Internalised Shame in LGBTQ People: Where It Comes From and How Hypnosis Can Help

The Quiet Arrival of "Different"

For many in the LGBTQ community, the realization of being "different" doesn't arrive with a fanfare. It arrives quietly, often long before there are words to describe it. It manifests as a subtle sense of being out of step with the world around you. It is the distinct feeling of needing to monitor your behavior, tone, and mannerisms. It is the early, wordless understanding that certain thoughts, feelings, or expressions must be hidden to ensure safety or affection.

Over time, this vigilance transforms. It deepens from simple anxiety or fear into something more corrosive: shame.

At Matthew Tweedie Hypnosis, we see this pattern frequently. High-functioning, successful, happily partnered LGBTQ adults who, despite their achievements and conscious self-acceptance, carry a heavy, invisible weight. They logically know there is nothing "wrong" with them, yet they feel a chronic background hum of wrongness.

This is internalised shame.

It is crucial to understand that internalised shame in LGBTQ people does not originate from the identity itself. It is not a symptom of being gay, trans, queer, or non-binary. It is a symptom of early conditioning. It comes from social messaging, family dynamics, and repeated micro-experiences that taught your developing nervous system one dangerous lesson: being authentic is unsafe.

This article explores what internalised shame is from a neurological and hypnotic perspective, why it persists even in supportive environments, and how we can use hypnotherapy to update these outdated emotional programs—not to "fix" who you are, but to help you finally feel safe being who you are.

1. The Anatomy of Shame: What It Is (and What It Isn’t)

To resolve shame, we must first define it accurately. In the context of therapeutic hypnosis, we distinguish sharply between guilt and shame.

• Guilt focuses on behaviour. The internal monologue of guilt is, "I did something wrong." Guilt can be constructive; it can lead to repair, apology, and growth.

• Shame focuses on the self. The internal monologue of shame is, "There is something wrong with me."

Shame is an identity-level distortion. For LGBTQ individuals, this shame often takes root during the imprint period of childhood (ages 0–7) or the socialisation period of adolescence. This happens when the brain is rapidly mapping the world, determining what is safe, what is acceptable, and what ensures attachment to caregivers.

Because this learning happens so early—often before a child has the vocabulary for sexuality or gender—the shame feels vague and pervasive. It doesn't feel like a specific memory; it feels like a personality trait.

The Symptoms of the "Shame State"

Clients often describe this state not as an acute emotion, but as a chronic "lens" through which they view the world. You might recognise:

• A Chronic Sense of Self-Doubt: A persistent feeling that you are "imposter-ing" your way through life.

• The "Spotlight" Effect: Feeling intensely exposed or uncomfortable when the center of attention.

• Difficulty Receiving Love: Deflecting compliments or feeling suspicious of affection.

• Hyper-Vigilance: Constantly overthinking how you are perceived by others.

• Minimisation: A tendency to shrink your energy, voice, or needs to avoid taking up space.

This is not evidence of a flaw in your character. It is evidence of a learned survival strategy.

2. How the "Software" Was Installed: The Formation of Internalised Shame

One of the most common misconceptions I address in the clinic is the idea that trauma requires a single, catastrophic event. Clients will often say, "I wasn't kicked out of home," or "My parents were generally okay," and therefore struggle to validate their feelings of shame.

However, the subconscious mind is a pattern-matching machine. Most internalised shame is not caused by "Big T" trauma (a singular shock), but by "Little t" trauma—the accumulation of thousands of micro-signals over time.

The Sponge-Like Nature of the Child’s Mind

Children are highly sensitive bio-feedback loops. They learn less from what adults say and more from what adults do, their tone of voice, their silences, and their micro-expressions.

An LGBTQ child might notice:

• A sudden silence when a flamboyant character appears on TV.

• A parent’s stiffened body language when the topic of gender comes up.

• Jokes at school where "gay" is the punchline for "bad" or "weak."

• That affection or praise is given only when they perform specific, gender-normative behaviours.

