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91. Harm OCD in Pregnancy Sent me to the ER with author Amber Williams Van Zuyen

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, OCD, Personal Testimony, Podcast Episode.

Amber Williams Van Zuyen, author of Pregnant and Drowning tells about her struggle with harm OCD during her pregnancy.

Episode Highlights:

  • How and when did her OCD symptoms start
  • What happened the first time she sought help for her OCD
  • How her OCD symptoms intensified during her pregnancy and after giving birth
  • What helped her during her process of overcoming her OCD
  • How God helped her get through her struggles
  • Amber’s book, Drowning and Pregnant 

Episode Summary:

Welcome to Episode 91 of Christian Faith and OCD. In this episode, I’m thrilled to share an insightful conversation with Amber Van Zuyen, the author of Pregnant and Drowning. Amber’s story is incredibly relatable for those who have struggled with anxiety and OCD.

Amber opens up about her personal journey with OCD, which began in childhood with compulsive rituals and obsessive fears. She recalls avoiding stepping on lines and constantly checking for lice. Her symptoms worsened in her twenties, especially after experiencing ocular migraines, which she feared were symptoms of a serious illness.

Amber’s story resonates deeply with anyone who has faced similar challenges. She describes her struggles with health anxiety, driven by fears related to her grandmother’s battle with MS and her own obsessive thoughts about having a serious disease.

Throughout her journey, Amber grapples with the stigma around mental health and the misconceptions within faith communities.

Amber’s reflections offer a poignant reminder that mental health issues are real and deserve compassion and understanding. Her story is a testament to the courage it takes to confront and manage these challenges while maintaining faith and hope.

Tune in to hear more about Amber’s journey and the insights she offers for those struggling with similar experiences.

Related Links and Resources:

Amber’s book: Pregnant & Drowning

Explore Related Episodes:

126. What if I Abuse My Child? Postpartum OCD Story with Sarah Brown

Transcript

Welcome to Christian Faith and OCD episode 91. If you’ve been listening to the podcast for a little while, you know that we love to tell personal stories of people who have struggled with anxiety and OCD. These are so important because they are relatable to other people who often feel so alone, and I think some of you are really going to resonate.

If you’ve ever experienced any type of harm OCD thoughts, you’re really going to resonate with our guest today. Here is my interview with the author of Pregnant and Drowning, Amber Van Zuyen.

Amber, welcome to the show. It’s good to have you today.

Amber: Thanks for having me. I’m excited to be here.

Carrie: You have a really unique personal story about anxiety and OCD and how that’s impacted you and your life, especially in terms of being pregnant and having your son. Take us back a little bit earlier to when you first started experiencing anxiety or OCD symptoms.

Amber: Well, looking back, I can pinpoint when I was 24 when it heightened and got to its worst point, but in early childhood, I would do things like, I’d be in the grocery store with my mom and I didn’t want to step on the lines on the squares because I believe something bad was going to happen or I just had to make sure that I did that so nothing would happen to me, or there was a little girl who had lice in class next to me and I obsessed about constantly having lice and I would go home and have my mom check constantly and it never stopped. It was always just, check again, check again maybe that’s kind of where I noticed my OCD in my earlier days. And then when I was in high school, I got obsessed with makeup and I always felt ugly, I had to cover that up during that time in my life, I would go to the bathroom during lunch periods and take it all off and then re-put it all back on just because I didn’t want anyone to see me. Looking back, those were things where my obsessive compulsive was kind of taking over. But when I was about 24, I had this really scary thing happen with my vision.

I ended up having something called ocular migraines which affected only one eye. I thought I was having a stroke, and my grandmother also suffered from MS terribly early on in my life, I saw her in a bad state, and that was also another concern of mine. So I was kind of always having obsessive thoughts about getting diagnosed with something, constantly reading things, self-diagnosing that triggered health anxiety for me.

I went to the doctor and he told me it was ocular migraines, that there’s nothing to worry about, but I also was concerned about MS too because my grandmother had it, and I was just so terrified and it just played over and over in my head that I was basically already living with a disease that I didn’t even have to the point where I didn’t wanna go out of the house.

