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We visit with Jillian Hosey, a therapist in Toronto. We explore presence in therapy, ruptures and repair, and the importance of our own work in caring for our clients. This is a two-part conversation.
Diagnosed with Complex Trauma and a Dissociative Disorder, Emma and her system share what they learn along the way about complex trauma, dissociation (CPTSD, OSDD, DID, Dissociative Identity Disorder (Multiple Personality), etc.), and mental health. Educational, supportive, inclusive, and inspiring, System Speak documents her healing journey through the best and worst of life in recovery through insights, conversations, and collaborations.
Welcome to the System Speak podcast. If you would like to support our efforts at sharing our story, fighting stigma about dissociative identity disorder, and educating the community and the world about trauma, please go to our website at www.systemspeak.org, and there is a button for donations where you can offer a one time donation to support the podcast or become an ongoing subscriber. We so appreciate the support, the positive feedback, and you sharing our podcast with others. We are all learning together. Thank you.
Speaker 2:In this episode, we continue our conversation with Jill. How do we make a space for everything to show up and to honor that without judgment, without criticism, and see that through a lens of survival as a defensive adaptation that's important, that has helped that person survive. And it's not criticism on me. It's not an attack on me. It's that there's been so much hurt.
Speaker 2:And that hurt is going to show up in the room with me because I'm a human being and it's a relationship. So many times survivors email the podcast or when we did the big survey about therapeutic experiences with survivors, the feedback comes from such small things like, I quit therapy because it stopped working or because there was a rupture or because, know, depending on what language access they have or or what how they express themselves. But it's always something small, not as in like a big baby fit or some big drama over a small thing, but a wound that hurt like a splinter. Yeah. Where like, there's so many examples that we get in emails.
Speaker 2:Like, I worked really hard to be able to bring this thing to therapy and I was braced for it and I was ready and I got there and instead they wanted to talk about this. Or I worked really hard to, like, for weeks and weeks to look up at my therapist and to be able to actually look at them in the eye and tell them something and share something that they were writing something else. Or, you know, just small moments of these little presentations of what our bodies are doing and neuroception and reading off of each other and into each other and how that gets interpreted or not. One of the big challenges for me, or for all of us, one of the big challenges for all of us has been telehealth during the pandemic and how not having full access to each other or things like the satellite delays, Putting the rhythm of things off or not being able to sense as much or in messaging, not being able to communicate the same way you would in person or reach out in the same way you would in person or things not coming across in words because it's just a message.
Speaker 2:There are so many little things that can feel off, but to a survivor with relational trauma feels like misattunement and then becomes a trigger and is a bigger issue than even just in the
Speaker 3:moment. Absolutely. Thank you for sharing that. The pandemic has been so challenging, and therapy feels so much like a dance where we're figuring out how do we coordinate, collaborate the steps so we're in sync, and then recognizing the moments where we're out of sync and being able to acknowledge it, being able to bring it into the room and say, that that was out of sync. I missed that.
Speaker 3:I got that wrong. In that moment, I hear holding my eye contact was something you worked so hard for and I was writing something else and I missed that. So making space for those moments, reflecting back, it feels so important, recognizing that there will be those ruptures, they're inevitable. I think about Edtronics still face paradigm and the idea of these ruptures will be inevitable. But how do we step into repair?
Speaker 3:And then what does it mean for us as therapists? What kind of work do we have to do for ourselves to be able to offer that? Because I don't know that healing can occur without it. It couldn't for me. I know everybody's experience is different, but honoring those things, honoring that this is awful.
Speaker 3:So out of sync being on Zoom and missing those micro moments, those really important things. But at the same time, we also adapt and find a way to work within those conditions, and then the conditions change. How do we
Speaker 2:readapt and acknowledge all the challenges that come with that? It's complex. It is. And I think that there's a level of prevention that we can do to a degree on some things where how much we're doing to care for ourselves as clinicians, whether that's therapy or whether that's yoga or meditation or resting time, whatever that looks like for someone, whether that's care for their body, whether that's work life balance, all of those things, I feel like that's something survivors can pick up on, especially with relational trauma and will be confused about what else is happening in the room. Even though we may have good boundaries and not be talking about any of those things, they can feel it.
