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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.
Over: Welcome to the System Speak Podcast, a podcast about Dissociative Identity Disorder. If you are new to the podcast, we recommend starting at the beginning episodes and listen in order to hear our story and what we have learned through this endeavor. Current episodes may be more applicable to long time listeners and are likely to contain more advanced topics, emotional or other triggering content, and or reference earlier episodes that provide more context to what we are currently learning and experiencing. As always, please care for yourself during and after listening to the podcast. Thank you.
Speaker 1:Okay. So this is Sasha, and I wanna talk to you about this conference because we're at a conference for the whole weekend. I'm not talking about doctor e presenting or that part of things or even, like, her perspective on what they're talking about. I wanna talk to you about what I heard because first of all, I heard stuff. Like, I could pay attention.
Speaker 1:Like, I couldn't pay attention in the beginning, but then I realized we had the notebook, and that's what got my attention. And I'm completely in love with our notebook. Like, I am going to marry our notebook. Okay? So I mean, like, the stuff that I learned from the notebook is so helpful and so good, not good like pleasant, but good like informative that I just need to pay attention.
Speaker 1:And so I saw the notebook, and I was like, I saw me writing in the notebook, except it wasn't me writing in the notebook. Like, I know that sounds crazy, so I don't know how to explain it. Like, it was like okay. First of all, my head hurts really bad right here. But, also, it was like I saw the notebook from far, far away.
Speaker 1:But the more I concentrated on the notebook, the closer I could get to it. Like, I was swimming or something. I don't even know. And then when I realized that we were listening to a speaker, I was trying to pay attention to the speaker, but then it was like the darkness of the circle around my peripheral vision would just narrow in and get smaller and smaller until, like, I couldn't see and I was far away again and then, like, further and further away. So then I had to focus on the notebook, and I could come in, come in, come in, come in, like, zooming in.
Speaker 1:So, like, I spent the morning playing some kind of new trick that I have not done before and don't know how it works or even if it's beneficial, like, anyone besides myself. It was like, I have new powers that are like zoom in, zoom out. I don't know how else to explain it. But because we were learning stuff, it was a good time to practice because we had the notebook. Some lady was talking about DID, and I could pay attention and almost get it.
Speaker 1:And then when something's too hard, it was like it was like when the husband talks, and I'm like, wait. You just said something really important, and it all slipped past me faster than I could hear it. Like, I know that you were talking, and I know you were talking to me, but I like, it didn't it went through my brain, like liquid through my brain. Like, it did not stick at all. I have zero comprehension of what you just said.
Speaker 1:So some of what she said was like that. And I don't know, like, all the clinical stuff the way doctor E does. So, like, she's gonna have to do her own thing with that. And I know she's working on that for the plural conference coming up. I'm just talking about my perspective of things.
Speaker 1:Like, my mind is so blown. I need to process. And so because I am trying not to text the therapist eight hundred things a day, and we already texted her of, oh my goodness. We're at this conference. What is happening?
Speaker 1:I need to not text her anymore. So we are back to the podcast because I have gotta process what's just happened. So item one on the agenda, zoom in, zoom out. What is that? What is this thing where I can focus on the notebook and all of a sudden, like, it pulls me out front, but it's still not me writing.
Speaker 1:Although, a couple times, I could get there, like, all the way so that it was me listening, and it was me writing. But most of the time, it was not. But I was still aware of what was happening, and I could still listen. But I couldn't stay very well, and sometimes she would get either too clinical or too trauma ish. And so, like, I was like, woah, and I'm lost.
Speaker 1:And it was like a slip and slide. Like, I was out of there. And I didn't even mean to be out of there. Like, how do you control that so you can stay? And can you really stay when there's someone else there?
Speaker 1:And how does that work? Like, I don't know, but I need these skills because I really do wanna get better. And I really do want to, like, be healthy or something. Like, I wanna function. I don't even know how to explain it.
Speaker 1:I don't know what I want. I want to not be crazy, and I want to be helpful, and I wanna be able to control myself. Like, do adultish thing. Well, hello. Like, I don't mean, like, adult ish things.
Speaker 1:I mean, like, be an adult or be in the environment where I'm supposed to be and, like, be there because I choose to be there, not because something triggered me out and I got stuck or not missing out because someone else got triggered out and got stuck. Like, do you know what I mean? So I don't know how it works, but I learned something today or experienced something today that I don't know what the word for it is, and I don't know how to make it happen again. And I don't know if I can do it in any other setting besides whatever happened this morning. But it was bizarre, and I don't know how to explain it more than, like, this zooming in and zooming out.
Speaker 1:I don't know. I I am now a telescope. A microscope? I don't even know. Like, what was that?
Speaker 1:It made me all, like, foggy and a little bit nauseous and definitely headache ish. I'm not sure it made me any smarter, but I knew something was going on, and I knew something happened. And now I wanna talk about it. So here I am. So here are some of the things that I learned about this morning.
