I recently visited my sister and her family. Right at the start of my visit I took a drink of water out of a glass which was standing in front of me. “You didn’t drink out of that, did you?” asked my sister. “That glass belongs to Luise, and she’s highly contagious.” I bent over the glass and spat the following words into it; “Make sure you don’t catch the Stefan disease!” Then I drank all the water in the glass. And nothing else happened – at any rate not to me.

A variation on the intervention in “Morbus Feivel” can be seen in the story “Risk of Contagion”. The story externalises the problematic bodily experience into the glass and gives implied instructions to the immune system to switch from a defensive to an offensive position

(From: Stefan Hammel: Handbook of Therapeutic Storytelling. Sories and Metaphors in Psychotherapy, Child and Family Therapy, Medical Treatment, Coaching and Supervision, Routledge 2019)

The city of Chelm once became the breeding ground for a strange epidemic, and this is how it happened. So many people in the city were falling ill that Doctor Feivel thought to himself how much quicker and easier it would be to stop examining the city’s residents to find out what illness they were suffering from, and instead to find out who had been infected by health and what kind of health it was. He diagnosed healthy bones in a patient who had no broken legs, a healthy heart in another patient, a severe case of healthy skin in a third and so on. When Schlemihl came to see him, he diagnosed uninflamed health of the gums. When Schlemihl asked him what he meant, the doctor – who had already started examining his next patient – muttered, “Morbus Feivel, advanced stage of severity.” Schlemihl did not really understand what he meant, but did not wish to admit his ignorance and so did not query the diagnosis. When he arrived home and his wife asked him what the doctor had said, he answered curtly, “Infectious health.” Schlemihl’s wife wondered how it could be possible that she and the children still had a cold when they lived in such close quarters with Schlemihl. When she asked Doctor Feivel, he explained, “It’s because of the incubation time. The proper symptoms only appear a few days after transmission of an infection of this kind.” And by the next day Schlemihl’s wife and children were indeed feeling much better. “We’re suffering from infectious health,” they explained to their neighbours. “We caught it from Schlemihl.” The neighbours were also infected with health over the next few days, and soon Morbus Feivel had spread like wildfire throughout the entire city. Before long the residents of surrounding villages came to infect themselves with Schlemihl’s epidemic, and eventually the entire country was infected with it – at any rate according to Schlemihl’s version of the story.

In my experience, anyone who regularly makes the apparently nonsensical claim that he or she is suffering from infectious health, as described in the story “Morbus Feivel”, is more likely to remain healthy during an outbreak of infectious disease. At the same time, some people appear to respond to the warning, “Watch out! I’m suffering from infectious health!” by recovering more rapidly from an illness. The story is based on a Polish-Jewish narrative tradition popularised by Isaak Bashevis Singer. (Singer, 1968. The idea of infectious health also appears in Hammel, 2012b, 51.)

(From: Stefan Hammel: Handbook of Therapeutic Storytelling. Sories and Metaphors in Psychotherapy, Child and Family Therapy, Medical Treatment, Coaching and Supervision, Routledge 2019)

Imagine you’re an eagle flying over the Alps. You’re flying in the direction of the midday sun, towards the place where the land known to humans as Italy lies far behind vast mountain ranges. You can see towering mountain peaks and cavernous valleys. You pass through a storm, with flashes of lightning electrifying the air and squalls of wind making you flap your wings more vigorously. There is no question of coasting on air currents here – you need to use your wings, and you also need to use them to make it safely over the summit of the Bernina Pass. Once you are over the summit, the mountain peaks gradually get lower, and the weather gets calmer and more pleasant. As you fly onwards, the landscape turns into a patchwork of hills and then into a series of gentle undulations, before finally levelling out almost entirely. You reach the sea. Its waves are smooth and flat, and it stretches out before you like a giant mirror. You fly out over the open sea. For a long time you fly towards the rising sun, then again towards the midday sun, until you reach land again – the Sinai Peninsula, which is a desert. Once again you fly towards the rising sun, before finally catching sight of a broad and smooth expanse to your left – the Dead Sea, the calm surface of which is completely unbroken by waves. You fly there, towards an oasis you have spotted behind it. The Jordan River is small and surrounded by green trees and bushes. You alight on its bank and take a drink from its water, finding a shady branch to sit on if you like. Take a minute to look around. You are at the lowest point in the world. The calm, smooth mirror of the Dead Sea lies four hundred metres below sea level. Enjoy the peace and quiet as you sit on your branch, and take anything which has proved useful with you when you fly back home.