Speaker 3:Oh, yes.
Speaker 2:And I know that we've had experiences like that as well, where we could feel, okay, this isn't working anymore because the presence that we used to have in that space that was here is not here. And it feels like an abandonment even though maybe you were exactly right with never taking a day off work ever or this or that or whatever, you know? There's that it's a rupture, but because it's an experienced one in the relationship, it it may not even be spoken if they're not able to find words for that or if if we're not aware that that's going on.
Speaker 3:Oh, absolutely. Thank you for sharing that. You know, it's it's interesting. I've noticed a big difference in myself in terms of how I'm able to show up in the moments where I am taking care of myself and tending to my own self care and engaging in the things that are helpful for me to have a calm nervous system and to show up in a way that's open to whatever comes into the room. And it's this felt sense, you know, this this neuroception of danger.
Speaker 3:And and then I think, okay, so the neuroception of danger that this connection is not safe. There's something that shifted, there's something that's changed. I think as therapists, we can be really, really well intentioned and really want to show up and at times even cross our own boundaries because and I'm reflecting on myself. I I can't speak about any other therapist, but the moments in which I thought I am doing the right thing because I'm working those extra two hours or I'm I'm, you know, crossing my boundaries and and maybe allowing things to happen that for whatever reason I think are helpful for the other person, but compromises my own self care. And in doing that, I'm not able to show up, and that's harmful.
Speaker 3:That's actually not helpful for my clients. Then I in the past when I've and I'm sure I I you know, there are moments in the present where I may be unaware of things and I'm on an ongoing process of learning this about me and how to make things work best in terms of my own self care. But, you know, showing up in one way in the beginning because it feels like this is what my client needs. Maybe we didn't even ask what our client needs. Maybe we just assumed, which feels quite dangerous for me.
Speaker 3:Walking into the room with assumption and hypothesis feels quite
Speaker 2:dangerous. But then we become depleted as therapists and are unable to show up and our clients can feel it. It's a felt sense and that's a rupture. So how can we be attuned to our own needs? Because as we're attuned to our own needs, we can better attune to our clients' needs.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. It makes all the difference. And it's not even about being a good therapist or a bad therapist, like life happens, but how we care for ourselves through all of that makes the And I think it's sometimes one of the most humbling experiences as a clinician when you do have survivors who have the courage to say, Hey, whatever is going on is not okay, or Whatever is going on, this is how it's impacting me, or I know something is going on even if you don't know what's going on. And having to step back and receive that and see not only through the transference and counter transference of it, but also then what is that bringing up for them and how is that meaningful to them and what repair can we bring not only to the present moment, but in those other layers where that wound has now been brought to the surface and how can we repair both the present and memory time in that way?
Speaker 3:Yeah, Absolutely. And and the other thing I as as we're speaking, I'm I'm realizing that in not taking care of myself and not engaging in that self care and not being mindful of those pieces, I thus become inconsistent and unpredictable. And in becoming inconsistent and unpredictable, am I then mirroring the inconsistency and lack of predictability that my clients experienced earlier in their lives. And that neuroception of danger, you're not consistent, you're not predictable in that moment, it's it's it feels that the greatest, one of the greatest gifts I can give to my client is engaging in that self attunement, you know, that attuning to myself, that taking care of myself, that looking at myself from the inside out and being mindful of what's happening and how I'm showing up and how it's being received and how I can show up with open ears and open arms to receive anything that comes into the room and acknowledge the ruptures, that that's part of healing. And if I'm not mindful of that, am I replicating the inconsistency, the unpredictability, the lack of, you know, dependability?
Speaker 3:All of these things that are needed in childhood to develop a secure base. How can we do this work if we don't work on developing that container, that secure base? It takes time. It takes time because with in trauma relational trauma, the relationship being triggering, we're navigating how to create that. For each client, it will be different.
Speaker 3:There is no manual. It's so moving and they think that there's such potential for healing through experiences with other people who are safe and good and kind and open and safe spaces that
Speaker 2:are able to contain that work for repairing ruptures and and bringing healing. But I think that's also why when something goes wrong, it hurts so much and why the wound can be so deep and why repair work really can be so difficult. And so things go wrong if therapists don't stay in it or if we're not willing to stay, just to stay. Yeah. I had no idea this is the direction we were gonna go.