The Adaptive Nervous System

When a child perceives that their authentic self triggers discomfort, withdrawal, or ridicule in their caregivers or peers, the primitive part of the brain (the amygdala) tags authenticity as a threat.

To maintain safety and attachment, the child’s nervous system develops a split strategy:

1. The Public Self: Constructed to please others, minimise difference, and ensure safety.

2. The Authentic Self: Pushed into the shadow, labeled as dangerous or "wrong."

This is an adaptive response. At the time, suppressing your identity kept you safe. The problem is not that you did this; the problem is that the "software" never updated. You are now an adult living in a different environment, but your nervous system is still running the "Stay Hidden to Stay Safe" program from 1995.

3. The Role of Cultural and Social Messaging

We cannot discuss internalised shame without acknowledging the ecosystem in which it grows. This is what we call Minority Stress. Even if your immediate family was supportive, the wider culture provides a "background radiation" of messaging that the subconscious mind absorbs.

Consider the landscape many LGBTQ adults grew up in:

• Media Erasure or Villainy: Growing up seeing LGBTQ characters only as punchlines, villains, or victims of tragedy.

• Moral Narratives: Religious or ethical debates that framed queerness not just as different, but as morally corrupt.

• Legislative Debates: Watching your rights to marry, work, or exist being debated on the nightly news as if your humanity were an opinion.

Even if you logically rejected these messages, your subconscious mind—which acts as a relentless recording device—stored them. Over years of repetition, these external messages calcify into an internal emotional conclusion:

“Being fully myself may cost me safety, belonging, or love.”

This conclusion explains why social acceptance has risen faster than LGBTQ mental health has improved. Emotional memory lags behind intellectual progress. Society has changed, but our internal maps often haven't.

4. Why "Just Talking" About It Isn't Enough

Many of my clients have spent years in talk therapy (CBT, counselling, or psychotherapy). They can articulate exactly why they feel shame. They can trace it back to their father, the church, or middle school bullying. They have immense cognitive insight.

And yet, they still feel the shame.

Why does this happen? Why doesn't understanding the problem solve the problem?

Cognitive vs. Somatic Processing

The reason lies in how the brain stores trauma and shame.

• The Prefrontal Cortex: This is the logical, rational, thinking brain. It knows you are safe. It knows there is nothing wrong with being LGBTQ. This is where talk therapy primarily operates.

• The Limbic System & Brainstem: This is the emotional and survival brain. It controls the fight, flight, freeze, or fawn response. This is where shame lives.

Shame is a somatic (bodily) experience. It is a rapid-fire nervous system reaction. When you walk into a room and feel a sudden wave of self-consciousness, that is not a conscious thought; it is a reflex. It travels from your amygdala to your gut before your logical brain has time to get out of bed.

You cannot use logic to fight a reflex. You cannot "think" your way out of a nervous system response. To resolve internalised shame, we need a modality that speaks the language of the subconscious mind. We need to go deeper than the prefrontal cortex.

This is where Hypnosis comes in.

5. How Hypnosis Updates Emotional Memory

Hypnosis is often misunderstood. It is not mind control, and it is not magic. It is a state of focused attention and heightened suggestibility that allows us to bypass the Critical Faculty.

The Critical Faculty is the barrier between your conscious and subconscious mind. It acts like a security guard, rejecting any new information that conflicts with your existing beliefs. If you deeply believe "I am flawed," and someone tells you "You are perfect," the Critical Faculty rejects that compliment because it doesn't match the installed program.

In hypnosis, we gently distract the security guard. We access the subconscious directly to update the files.

The Mechanism of Change

At Matthew Tweedie Hypnosis, we use this state to achieve three specific goals for LGBTQ clients:

A. Separating Past from Present

We help the subconscious mind distinguish between then and now. We validate that the fear was useful when you were 12 years old—it protected you. But we demonstrate to the nervous system that you are now an adult with agency, resources, and a different environment. We thank the old protection mechanism and let it retire.