Speaker 1:This is not like a clinical presentation. This is not DID knowledge and gonna teach y'all how to do anything important. It is not that. This is my response to what I took notes on that what I learned because that's where I could do the zoom in, zoom out thing. These were the things that were getting my attention, and so I wanna talk about them.
Speaker 1:Okay. So one of the things that she talked about in the very beginning was about previous therapy experiences that even when someone was really lousy at treating DID, that you can still find the good in what they did right that was stabilizing for you. So I'm not talking about creepers who are straight out abusive. I'm just talking about people who are like, okay. I'm really glad you helped me right now, but you no longer know what you're doing, and so I am out of here.
Speaker 1:So she was saying that doing this can be, like, really helpful in crisis even when they were not helpful in trauma or in helpful in learning what you need for therapy, like maybe some people who get a diagnosis and then go to a different therapist or are referred to a different therapist and that kind of thing. Like, there are reasons that even though it's a bad therapy match, that it can be good for you. And looking at what is good is helpful and empowering instead of only being stuck with your now time therapist who actually is good at DID, but you're afraid to trust them, not because of anything with them, but because of everything before. And so this caught my attention and was one of the times where I, like, I had this whole zoom in experience because I wanted to hear what she was saying about that because I think this is something that, like, we are dealing with. Like, we adore our therapist.
Speaker 1:She is rock star awesome and rock star solid, both of which matter. Like, that's a good connection, and it's a good therapy, and we've got it. But at the same time, for all kinds of reasons, not just bad therapy. I know there's more to it than that even though I don't know what there's more to it than that. But I know that, like, part of the problem is because we've had bad therapy experiences.
Speaker 1:But what she's saying is even that does not have to control you in now time. She didn't say now time. I just our system knows that now time and what that means, and that helps me. So, like, I could apply it to now time. But what so she didn't use the phrase now time, but I could apply it to that and understand it.
Speaker 1:So, like, it made me think back because I can think of two therapists, maybe three. No. Two. I can think of two therapists that we had, like, very first one from the college and then the one that had an affair with our partner. Those two were just straight up dangerous.
Speaker 1:Like, what they did was absolutely not okay. It was not helpful. Although even that is hard because the second one got us away from that partner. Like, she can have her. She was not good for us.
Speaker 1:And so, like, that was a good thing. Right? So, oh, look. See, I can even do it with that. I thought these were the two I couldn't do it with, and now I'm doing it.
Speaker 1:Because the first the very first one at the college at least got us to the therapist who diagnosed us. Oh my goodness. I have to rethink this whole thing. Okay. So oh my goodness.
Speaker 1:My brain is blown again. Okay. Here's the thing. So our therapist now is cool. It would be cool if we actually participated in therapy, but she's cool, and she's ready as soon as we are.
Speaker 1:Like, a year later, she's still ready any second now when we are ready. But I can think of the therapist that we had before. That was really hard. But I don't think she was an unsafe person, although there were unsafe things that happened that were triggers for us and, like, common sense things of, like, why did you do that? What were you thinking?
Speaker 1:But not necessarily, like, we were in danger. So it wasn't that kind of bad experience, but even that was not because she was bad. She's just really good at a specific kind of client and really good at doing that, which is totally fine, but she went way outside of that to work with us, and that was not a good idea. That's all that happened there. The things that she did with us and the things that she did in therapy with us or didn't do in therapy with us would have been fine if we had normal kid issues, not trauma issues, and not as an adult.
Speaker 1:It wouldn't have been a big deal. But because we are an adult and because there were trauma issues involved, she should not have been working with us. That's all that that is. So hers was like like a limitation of her skills, not she's an evil person. Right?
Speaker 1:So I can see that. But then if I go back to the therapist before that, which was, like, fifteen years ago or twenty years ago or something, that that therapist was kind of helpful, but he and his wife were in all of our sessions. Like, both of them were there. And the problem with that was, first of all, I don't know why they were both in our sessions. That was kinda weird come to think of it.
Speaker 1:Like, I never thought about it being weird until this minute, but that was weird. I don't know. I don't know. I can't ugh. I'm gonna zoom out.
Speaker 1:Now see, I've got a whole new lingo now because this is what happened to me this morning. So I'm just gonna zoom out of that and, like, back off because I don't even wanna go there. I don't know what that was about. But the problem became that because we were going to therapy with them and they were both there, then they, like, started fighting in our sessions and ultimately got divorced. And so we didn't have therapists anymore because they couldn't they were fighting over who got to keep which clients.
Speaker 1:Okay. Can I just say retraumatizing? Like, we are children of divorced parents. And even if even if we don't wanna live with either parent, I don't need my therapist fighting over me or my therapist not wanting me. Like, it was just bad.