Speaker 2:Is there anything else that you wanted to share or anything specific you wanted to bring up today?
Speaker 3:No. This is this is actually the focus of my own curiosity in my work and looking at how can I back up before we even move towards, you know, intervention, strategy, technique, modality? How can I back up and create a frame, create a space that works for my client? And and I'm gonna trip and I'm gonna fall and acknowledging that and bringing it into the room. And so this feels actually very authentic to me and to my practice.
Speaker 3:And what I'm trying to navigate and figure out while also recognizing that I'm probably not going to be able to figure it out. How can I develop comfort with that? It's so insightful when we start to look at these layers and what happens internally and seeing how it plays out in sessions. I was trained actually by a union because I had all this terrible college education. So when I was ready for supervision, was like, I'm going in for real for deep because I want
Speaker 2:to really understand how things work. So I chose the hard path on that one. But he told a story about a clinician that came to him for a consult and he had permission to share the story and it was twenty years ago in another state. Like, it's not related to anyone. But Yep.
Speaker 2:They they came for supervision for a consult with him because all of a sudden in one month, all of his, quote, regular clients were just a mess. Like, they weren't doing well. They were a mess, and things just had kind of, like, all this regression with all of his clients. So there was this pattern, but all of his survivor clients specifically had either attempted suicide or quit therapy, like all within the same week or two. And so he came for this supervision and to sort of process this experience.
Speaker 2:And he's like, I don't know what went wrong because I was being consistent here and I was doing all the right things and we were doing therapy as we always had. I hadn't changed anything. And it was that same question of what is going on inside you? Because you're the one who brings everything into the session. Yes.
Speaker 2:And so so looking at what had happened in his personal life in a in subtle ways and what he had been triggered up triggered in a way and had given up hope on something that was not even a relationship. Like, he was not suicidal. He was not wanting to quit working or something. Like, it was not expressed in that way, but he had absolutely given up hope on this one thing that he was dealing with in life and was just like, okay. I just can't.
Speaker 2:And not in a, like, healthy boundaries way, in giving up, he he gave up hope. And it, like, spread like the flu bug or like coronavirus or something. Yeah. It spread through all of his clients.
Speaker 3:Wow. It can be felt. It's it as I'm I'm sitting and reflecting on that and I'm thinking what happens when we're not attuned to our own processes and what's happening internally for us and how that is contagious. Like COVID, just as you said, like the flu, it's it's contagious. And I I I oftentimes find myself drawing on language, so using and this is not unique to me.
Speaker 3:I mean, there's many frameworks that offer these ideas, but this idea around preparatory language, choice based language, and and inventory language invitatory language that consists of open invitations all about choice and preparation. And in this case, thinking, you know, walking into a session and even reflect reflecting back to a client, you may notice today that something may look different on my face. I had a headache last night or something that brings into the room what can be felt. Not that it gets made about the therapist, it's not at all. There is that very clear boundary that this therapy is not about the therapist had a headache last night, but just sharing, you may notice something different.
Speaker 3:They're, you know, had a headache last night, and so if you notice something, I welcome that. Attuning to what's happening within us because it can be felt.
Speaker 2:I think that there's something healing in the context of relational trauma in doing that as well, where there is some building of safety and communicating that directly. There's no covering up. There's no withholding. There's no separation from this is what I'm dealing with, and this is what you're dealing with, where it feels like a power dynamic or any kind of triggers like that. It's simply, this is what I'm bringing with me because of circumstances.
Speaker 2:It's not related to you, but we're gonna feel it in the session today. We're gonna stay with your stuff, but just so you know, I had that headache. And so you might be aware of it because I'm aware of it. And then going into things, just communicating that and sharing that makes such a difference.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I mean, I wonder, you know, how in those moments, how is my face being neurocepted? You know, if my face looks tired, does that look angry? And if we don't bring it into the space, it stays concealed. We're not talking about it.