I was obsessing with medical books, reading symptoms over and over again, and actually convincing my body that I was having those symptom. This went on for about a month, and I went to the doctor and they prescribed me medication, and I refused to take it for about a month, but I eventually did, and I slowly got better I never completely got over it, but I learned how to deal with it differently.

Carrie: Did they recognize the OCD at that time?

Amber: No, they told me I had anxiety, but looking back, I definitely in the mind it’s repeat, repeat, repeat. It was really destroying my life because I obsessed about it so much as I was living at 24 7 but I eventually got on medication and it got better. And then it was one of those things where I’ve always felt guilty about it because it’s like a lack of faith I feel in a sense, but I do feel like it’s an imbalance that I’ve struggled with and that I truly need medication for it. There have been points in my life where I’ve been off of it and then on it again, and then, Recently I’ve had a trigger because I got off a medication and I was triggered again with medical stuff because of stories Christina Applegate just came out with MS and it triggered that time in my life again but with that said about MS, I see a lot of people doing wonderful with it.

My grandma just got diagnosed at such a weird time she didn’t get diagnosed for with it for 10 years people said she was crazy. She went to doctors and they told my grandpa, you know, your wife’s crazy you need to lock her up in a mental institution but really she was really sick with MS they just didn’t recognize it at that time. She got so debilitated and basically, there was nothing that they could do for her she was too deteriorated at that point to help her. A part of me feel so guilty because I see all these people doing so wonderful with it or just having a good attitude with it and that has been a struggle for me, I feel guilt.

Carrie: Going back to the piece about faith, because I think a lot of people have that wrestling that struggles with anxiety or OCD, well, maybe this is a faith issue, “I don’t have enough faith in God kind of flesh that out a little bit more for you was, I don’t have enough faith, if I do get MS, that God’s going to take care of me and I’m going to be okay.”

Amber: Yes to me, I felt so bad because here I am creating these things in my own head when there are people out there suffering with it and doing good with it because the most courageous people that I know, my brother-in-law’s a paraplegic and he’s just a testimony.

Just such an attitude and I just think God, what is wrong with me? Why am I like this? Is it a lack of faith, but really it’s anxiety and OCD, and it’s truly a disorder? And I had to come to terms with accepting that because I know now going through several years, I’m almost 40 and dealing with it, that it is an actual disorder.

When I’m on medication, I can control it and I can think clearly, it’s almost a bunch of trash jumbled up in your head and then it gets cleared away and you could see clearly without the medication I couldn’t see clearly.

Carrie: I think it’s really hard for anybody to accept that they have an issue, whether it’s physical or emotional. There is a sense of grief and loss of saying, okay yes, I am struggling with OCD because it wasn’t something that you wanted, it wasn’t something that you brought upon yourself it just, it happens, and there’s probably genetic and environmental factors that contribute to all of that most mental health conditions. So that piece of just learning the acceptance is hard.

Amber: It is, and a lot of people are just, oh, get over it they don’t understand so there’s just this stigma that anxiety isn’t real, your OCD is just something that you are making up. You get a lot of that from people that don’t understand it, and I think that’s where a lot of the guilt comes in is people just throw it to the wayside.

This isn’t a real problem, this is just a you problem, but anxiety has a face just like diabetes or anything else does, and it’s an actual disorder some people need medication for it, some don’t, I tend to relapse when I’m not on medication.

Carrie: Tell us about that in terms of maybe responses from people in your faith community when they found out that you were struggling.

Amber: Well, I had a really interesting experience while I was pregnant, I was really struggling with really dark, violent thoughts, and I was thinking these thoughts were my thoughts and I was struggling so much my mom didn’t know what to do. She made an appointment with a Christian counselor at her church, and I went, I sat down with her. She was an older woman, and I began to tell her, I’m struggling with these thoughts I’m getting really depressed, I don’t know what to do. And she looked at me in the face and said, you don’t have real problems, my daughter has real problems, my daughter almost died giving birth, you don’t have real problems. And I just couldn’t even believe that she had gone there and said that, because I’m already so fragile she could have pushed me to, I don’t wanna say suicide, but there were moments during my pregnancy that I questioned those things. Without my family I could have done that, which is her saying that, and it was just so shocking coming from a Christian counselor.