Speaker 1:So that was a whole different kind of not good. Not good. But what it did, if I'm trying to do what she said about connecting to what was good or stabilizing about it. What was good was when they fell apart, I realized that even though I was a young adult, like, were maybe, I don't know, 20 or 18 or something, what I realized was that even though we were barely an adult, barely an adult, we were functioning better than those two were. And so we didn't go to therapy for another fifteen years because we were way better functioning than those two people were.
Speaker 1:That is what we learned about that. So that was the good there, which, like, helps me just okay. I can just let go of that because it's settled. Right? So those two pieces, the one therapist that was just outside of her realm of what she is able to do, and the other ones that were just like, no.
Speaker 1:You two need to, like, go work this out amongst yourselves. Those issues were not about us. Like, I can hold that in my head. I know that's true. It took me a long time to realize it, but we're there now.
Speaker 1:Like, if I had a box at the therapist's office, which, first of all, is hilarious because we already have, like, so many notebooks there. But if I had a box at the therapist's office and, like, wrote on note cards of when, like, a particular issue was actually finished, Like, we have completely worked through this issue. It is closed. It is finished. We don't need to readdress it.
Speaker 1:And I don't mean, like, denial. I mean, like, legit, I'm okay with this and where it's at, and it's closed. I could put both of those therapists in that box. Like, I'm okay with it. I get it.
Speaker 1:I've worked really hard through it and through some layers of it, and we're good. We're good. Okay? But the other two therapists that I could think of that I was like, there's no way there's anything good was the one who had an affair with our partner and the one from the college that, like, was so terrible and disclosed everything about us and our system to the entire faculty of our college. So, like, I was like, there's no good in them?
Speaker 1:But as soon as I talked about it a minute ago, like, I realized was I'm just mad about it. It's not that it's not that there was no good in it. It's that I'm mad. I am mad at those two people. She should not have had an affair with our partner, and the other one should not have sent all that.
Speaker 1:So those are, like, two betrayals. Right? I learned that this morning. It's called betrayals, and it's a betrayal trauma. And it can cause shame, and it can also cause disruption in attachment or something like that and rupture in the therapeutic process.
Speaker 1:Okay? So that ruptured me all over the place, both of those experiences. And I thought those are the only two I can't find any good about. But as soon as I tried to start talking about it, I totally realized there was good. Because the first one at the college, at least we got away from that college.
Speaker 1:And the second one, we got away from that partner who was an alcoholic and not good for us. Like, it was to a seriously abusive level. Like, yeah, that was bad. It was really bad. So so this is what I realized as I started talking about it, that dang it.
Speaker 1:She's right. Yes. If I realize what was good about it, then that connects it, and I can kind of let it go. I think there's some more layers on those two that different insiders need to, like, maybe talk about or write about and process a little bit. Is it not finished?
Speaker 1:Like, I can't check it off and put it on the card and drop it in the box. Like, it's not done. So somebody's still carrying around, like, some of the layers or whatever, but at least there's a context for it now. And what I learned this morning is not just the context, but it means like, that means there's a connection. Like, I shouldn't even know about this because this is way before I was even around.
Speaker 1:But I am connecting, and I want this to be my new job, and that's what's happening. Like, zoom in, people, because I am paying attention, and I am trying to connect some dots. And she said that that's actually what helps is putting things into context, connecting, like, different insiders who know different pieces of those stories and communicating about what those pieces are, and then, like, processing or whatever that is all with the therapist. Right? So that's a huge piece.
Speaker 1:Another piece that she said at one point, and I don't even know the context because this was a zoom in, zoom out moment. Like, I got nothing but this one line. She said, sleeping and eating have to be priorities or else you're still functioning from an adapted state. I don't know what an adapted state is, but that can't be good. But I know we have issues with both.
Speaker 1:We have issues with eating and with sleeping. So our issues with sleeping have to do with, like, sometimes being afraid to sleep, and sometimes it's waking up for nightmares, and sometimes it's some littles who just won't go to bed. And I don't mean like they're playing and having fun. I mean, like, wandering the house or sitting outside the children's rooms like little creepers trying to make sure that they're safe or like, I don't know what all is going on. But, like, this body has got to be in bed at regular intervals because we cannot function.
Speaker 1:Since starting therapy a year ago with our therapist now, this one is getting better. It's not perfect yet, but it's so much better. So I get that it's progress. And then the other one about eating, ugh, we have such eating issues. Like, I don't even know how to talk about it.
Speaker 1:It is not like like, we don't have any eating disorder. I don't mean like that. But the first problem is that when we were in the hospital with the baby for, like, three years, we didn't have any money, like, no money because every all of our money was for keeping the baby alive and so and feeding the other children. And it was a really scary time. Like, even our church had to give us food sometimes.