B. Releasing the Somatic Marker

Since shame is stored in the body (the knot in the chest, the tightness in the throat), we use hypnotic techniques to locate and release these somatic markers. We don't just talk about the feeling; we allow the body to process it and let it go.

C. Reconsolidating Memory

Neuroscience shows that when a memory is accessed, it becomes malleable for a short window (memory reconsolidation). During hypnosis, we can revisit the "learnings" of childhood without re-traumatising you. We can view those old memories through the eyes of your adult self, changing the emotional conclusion from "I am wrong" to "I was in an environment that couldn't understand me."

6. Moving from "Pathologising" to "De-Hypnotising"

A critical aspect of my approach is that we do not pathologise your identity.

Historically, psychology failed LGBTQ people by treating their identity as the illness. Even today, well-meaning therapists can inadvertently reinforce shame by focusing too much on the "struggle" of being queer.

I take a different view. You are not broken. You do not need to be fixed. You simply have an outdated program running in the background.

In many ways, the process is not about hypnotising you; it is about de-hypnotising you.

• You were hypnotised by society to believe you were less than.

• You were hypnotised by early experiences to believe you had to hide.

• You were hypnotised to believe love was conditional.

My job is to wake you up from those old trances so you can see reality clearly: that you are whole, valid, and safe.

7. Case Scenarios: What Change Looks Like

To illustrate how this manifests in real life, let's look at a few composite examples of how internalised shame shapes behaviour and how hypnosis resolves it.

The "Over-Achiever"

• The Pattern: Sarah is a high-powered executive. She is a perfectionist who cannot say no. She feels that if she isn't the smartest, hardest-working person in the room, she will be "found out."

• The Root: As a young lesbian, she learned that she could deflect attention from her sexuality by being "the good student." Her worth became tied to her performance.

• The Hypnosis Shift: We worked to decouple her self-worth from her output. After several sessions, Sarah reported a quiet mind. She stopped over-preparing for meetings. She set boundaries without guilt. She realised, "I am enough just existing."

The "Chameleon"

• The Pattern: David is a gay man who finds it hard to maintain deep relationships. In every relationship, he morphs into who he thinks the partner wants him to be. He is terrified of conflict and anticipates abandonment constantly.

• The Root: Growing up in a religious household, David learned that "keeping the peace" was the only way to avoid scrutiny. His nervous system equates disagreement with danger.

• The Hypnosis Shift: We used regression techniques to heal the "younger David" who felt unsafe. We installed new resources of confidence and self-trust. David now navigates conflict with his partner calmly, understanding that disagreement does not mean the end of the bond.

8. The Ripple Effect: Life After Shame

What happens when you finally put down the heavy baggage of internalised shame? The results are often broader and more profound than clients expect. It isn't just about feeling better about your sexuality; it affects every domain of life.

1. Trust Returns

Shame erodes self-trust. When you spend decades monitoring your own behaviour, you learn to second-guess your instincts. Hypnosis rebuilds that bridge. You begin to trust your gut again. You trust your decisions. You trust your right to be in the room.

2. Relationships Deepen

You cannot be truly intimate while hiding. Shame creates a wall that says, "If they really knew me, they wouldn't love me." When that wall comes down, true intimacy becomes possible. You allow yourself to be seen, and you find that being seen is no longer terrifying—it is nourishing.

3. Energy Increases

Hiding takes an immense amount of metabolic energy. Managing a "public persona," scanning for threats, and suppressing emotions is exhausting. When that vigilance is turned off, clients often report a surge in physical and mental energy. The "brain fog" lifts.

4. Authenticity Becomes Effortless

The ultimate goal is effortless authenticity. You shouldn't have to "try" to be yourself. When the fear is removed, authenticity is just what happens naturally. You speak more freely. You laugh louder. You dress how you want. Not as a statement, but simply as an expression of self.

9. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Can hypnosis change my sexuality? Absolutely not. Hypnotherapy at Matthew Tweedie Hypnosis is affirmative. We do not engage in conversion practices. Our goal is to remove the shame surrounding your identity, not the identity itself. We help you embrace who you are.

