High speed switch to hypnotherapy for world champion rally driver

Posted November 2006

Natalie Barratt, the world’s top woman rally driver, has qualified as a hypnotherapist after clinical hypnosis helped her overcome two major career threatening problems.

The Cheshire-based racing star suffered a crisis of confidence following the deaths of her co-driver and a close friend.  On top of that she also found herself diagnosed as having rheumatoid arthritis.

It was, she admits, a low point in her life and came close to quitting the high risk world of racing …  until she realised she would miss the excitement too much.

But the lows combined with the highs of the adrenaline of racing on international circuits proved an unhealthy combined.

It created a rollercoaster of emotions with the result that she lost her confidence the year co-driver Roger Freeman was killed. 

“I thought the absolute world of him. That was a life lesson,” she explained.

“My brother asked me to stop rallying after Roger died. I thought about it, but I couldn't. I realised I love this thing I do so much, I will not stop. Life's for living, I believe that.
Natalie Barratt

But the lowest point was being on a rally seven weeks after her best friend was killed in a helicopter crash. 

“I’d gone probably 40 metres down a mountain, rolled eight times, climbed out of the car, pulled my co-driver out and sat at the top, bawling my eyes out,” she recalled.

“Sometimes it's not been a healthy balance – the rollercoaster of emotions – and I've found clinical hypnotherapy has helped me. Clinical hypnotherapy restored my confidence and cured me of arthritis.

“It's a fascinating practice which enabled me simply to get back in the car.”

Having experienced the benefits of hypnotherapy Barratt decided to train and qualify as a clinical hypnotherapist herself and now has her own clinic in Manchester.


 
© 2006 James Braid Society; all rights reserved
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