Speaker 1:Like, it was a really scary time. But that's getting better, and we are catching up on her medical bills and things like that, and we're able to provide for ourselves differently. So, like, for the first time in three years, we have bought groceries every month for the last four months. Like, that's how new it is that we have food in our house. Well, we had food storage, like dried food that we rehydrated or that the the church gave us that and we made sure the kids always had, but sometimes we had to let the kids eat and we didn't eat.
Speaker 1:So that is one layer of things, but that is slowly getting better. But the other thing is we had, like, food trauma from when we're little, which I don't wanna go into right now, but it makes it hard to know that, like, you have permission to eat and hard to know that, like, you should stop what you're doing because you're hungry and someone needs to go eat something. Does that make sense? I don't even know if that's a thing. But, like, literally even noticing that we're hungry or doing the work of who's going to actually go get food and eat.
Speaker 1:And then there's also a layer of trauma, which I don't wanna be super specific about, but where we were sometimes, like, a psychotic mother. Okay? And, like, sometimes we were given food that wasn't actually food. And I don't wanna talk about that, and I'm not talking about any context other than the mother was not well. But then also there's a layer of, like, when they were little like, John Warner told me this.
Speaker 1:When they were little, they got to eat every three days like the chickens. What does that even mean? What am I supposed to do with that? I don't know what that means. Also, why do you only feed chickens every three days?
Speaker 1:That doesn't make sense either. So I don't I don't even know what that means or if that was a thing, and I don't wanna, like, try to make it mean something is not. So I'm just letting that hang out there until we fix it or work on it in therapy. Like, I don't know. But it means Jean Marc's kind of in charge of making sure that we eat.
Speaker 1:And I don't know. It's hard. It's just a hard piece. So we have lots of layers. And then the other layer of the food issue is that we have a serious, serious, serious gag reflex.
Speaker 1:And so there are sometimes, even when we're trying to eat, it won't go down. Like, we just can't. And we've been cleared, like, medically. And so we know it's nothing like that. It's literally just psychological, and they told us to work on it in therapy.
Speaker 1:And at sometimes and I don't know if it changes, like, who is out or what, or if there's certain littles close to the surface, then, wow. I just said that. Is that a thing? Where did I learn that? Close to the surface.
Speaker 1:That's a phrase. That's like a specific phrase. I don't even know where I heard that. I had to hear that somewhere. Maybe Jane's show?
Speaker 1:I don't know. Someone must have said that in an interview or something because I hadn't thought of that. But now I have a word for it. So I'm glad it came to me, but I don't know where it came from. But anyway, if there's certain littles close to the surface, then that gag reflex thing is worse.
Speaker 1:And so sometimes it's literally just hard to eat. And then when we had cancer and we're on chemo and that made us sick a lot anyway, that made that worse. So, like, it's a whole big swirl tangled thing of we would just rather not have food ever, like ever, ever, if we could survive, which is hilarious because we are not like a tiny person. I mean, we are, but we are the smallest person in the family. Like, our biological family, they are large people, you guys.
Speaker 1:Large, large people. And I am not a tiny person. This body is not a tiny body. We play with the kids a lot. We walk a lot.
Speaker 1:We're doing more and more since we've come off the last round of chemo. Like, physically, we're getting a lot better, and we have a lot of strength, like, more than I realized we still had. So those are good things, but we are not skinny people, and we will never be skinny people because that's just not our like, besides any other health issues, like, that's just not in our genetics. So it's not like we're in danger of wasting away. We eat enough, but sometimes it's literally like, we had some rice today.
Speaker 1:And on a good day, maybe we can have some edamame with the rice. Maybe if we leave therapy in a really, really good place, we can drink some soup on the way home. Like, we are trying. But part of it is therapy. Therapy.
Speaker 1:Part of it is chemo, part like, all these different layers. Like, it's a tangled mess. And she's saying that, like, almost in a hierarchy of needs kind of thing, like that triangle or whatever, that the same way you have to work on safety in therapy before you can work on other issues in therapy, you also have to work on eating and sleeping. And I'm like, crap. Because we suck at both of those things, you guys.
Speaker 1:Like, how what is that? It's we don't up our food on purpose. We don't make ourselves throw up. We don't starve ourselves on purpose of, like, oh, I should be skinny, and so I'm going to starve myself. Like, it's not an eating disorder in those kinds of ways, but there are so many triggers about eating and so many triggers about food.
Speaker 1:Maybe I think I'm using triggers correctly here that food is just really hard, and I don't know how to fix that easily. But I get and I hear that she's saying that we should. So I don't know. It's on the list now. Okay.
Speaker 1:And then the next thing that I wanted to say of my, like, own perspective or the zoom in, zoom out, one thing that zoomed me in so fast when I heard it was she was talking about, like, being a system of parts, like, a being a whole is made up of parts. And so it's not that the parts aren't real. And I guess by parts, she means alters or personalities or insiders, whatever. She was using the word parts. And my friend Jane has talked about that.