Carrie: That’s really unfortunate that happened it sounds sometimes counselors can have an internal reaction to things that people tell them, and if we’re not in check with those experiences that happen within ourselves, we can do damage. And so it sounds she had some kind of, we call it counter transference reaction towards you as a pregnant woman and dealing with things. And clearly it sounds like she was not up to speed on OCD or what those symptoms are.

Amber: Yes. She definitely was not qualified for at least someone with my condition going on.

Carrie: When did you get that diagnosis of OCD? Was it when you were pregnant? Did someone tell you like, “Hey, this is harm OCD, these are some classic things and these are intrusions it’s not really you?”

Amber: Probably I was 12 weeks pregnant, these obsessive thoughts started five days after I found out I was pregnant. I’ve always had that health anxiety and I’ve always worried, I wasn’t really sure if I wanted to have children at the time, and I was still married. My mom’s like, oh, when are you gonna have kids?

Everyone’s like, “When are you going to have kids?” I don’t know. I was 33 and I’m like, okay, I guess we’ll try and I got pregnant really fast. It scared me and I was laying on the couch one day, a few days after I found out I was pregnant and I was petting my dog and I had this thought in my head where she trusts me so much, I could just snap her neck and she wouldn’t even know it and it scared me.

I had no want or desire to do that, but I started to think, am I starting to go crazy? Am I going to get postpartum? And then I let this repeat, repeat and it turned into a big monster, and it got to the point where I called my OBGYN, and I said, these are the things that are going on in my head and I don’t know what to do, I’m scared that they could happen, not that I want them to happen, but they could and she told me, well, thoughts turn into plans, and then things happen.

Carrie: Oh my goodness. Thanks.

Amber: That triggered me so bad that now the thoughts went from my animals to my mother, to my husband to everyone around me is not safe anymore. Any object around the house, I took all the knives out of the house, put them away, I was scared of the knife drawer, I was scared of the cord that goes through your iPod I thought anything could be a weapon. I was talking to my good friend, she’s a nurse, and she was just walking me through all this, and then one night I was lying in bed and I thought I heard a voice say, just do it already but it was really my thoughts but my friend got freaked out and she said, it’s time for you to go get evaluated. I went to the hospital the next day I was so incredibly terrified I thought everyone’s gonna find out, but at least they will shackle me down and I can’t hurt myself, I can’t hurt anyone else, and this baby can have a chance, so I’m gonna go, but I really thought they were going to 50150 me, they didn’t.

Carrie: In terms of involuntarily hospitalize you, that kinda thing?

Amber: Yes they told me that I was suffering from horrible OCD and anxiety, extreme levels of it. I was like O C D interesting, I didn’t really think about that ever being a thing, because you know, when I think of OCD, it’s like locking the door five times or checking. I didn’t do that, but my mom did that I don’t know if it was hereditary. I ended up going to a therapist through my insurance company and I ended up getting on medication while pregnant, and that was a whole other ordeal as well, because I had one doctor tell me he was, I just switched carriers, so I’d gone to a new carrier while I got pregnant.

This is a whole new doctor, and he told me that because I told him I was suffering from anxiety and this was prior to me going to go get evaluated. And I was just kind of seeing what I could do, I tried acupuncture and I was going to try to get a referral cause it was really expensive to go out of pocket every day because I was suffering so bad, because I said antidepressants while pregnant, what do you think about it? And he said it’s equivalent to a mother drinking every day pregnant. And I’m like, what?

I was just shocked well, okay, this isn’t an avenue I can go down this isn’t going to work. I guess I ended up getting put on medication and I had another doctor, a different one after going through the evaluation process, she put me on something, a roll of doses and it turns out that it’s not the stigma that’s attached with taking antidepressants while pregnant. There’s some that are more harmful and then there are others that don’t travel through the placenta quite the others do. And I’ve asked several doctors and they say that it’s a very low-grade risk as far as the baby’s health goes certain ones and the one that I was on in particular, Prozac, was a friendly one for pregnancy.

Carrie: That’s interesting that your first doctor said that because there are all kinds of studies that have also been done on depressed mothers who are pregnant and that can actually cause harm, low birth weights and those types of things.