I’ve been this way for 30 years. Is it too late? It is never too late. The brain retains neuroplasticity throughout life. While early patterns are deep, they are not permanent. In fact, the adult brain is often better equipped to process these changes because you now have the safety and resources you lacked as a child.

How is this different from meditation? Meditation is fantastic for symptom management and calming the mind in the moment. Hypnosis is more active and goal-oriented; we are going into the subconscious to do specific "repairs" or "updates" to the root cause of the reaction.

Will I lose control during hypnosis? No. You are always aware and in control. You cannot be made to do anything against your will or values. It is a collaborative state of focus, much like being deeply engrossed in a movie.

10. Conclusion: Your Nervous System Needs an Update

Internalised shame is a heavy burden to carry, especially when you have carried it for so long you no longer remember what it feels like to walk without it. But it is not a life sentence.

It is simply a predictable, biological response to an environment that wasn't ready for you.

Your nervous system learned to protect you by making you small. It learned to protect you by making you vigilant. It did a good job. It got you here.

But that protection is no longer required. The war is over. It is time to tell the soldier at the gate that they can stand down.

Through the targeted use of hypnotherapy, we can help you release the outdated learning of the past. We can help you update your emotional memory so that your body finally understands what your mind already knows: You are safe. You are worthy. And you are free to be exactly who you are.

Ready to Let Go of the Weight?

If you recognise yourself in this article and are tired of letting old shame dictate your future, I invite you to take the next step.

At Matthew Tweedie Hypnosis, we specialise in helping clients clear the subconscious blocks that hold them back. Let’s work together to update your emotional software and unlock the confidence that has been waiting for you.

Contact Matthew Tweedie Today for a Consultation]

Common Questions About Hypnosis for LGBTQ Internalised Shame

Can hypnosis change my sexuality?

No. Hypnotherapy cannot and should not change your sexual orientation or gender identity. At Matthew Tweedie Hypnosis, we practice strictly affirmative therapy. Our goal is not to change who you are, but to change how you feel about who you are. We work to remove the layers of shame, fear, and conditioning that society has placed upon you, allowing you to embrace your authentic self with confidence and pride.

I’ve been feeling this way for decades. Is it too late to change?

It is never too late to update your emotional responses. The brain retains neuroplasticity (the ability to rewire itself) throughout your entire life. While early childhood conditioning is deep, it is not permanent. In fact, many adult clients find they can process these changes faster than children because they now have the adult resources, safety, and autonomy they lacked when the shame was first learned.

How is this different from standard talk therapy?

While talk therapy works with the conscious mind, hypnosis accesses the subconscious. Talk therapy (CBT or counselling) is excellent for understanding why you feel shame. However, shame is often a somatic (bodily) reflex stored in the nervous system, not just a logical thought. Hypnosis allows us to bypass the "critical faculty" of the conscious mind to communicate directly with the emotional brain, releasing the reflex where it lives. Many clients use hypnosis to "finish the work" that talk therapy started.

Will I have to relive my past trauma during the session?

No, you do not need to re-experience trauma to heal it. Modern hypnotherapy techniques, such as the ones we use, are designed to be dissociative and safe. We can review past events from a position of detachment—like watching a movie on a screen—rather than stepping back into the pain. The goal is to acknowledge the old learning and release it, not to retraumatise the nervous system.

Is online hypnotherapy as effective as in-person sessions?

Yes, online hypnotherapy is equally effective for resolving internalised shame. Because hypnosis relies on focus, auditory guidance, and relaxation, it works perfectly over Zoom or video calls. In fact, many LGBTQ clients prefer online sessions because they can process vulnerable emotions in the safety and comfort of their own homes. As long as you have a stable internet connection and a quiet space, the results are the same.

How many sessions will I need?

Most clients experience a significant shift in 3 to 6 sessions. Unlike psychoanalysis, which can take years, hypnotherapy is a brief, solution-focused modality. While everyone is different, our protocol is designed to target the root cause of the shame quickly. You should expect to feel a difference in your baseline anxiety and self-talk after the very first session.