Speaker 1:Like, she uses the word parts because she wants to remember that they are all parts of a whole and parts that are important together. So other people don't like to use parts because it sounds like so cold or something, I don't know, not cool or offensive to them or whatever. And, like, personalities or alters sound so clinical and not real or so clinical and weird. The way she described parts actually makes me like that phrase better than the way I liked it before. Like, I understand it differently now.
Speaker 1:And what she was saying was, like, every one of the parts has a right to be there and a reason to be there and a purpose for being there. And that's why they are parts because they are parts of the whole. But she also said something that made me really uncomfortable, and I don't know if it was uncomfortable because it was hard or if it was uncomfortable because it was wrong. Does that make sense? Like, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Like, I don't know if I agree with her or disagree with her or if I just didn't like what she said. I don't know. But what she said was that people with DID have difficulty differentiating between thought and action, or in other words, internal experience and external reality. So she is saying, like, what happens inside, it's not that it's not reality, but it's not external reality, that there's, like, an incongruence between what's happening inside and what's happening outside. And sometimes this shows up in, like, shame, for example, where you've where you're like, oh, the therapist is gonna fire me because I made a podcast.
Speaker 1:When in reality, the therapist is like, hey. Cool. You made a podcast. Good job. That's an example.
Speaker 1:And so she's saying, but how that affects, like, parts or other insiders is that there's not an actual like, her example was a three year old. She was saying there's not an actual three year old. There's a representation of the three year old that you once were. So, like, I don't think she was trying to be offensive. And if I'm looking for the evidence, like the therapist says, in most of, like, what this lady who's saying, she was actually really sensitive and went out of her way to be careful about those kinds of things.
Speaker 1:So I don't think she was saying like, oh, you fakers, you're not really real. Like, it's not that. Like, she talked about how they work together and all the different all the different kinds of parts and all the different ways parts to work together and how parts can talk and all these things. So it's not like she was dismissing parts, but it was like what she said was so hard, I can hold on to it. Like, it slipped again.
Speaker 1:Like, talks, I'm like, your mouth is moving, and I hear silence. How can my brain do that? Like, what you just said was really important, and I somehow skipped it, like, on a record. Like, an old school vinyl when it skips, and you're like, I just missed a really cool piece of music. I have no idea what happened, but we're moving on.
Speaker 1:So, like, something like that happened while she was talking. So I'm not sure. But she was saying that there's a difference between recognizing the internal reality of a three year old and something something external. I don't even know. It was really hard, but it went back to, like, we're all part of a system, and we are all part of a whole.
Speaker 1:And so she was like, we need adult parts to participate in therapy. Not that littles can't participate in therapy, but that part of taking care of littles is, like, internal self care, not just other people taking care of you for you, but you learning to take care of yourself. And part of that is learning to tolerate therapy. Ugh. I don't even know what that means yet, and I'm already scared.
Speaker 1:Like, what what does that mean learning to tolerate therapy? And so that's what she was talking about is that, like, you, if you're an adult part, you need to learn how to work together. So I automatically right away thought of Molly, who's, like, totally stepped up and helped with the littles on the inside. But then I was like, crap. I'm just talking about things on the podcast, but not actually like, I didn't go to therapy for all year.
Speaker 1:We were in therapy. I knew it, but I didn't talk to her. So how is that helpful? Well, it turns out that it's not helpful. Okay?
Speaker 1:So I confess that I have been not helpful, but I wanna be helpful. And so how can I do that? Like, can I like, I wanna step up and be cool? How can I help? Or what do I do?
Speaker 1:How do I go to therapy, actually participate, and try to stay present even if someone else like, how can I do that zoom in, zoom out thing if there are littles or someone else who's there? Like, I don't mean spy. I don't wanna be intrusive. I don't wanna be a creeper. I don't wanna scare them.
Speaker 1:But if we're supposed to have someone who can stay present during therapy, like, the lights are on, people. Pay attention. The therapist is talking to us. We need to soak this in. If we're supposed to have an adult part who can stay present, know that we're in therapy, and, like, hold on like, I don't know how the words are.
Speaker 1:I don't know the language to express all of this that's happening inside or what I'm learning. But, like, how do you go to therapy and hold on to now time and also hold, like, monkey bars or something? Like, hold on to now time with one hand, and with another hand, hold on to another part who needs help getting out of memory time or who needs to talk about what happened in memory time, but without losing now time. Does that make sense? Like, I'm not sure I'm even still saying it yet.
Speaker 1:But she talked about it, and she knew what she was talking about. And it seemed important, so I wrote it down. I don't know how to say it, and I don't know how to do it, but I wanna help. But what she said was that the reason it's hard to do is because of dissociation and that what dissociation basically is is like a self phobia. Like, I'm so afraid of myself.
