm so angry at this eczema, I love and accept myself, and I forgive the eczema for all the pain it gave me over the years, and I choose to release it now.
Even though I'm angry at myself for scratching last night and making it worse, I was half awake and couldn't control it, I love and accept myself, and I forgive myself.

Again, it did take a few rounds before Anna said she couldn't feel anything anymore. 

And as I thought we were done, Anna confessed that the period pain, or maybe just discomfort, was "sort of coming up and down around" as we were talking.

Even though this pain keeps coming back and forth and I really don't need it any more, I love and accept myself, and I choose to release all pain right now.

As it appeared to go away again, we finished this session then.

Anna's case was definitely not a one minute wonder, and it took persistence to get some results. There is still a lot to do, since Anna is a worrier and stress is a big part of her life. But at least now she has a tool to address it whenever she feels it coming up, and for that I'm grateful to EFT.