Speaker 3:You're right, it feeds into this power imbalance, this power over dynamic. What are these micro moments or opportunities that we can use to share it, to share the power that it's not I mean, inherently, there is this power imbalance that is set up between it feels that there's this power imbalance between therapist and client. So how can we also bring that into the room to talk about it and share it? Share the power instead of I may be using the wrong words with this or words that don't land well. How can we share that so it doesn't feel like the sense of power
Speaker 2:over? I've seen that in sort of the opposite from that consultation case from when I was getting licensed. The other experience that makes me think of it is one time my own client came to me years ago when I was getting engaged to my husband and they did not know about that. I didn't talk about my dating life in session, but we just it was always a good session and it was always this good energy in session and we were making all this progress. And then when my husband and I got engaged, this client, when this client heard about that, they wanted to quit therapy because they thought all of that positive energy and that connection that they had was something we had built together and they felt betrayed by the engagement.
Speaker 2:There was no erotic transference or anything like that going on. Just specifically the energy in the room and what we were bringing together, they thought that that came only from them. And then when I got engaged, they thought, oh, so none of it came from them. None of it was about me. It's only because you're happy over here.
Speaker 2:So none of this was real. And I thought, what a strange thing. And I tried to explore that and repair that with that person. And then years and years later, I had a similar experience where I thought in a therapy setting, this is feeling safe because we have this connection. And I could see the therapist changing in ways that made me think, okay, I'm safe here because we have this connection.
Speaker 2:There's this energy building. And then they came out public with this big project they had been working on, and I felt the same thing of, oh, it was just because they were excited about their project. Like, I'm so embarrassed. I thought that this was, like, our thing and this our energy that they were building, but really I was picking up on theirs and it wasn't about me at all. And so then I felt the same thing as that other client had felt.
Speaker 2:And so I think that just have to be aware of how all of these things are happening in us more than we realize. It's almost like people even without DID have this level of dissociation going on, but people who, especially survivors of relational trauma specifically, are able to pick up on that in ways we don't even see sometimes. Yeah. And what those that moment of realizing,
Speaker 3:I mean, I'm listening, this felt sense of and I don't even know that this was your experience, but this felt sense of I must not matter. Right. I must not be important. I must not matter. It was that, not this.
Speaker 2:Right. And so then the context of dissociation, it becomes, oh, so none of this was real, which means, like you know? And then it becomes the trigger of, oh, look. I just set myself up again. Like, why did I even no.
Speaker 2:I'm never doing this again. I'm out. You know? All the shame that follows. How how do we bring this full circle to to end on a positive note?
Speaker 2:How do we take care of ourselves so that we can care well for our clients? How do we tend to those nourishception moments in relational trauma in the session or caring for ourselves with them caring for themselves as part of I feel you feeling me? How does all that fit together in a healing way?
Speaker 3:That's a really good question. And for me, feel like I'm on this journey of trying to figure out for myself what that means. And I feel like through curiosity, through attuning to ourselves, and creating a sense of openness to really explore these difficult moments that can show up in the therapy room. Again, drawing on curiosity, self compassion, self forgiveness that as therapists, we do have these moments where we don't get it right and we don't show up in the way that's needed. How can I then take my hand to my heart and say, You know what, Jill?
Speaker 3:That didn't go so well. How can I offer myself compassion and then come into the room with curiosity with my client around, I wonder what this has been like for you, and I wonder what's needed, and how we can collaboratively continue on this journey, really being curious, free of hypothesis, free of assumption,
Speaker 2:free you know, coming in from a stance of not knowing so that we can collaborate and coordinate to find those healing repairing moments? I feel, just to neutralize things a little bit as we close, I feel like I have to practice those skills. Like, they are hard for me because I come from a background where the people around me don't talk about things, their secrets, all of these things. Right? And then also just my own level of dissociation.
Speaker 2:So to be present at that level is such an intense work that there's always pieces just out of the corner of my eye that I'm missing. And so one of the things that I have to do regularly, not just for my clients, but also to be able to go into that with my clients, but even more practically with my family and with the husband and the children to sit down at the table and say, this is what's going on with me, just in a general sense, not in a putting my stuff on them kind of way and not any details that aren't appropriate, but just communicating, I have an extra meeting today. Like ISSTD, because for all therapists, the meetings are on Fridays so often or this or that. I'm like, why do we have meetings on Fridays? And saying to my kids, hey, it's Friday, which means I'm excited for the weekend and I know we have some fun plans, but also I'm exhausted from working all week.