Speaker 1:I cannot be myself. But I guess sorry. That's just funny. I can't I'm sorry. I'm so afraid of myself.
Speaker 1:I cannot be myself. I'm sorry. It's funny because it's true. So she's saying that it's not just that the trauma is so hard and awful, and it's not just that the trauma happened for so long of a time, but it's also that it's awful that that trauma happened, like, to me. Except it didn't happen to me because I have a self phobia.
Speaker 1:So she said the other thing is that a self phobia is really actually a trauma phobia, that we're afraid of knowing other parts, we're afraid of knowing their stories, and we're afraid of losing functioning if we do. So I think that about sums us up, and we're done here. So since she has figured out all that, we can just go. Like, we're done. She's figured it out.
Speaker 1:We're good. We don't have to go therapy anymore. I'm just kidding. So then she talked about all the different ways that that looks and all of that, and doctor e can talk about that because I don't get it. But self phobia cracked me up, and I'm totally gonna use it in sentences from now on.
Speaker 1:Because self phobia is really a trauma phobia, which is totally true. Who's not scared of trauma? Trauma's awful. I don't even wanna know. So now there's a word for not wanting to know, and it's not just denial.
Speaker 1:It is self phobia, which is trauma phobia. So I can just stay out of it. But if I stay out of it, then I can't be the cool one who steps up in therapy and tries to help other people. Whatever. So anyway, then she told a story about her own three year old, like, grandchild or something.
Speaker 1:And she said the cool thing about having grandchildren is that you can watch them without having to actually be the parent who's involved with either helping them or messing them up. Everybody laughed when she said that. But what she said is, like, a three year old is not actually, like, all needy all the time. So when a three year old from inside is trying to get help in therapy, that it's more trauma based and not just needy, but the adult parts, like, interpret it as needy because because they don't know how to meet those needs because those needs were never met. But the therapist knows how to meet those needs, so you have to trust your therapist.
Speaker 1:Ugh. I hate when they're right. But she said the other thing, though, is that the other thing she said, though, was that three year olds aren't just needy all the time. Like, they're really good at running off and doing their own thing and exploring the world and that that's part of what they do. And so part of healthy therapy is letting them do that.
Speaker 1:So it's not just meeting the needs of that three year old, but learning those same skills as an adult. So she's like, if you get some blocks or toys or something for your littles, then that's a good thing because you're paying attention to them. That part of you knows that they can connect, and they start to build safety and all those kinds of things. And there's, like, a whole stuff about that, and I don't even can't even talk about that right now. But she said it's also important that you do those same things for yourself, that the adult parts, whatever they're learning with the littles, they learn from the littles.
Speaker 1:It's not just that you rescue the littles and that the littles get all the help, but that you learn from the littles what you also need. So, like, if the littles need books and toys, for example, then what do you need that are your books and toys? Like, doctor e needs nerdy books that bore me, but were, like, toys I can play with. But what is it that's play for me? And so like, as an adult.
Speaker 1:So, like, when we take our outside kids to the park, they feel better and have fun and they play, but so do we. And not just with the littles, but, like, because we get exercise because we're out in the sunshine and that's good for our mood, things like that. So she was talking about how even when you're just working with a part, like your therapist is helping your littles or something like that, that it's still good for the whole system because the parts are always part of the whole. Mind blown. So, again, it, like, stretched my brain.
Speaker 1:When I zoomed in and tried to pay attention, it stretched my brain so much and made my brain hurt. But maybe I could almost get a grasp on it, and then it was gone. But trying to write down pieces and talking about them, I thought might help a little bit. So then the next piece of stuff that she talked about was like shame, which she said was acting in instead of acting out. So that's what the husband is always talking about is how m struggles with stuff internally and we struggle with stuff externally or something like that.
Speaker 1:I think that's what he meant. Like, she's acting in because of shame instead of acting out like me in my mouth or whatever. So she said that trauma survivors are really good at catastrophizing. Like, because things have always been so bad, and when things were bad, it was really bad that we think if we make changes now, even if there are positive changes, we won't be able to go back and use the same skills that we could before or that we'll be trapped without parts or a therapist to help us. Or that if people think we are able to do stuff function better, then we'll have to even when we can't or that people will think we're okay when we're not.
Speaker 1:So she said those are, like, reasons that shame comes in and can slow down progress or therapy therapy when, otherwise, we would be doing really well. But she said shame is a human emotion, and everyone feels it, and you can learn to manage it just like fear or other emotions. So she said you could even, like, literally tell yourself, I'm having a shame attack instead of just this shame means I am bad, which is pretty much how Em lives in the world. So I'm not trying to talk bad about her. I'm just talking about shame.