The following story was designed and tested for the purpose of reducing and stabilising the pulse and blood pressure, and can also be used to stabilise a patient’s breathing rate at a low level and reduce the frequency, duration and intensity of muscle contractions, for example during premature labour. It is also suitable for reducing panic attacks; when used in this connection, the start of the story must be told in a flustered or panicky manner (principle of pacing and leading). In slightly modified form, the story can also be used for dental treatment, for example in connection with a dental phobia, in which case the eagle should see a chain of snow-capped mountains a long way off which might bear a vague resemblance to a row of teeth for some people, but the eagle has a sharp beak and is not worried about such things…

(From: Stefan Hammel: Handbook of Therapeutic Storytelling. Sories and Metaphors in Psychotherapy, Child and Family Therapy, Medical Treatment, Coaching and Supervision, Routledge 2019)

Steam engines hold a particular fascination for many people and exert a special attraction over both young and old. Anyone who owns such a precious machine must handle it very carefully. The most important thing which a steam engine does is to regulate pressure. It is vitally important for the steam pressure valve to open in good time and reliably discharge any excess pressure. It is also important to ensure that steam engines are only heated to a moderate temperature, particularly if they are already well advanced in years. They need regular breaks, proper oiling and expert maintenance. It is a huge mistake to overheat a steam engine, and a mistake that will only be made by an amateur. A good technician knows what his treasured engine needs, and always drives it at a moderate pressure.

The story “Steam Engines” can be used to regulate blood pressure and breathing and to reduce stress, as well as to equip patients to handle stressful emotions more easily.

(From: Stefan Hammel: Handbook of Therapeutic Storytelling. Sories and Metaphors in Psychotherapy, Child and Family Therapy, Medical Treatment, Coaching and Supervision, Routledge 2019)

“My feet often feel as cold as ice,” said the man. “That’s why I catch so many colds. I used to have Kneipp treatments and that really helped, but I can’t do that everywhere.” “Let me tell you a secret,” said the other man. “An imaginary Kneipp treatment will work just as well if you imagine it hard enough.”

The case study “Placebo II” demonstrates a similar procedure for sluggish circulation, in which the patient imagines a Kneipp hydrotherapy treatment.

(From: Stefan Hammel: Handbook of Therapeutic Storytelling. Sories and Metaphors in Psychotherapy, Child and Family Therapy, Medical Treatment, Coaching and Supervision, Routledge 2019)

“I used to get terrible stage fright every time I had to speak in public,” said the man. “My blood pressure shot up, I got palpitations and my breathing became rapid and shallow. But then my wife gave me these tablets to lower my blood pressure, and I’ve not had any problems since then.” “Can I tell you a secret?” replied the other man. “Every time you take a tablet, your body knows that it needs to reduce its blood pressure – it knows what it has to do in response to the tablet. It knows it so well that it will do what it needs to do by itself, even if you just carry the blood pressure tablet with you.”

The case study “Placebo I” illustrates how blood pressure can be regulated by imagining blood pressure tablets. The story could also end; “Your body knows it so well that it will do what it needs to do even if you simply draw a white circle on every page of your presentation to remind you of the blood pressure tablets.” Further interventions on stage fright and exam nerves can be found in Hammel 2017, 103.

(From: Stefan Hammel: Handbook of Therapeutic Storytelling. Sories and Metaphors in Psychotherapy, Child and Family Therapy, Medical Treatment, Coaching and Supervision, Routledge 2019)

While the paramedic hurried over and the ambulance crew shouted instructions to each other, I imagined a large manta ray gliding through the warm water, with strong calm flaps of his majestic fins, noiseless and beautiful, the embodiment of calm, the embodiment of calm, the embodiment of calm… a truly wonderful creature!

The story “Manta Ray” outlines an intervention for impending heart attacks and asthma attacks, and was inspired by a patient who had suffered a heart attack but who amused the ambulance crew, paramedic and himself with jokes and anecdotes to relax both them and himself and to keep his blood vessels open, based on the principle that anxiety narrows the blood vessels, whereas relaxing images and thoughts widen them and thus increase the chances of survival in a threatened or acute heart attack. Similarly, anxiety during an asthma attack makes it harder to breathe and results in exactly what the patient fears. The metaphor incorporates suggestions for relaxation of the emotions and muscles, regulation of the frequency and intensity of the heart rate and breath and widening of the vessels (warm water), since the simulation of these autonomic states by the imagination stimulates a matching state in the body. Prior mental training is necessary to ensure that these images are called to mind automatically during a heart attack or asthma attack. If necessary, the manta ray should start flapping his fins with “fast and irregular beats” which then gradually become slower. When the story was told to a patient suffering from palpitations (sinus tachycardia), a reduction in pulse rate and a significant improvement in the accompanying symptoms were observed afterwards. The story can be modified to feature an electric ray which generates electrical pulses while he moves, in the same rhythm as his heart beat. As ever, it is important to use these methods to complement traditional medical treatments rather than as an alternative to them. Further stroies that can be used on heart diseases are found in Hammel, 2011, 67, 162. Stories and narrative interventions for asthma patients are found in Hammel, 2011, 70ff., 171 and in Hammel, 2017,120.

(From: Stefan Hammel: Handbook of Therapeutic Storytelling. Sories and Metaphors in Psychotherapy, Child and Family Therapy, Medical Treatment, Coaching and Supervision, Routledge 2019)