Speaker 2:So just know that this space is because I'm tired, not because I'm not excited. And I'm frustrated because we have a meeting and I I wanna be at that meeting and I'm excited about what we're doing on the meeting, but it's a Friday. What's it a Friday? We have to be a meeting. Face is about that meeting, which I actually love.
Speaker 2:It's just that it's just that it's happening now, and I'm pretending I'm irritated because I'm excited to be with you. So when you see this face, know it is not an anger face at you. It isn't what is wrong with the calendar and I'm itching. There are parts of me itching to get out that have not been released yet because there's one more meeting to go. You know?
Speaker 2:And just communicating about things or or or saying that with the husband who's who's on the podcast sometimes and so gracious about that. But as I learn to make friends because I'm terrible at friendship, and I don't mean that derogatory or mean to myself. I mean that I am so inexperienced. And as I began to learn how to do that, the pandemic happened. And that was like a rupture because I couldn't connect with people to fix things or to heal things or to practice things or how do you maintain it.
Speaker 2:And so it's been such a messy experience. I don't mean I'm gonna be terrible at it forever, but it has been such a messy learning experience to come from my kind of background and say, my goal is to have some earned attachment in this way this way and this way. And with this person and this person and this person, I'm trying so hard in these kinds of And part of that sometimes is just saying, hey, you, who's my new friend? I'm trying really hard to connect, and I'm sorry because I'm aware that I'm not actually connecting. But I actually think about you every day, or I actually want to tell you this list of things, or this is what's going on, or why it's so hard, or Yeah.
Speaker 2:When we do connect, that's a good experience. But guess what? Tolerating good is also really hard for me. So after we connect in a really good safe space, this is also what happens to me because of that and that becomes part of the whole. So I'm actually navigating all of these things, you know, whatever it is, whatever that looks like.
Speaker 2:Practically practicing that in different ways becomes such a part of
Speaker 3:the process. Oh, absolutely. As you're speaking and as you're sharing these moments of showing up and just sharing, you know, this is what's going on, it's interesting because I can actually feel my nervous system and my body relaxing. This offering of what's going on, creating that predictability, that awareness of this is what's happening. Even through this, you're sharing with me this experience and we're at a distance and virtual and even my nervous system is attuning to that and relaxing.
Speaker 3:That's amazing. This moment of joining that we can create by just showing up and sharing what's happening, even if it's messy and it doesn't feel good, just that there's there's there's real power in that. Well, thank you for joining with me today to share. Thank you for inviting me. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3:This has been incredible for me, and I have so much to reflect on just in terms of my own practice and how I show up. And so I'm really grateful and really appreciative to have been given this opportunity and this time to speak with all of you. So thank you. It was so beautiful. I really, really appreciate it, truly.
Speaker 3:Thank you. It's real. This is me. And I I bring myself into the room and into the work, and I can't remove myself, and it feels boundaried. It feels appropriate, and I would just say, let's go
Speaker 2:with it. I love it so much. Awesome. Thank you. Thank you so much, truly.
Speaker 2:I could have talked about that forever. Felt like we were out camping somewhere, like somewhere, you know, just tense and like, I just had this amazing vision and such a safe and peaceful feeling. Thank you. I think one of the things I appreciate about you, Jill, are is that authenticity. And I think that's part of what makes you a safe person for me.
Speaker 2:Although I don't need to be a creeper because I know I'm just out here in the middle of Oklahoma. But I really appreciate you truly, and I want you to know that.
Speaker 3:I I want you to know that I truly appreciate you as well. I truly when you invited me, I sat there in shock and in awe. So thank you. The work that you're doing is transformative. So thank you.
Speaker 3:Oh, that made me cry. True. It's true. So thank you for saying that because for me, that was healing to hear. So thank you.
Speaker 3:Oh my goodness. Thank you, really. Okay.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna go find my own tent now. Oh, have an awesome weekend with your kiddos. Yes.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Thank you for your time.
Speaker 1:Thank you for joining us for System Speak, a podcast about dissociative identity disorder. This podcast is available on any podcast player and on systemspeak.org. If you would like to know more of our story, our memoir, If Tears Were Prayers is now available at systemspeakbooks.com. Thank you for listening.