Speaker 1:But she said shame shows up in the body and thoughts and feelings. And here's the kicker. This is what I wanted to tell you about. She said that shame has triggers just like trauma has triggers. So our therapist has taught us about triggers and what triggers means, like that word, it's like when something let me see if I can say it right.
Speaker 1:A trigger is when something in now time makes you think of something from memory time or even feels like something in memory time or even makes you think you're in memory time. But, really, you're in now time where the trigger happened. You're not really back then. Back then is over. But shame works the same way, this lady said.
Speaker 1:And so the good thing, like finding the good and the bad therapy experiences, you can find the good and the shame. Not that shame is good, not that you want shame, but you can use it. So just like with trauma triggers, you can anticipate it, you can recognize it, and you can cope with it. Ba bam. Except I don't know how to do that.
Speaker 1:She just said it was possible. So that was, like, our whole entire morning. Okay? And my brain hurts. There's pieces I'm trying to hold on to and things I think like, maybe I could help with this.
Speaker 1:And I even felt a couple times, like, my feelings were excited of, like, okay. There's some hope here. I have words for things I didn't have words before, except zoom in, zoom out. I don't have words for that yet. I don't know what that's called.
Speaker 1:And there are, like, ways to, like, ways to make things better, I guess. Maybe? Maybe? I'm not sure. But that's what she said.
Speaker 1:So we'll see. We'll see. So then the next thing that I learned that I wanna tell you about is how she connected this was Kathy Steele, by the way. I didn't even tell you that because I'm so scattered. Like, this stuff was crazy.
Speaker 1:Helpful. Crazy helpful. That's what I meant. I'm working on not being offensive. So I'm probably not supposed to say crazy, but shoulda coulda woulda.
Speaker 1:Okay. So so the other thing I wanted to share that she talked about is more about that shame stuff. So, like, you know how guilt, even if it's false guilt, like, feel bad about something you did, right, or didn't do. But shame, you feel bad about who you are. Right?
Speaker 1:So this is something we've learned since group and have talked about in several different interviews, so I've learned about it from the podcast. But she talked about it. So she said when you have a need and your needs are not met, then that's what leads to shame, and that goes back to all the attunement stuff. You need to watch the still face experiment on YouTube if you were never in psych class or if you never got to see it because it totally shows all this misattunement stuff. But when your needs are not met, then, like, is ruptured, like connection in your relationships.
Speaker 1:Right? And shame leads to rage. And I was like, what? Because I'm not a rageful person. Like, I only talk on the podcast.
Speaker 1:I don't talk to people. I don't talk to people inside. I don't talk to the therapist. So if I don't even talk to them, how can I rage at them? But you know what she said?
Speaker 1:Then she, like, totally defined rage as either attacking yourself or attacking others. So back up for a minute. What? She said when you withdraw from others, that looks like isolation, like social anxiety. Check.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Working really hard on the friendship stuff, by the way, like, really hard. I'm really terrible at it. I need a therapy session that's, like, just how to be a friend because I'm a terrible friend. So, we got check marked on that one.
Speaker 1:Or this may also be a problem, perhaps. I'm not just saying. I'm not saying. I'm not confessing. I'm not admitting to anything, but it's possible that this is also true.
Speaker 1:She said it can also look like you're pretending to be extroverted and that you have lots of people around you, but it's all superficial, and you don't actually go, like, any deep with them. I need some depth. I need some I need why is it so hard? People. People.
Speaker 1:Okay. So I totally got marked on that. So she said you heal that by participating and also by deepening your friendships. And then the other thing was she said you can also withdraw from your internal world, like denying it, oopsie, and not communicating with each other or more shame stuff even inside. And so the way you heal that is by facing it, like listening to each other and looking at the stuff that there is, talking, listening, writing, however, like, that can happen, and then also building trust with each other.
Speaker 1:So hard stuff. But then when she was talking about the shame and about rage and how that looks like attacking yourself or attacking others, She said that severely neglected children cannot use imagery. So they were talking about EMDR stuff. We are not an EMDR therapist. Doctor e does not do EMDR.
Speaker 1:We are not EMDR haters. Just like we don't treat trauma, and we don't treat issues EMDR is helpful with, so we never did that. So I don't know about all that, but she did some kind of, like, imagery thing, and that was all kinds of crazy for us. So I don't know. But what she said was, you can't use it with severely neglected children who or adults who were severely neglected children when when they are unable to use imagery.
Speaker 1:And so she said those people are people who are super extroverted, aggressive, and they overshare, and that it's because their frontal cortex is inhibited. I know nothing about frontal cortex, guys. I can barely say those words. So doctor e will have to explain all that, but she said their symptoms show up as like impaired decision making. On the other hand, the other way severely neglected children respond as they grow up are becoming extremely sensitive to imagery.
Speaker 1:And so, like, symbols, a high hypnotic suggestibility, also can't say that. Things like EMDR are really helpful and guided adapted meditations. Like, I don't know. Like, this is pretty vulnerable. Like, I don't know exactly all the words for it or labels of it, but this is, like, what our therapist is really good at also because she takes care of us this way.
Speaker 1:But she said that those people grow up to be artistic and introverted, under share until they become an adult and start a podcast and have, like, impaired verbal direct expression, which means you do a podcast instead of actually talking to your therapist, and you interview your friend instead of actually being a friend. That is indirect communication. So she said it's because, though, like, it's a thing. Like, we're not just being naughty. She said it's an inhibited, broken area, something in the brain.
Speaker 1:Severely neglected children, so not just abused children, but specifically severely neglected children get impacted two different ways. And based on what part of the brain is impacted and why, all it shows up in these two different ways. So that was, like, fascinating, you know, if you have glasses. But then there was one more thing, one more thing that I wanna share about what we learned at this thing today. She talked about feelings are also triggers.
Speaker 1:So trauma triggers, shame triggers, but also feeling triggers that, like, you can spaz out because of specific feelings or because of why you're feeling or because of trying to express your feelings or and this was huge, you guys, huge. Also, because of animal defenses. And I was like, what? Because I am not an animal. So I got very confused on this part.
Speaker 1:But she meant, like, biologically, physiologically, like, what your body does is, like, a natural organic response, not just a choice. So, like, when there's a predator, your body and your brain respond a certain way just like everyone else in the animal kingdom. I am not making this up. This is what this lady told us. And so she said, it's not a conscious choice.
Speaker 1:Like, physiologically, your body shuts down. You have no choice externally because there's a predator like the abusers. Right? And you have no choice internally because you can't get away. So when you have thoughts like, why didn't I fight back?
Speaker 1:Or why couldn't I get away? Or things like that that are really shame based questions, the answer is because you couldn't. And it's not your fault. And logic does not actually help with shame based issues. But, like, that's a really helpful thing to know when you're in a good place to have some knowing and to think about things.
Speaker 1:Like, she said, you literally couldn't. You couldn't get away outside, and you couldn't get away inside, and that's why dissociating happens. I don't know. I may have to think about it. But the important piece seems to be that it's not your fault.
Speaker 1:And I don't know how many times we can say that. It's not your fault. It's not your fault. It's not your fault. Like, we'll keep saying it's not your fault, and I'll keep saying it.
Speaker 1:And maybe I can remember it. It's not my fault. It's not my fault. Except I I don't know how to tell like, how do you tell in that, or how do you tell the littles that? Like, that's why I need to be participating in therapy.
Speaker 1:Because when I get a piece like that, it feels really big, and it feels really important, but I don't know where it goes. So I had to go back to direct communication and talk to my therapist and talk to the others inside and tell them what I learned, that not only is it not your fault, like, oh, they were bigger than you or they were meaner than you or they this or they that, or whatever. Like, stuff I don't wanna talk about right now. But, like, literally, she talked, like, this whole thing. Like, it was really triggering, actually.
Speaker 1:I think we got a little spacey. Like, she talked about this whole thing about how it works in the body that your body physically shuts down when you're being attacked. Like, it's not even a time of flight or freeze or fright or something. Yeah. It is a fright.
Speaker 1:That's not right. Flight or fright. No. Wait. What is it?
Speaker 1:Fight. Fight or flight. Like, not just that moment, but, like, once it's already happening, it's already too late for that, and you cannot respond. Like, body just shuts down. And she explained how all that happens in the brain, and I don't understand it enough to tell you.
Speaker 1:But the point is, it happens in the animal kingdom and with prey and predators and all of that of, like, your body just shuts down, and there's nothing you can do about it in that moment when you're a child. And so, like, it's not your fault you couldn't get away, and it's not your fault you couldn't fight back. Like, there's supposed to be some compassion there and understanding that and communicating that, and that's why we should go to therapy. So just putting that out there on the pro list for therapy. We have a whole other day of this tomorrow, so we'll share more if we learn anything.
Speaker 1:And then doctor e will do, like, a legit review of what we learned, and she's presenting for the pleural conference. And so those of you who want the nerd town stuff, you can get that then. I'm just telling you this is what made me crazy and why there was all this stuff going on about zooming in and zooming out. I need to know what the word is that. So if you're listening to this podcast and know an actual word for this whole zoom in, zoom out thing, you should let me know.
Speaker 1:Or else we can just call it zoom in, zoom out from now on because I don't know how to explain it, but I'm learning stuff, and it feels important. So I'm trying to keep it up in my head. Thanks for listening. Thank you for listening. Your support of the podcast, the workbooks, and the community means so much to us as we try to create something together that's never been done before.
Speaker 1:Not like this. Connection brings healing, and you can join us on the community at www.systemspeakcommunity.com. We'll see you there.