Depression in itself is not good for pregnancy, but taking an antidepressant sometimes can help, mitigate some of those risks from the depression.

Amber: Yes.

Carrie: Did your baby come out just fine?

Amber: He came out wonderful. I missed one little part of that story when I told my OBGYN my thoughts, she put me on a medication instantly and not a lot of high risk to it. I was terrified I was on that for six weeks, and then they switched me to Prozac, which is a lot better but he came out beautiful, perfect, good birth weight, he was seven pounds, eight ounces.

Carrie: That’s great. Do you feel like that changed the course of the rest of your pregnancy? How far along were you when you got on the medication?

Amber: 11 weeks.

Carrie: You had these symptoms really early and I’m not a doctor, so I don’t know a ton about this, I just know from anecdotal experience that individuals I’ve talked to have struggled with OCD. Some of them, I guess with all the hormones and different things that are going on in your body and pregnancy is somewhat stressful to your body in general, that can increase people’s OCD symptoms.

I don’t know if you’ve talked to other people who’ve had similar experiences or heard or read articles or things like that.

Amber: Actually, I had two girls reach out to me that kind of heard about my story. Their OCD was a little different. One girl was just terrified of throwing up she has this horrible fear of throwing up, and she was obsessively thinking about it during her pregnancy, and it was derailing her from her everyday life.

She couldn’t focus, she couldn’t go to work. I kind of tried to talk to her as much as I could through it, just knowing that she’s not alone, that we’re all in this together, and that we all have different little things, but they’re all kind of in common when it comes down to the core of it. And then there was another girl who suffered horribly with depression and my boss at my job kind of hooked us up and I kind of just texted with her and she ended up getting on medication while pregnant, and that was a big game changer for her too. She didn’t completely get through her OCD depression during pregnancy, but it helped tremendously.

Carrie: That’s great. I think it’s mental health it’s so important to talk about these things while pregnant too and this is kind of close to my heart because I had some mild depression when I was pregnant with my daughter, and I think I struggled so much with like the shoulds. Well, I should be happy because I got pregnant and I was older and had lots of friends and family that had dealt with infertility, and so I put all these kinds of like shoulds on myself. You should be happy and I had this expectation that I was going to still be able to be fit during pregnancy and dealt with some back pain and different things. It was hard I really had to read just things. I guess I say all that to say I want people to know pregnancy is a happy time, but people can still struggle with some pretty significant mental health issues through that experience.

Amber: Yes, I mean when I had my baby, I held him and I didn’t feel anything right after I had him and I’m just thinking, aren’t I supposed to feel all these things? I just felt numb. Before they make you go home they have you watch this video, don’t shake your baby, don’t do this, don’t do that and I just felt, or if you’re feeling these things, come back in it’s one of those postpartum videos. And they’re playing this because they know who I am you know, just like all of these fears and for the longest time after he was born, I would get these bouts of fear changing him. I’d feel I’d lose control over my hands and they would do something to hurt him not that I wanted to, just the fear of it. And I would have to take him to my mom’s and go, just take a breather for a minute, go for a walk, and kind of work through that.

Carrie: I think the things that you’re talking about, one of the reasons OCD goes undiagnosed is because people don’t know what a lot of the symptoms are and that the obsessions can take a variety of different forms.

It sounds like you’ve struggled with your share of harm, OCD obsessions, but also somatic obsessions in terms of your body, and maybe there’s something wrong with me and maybe I’m really ill. Tell us a little bit more about how you got through that dark part in your life spiritually, this is the lowest point I feel like I’m going crazy, I feel there’s something really wrong with me, I don’t know what it is God help me.

Amber: I meditated on the Bible so much, just verse after verse, great glory from harvest I would put him on every night about fear and worry and anxiety, and I just would fall asleep to his messages and it would give me peace and calmness.

That was the only place I found a place where I could take a deep breath and just be like, I’m going to be okay. Another book, which really helped me was Battlefield of the Mind by Joyce Meyer. That just really helped me put into perspective. I can have a thought come into my head, but I don’t have to let it make a home there.

Just that God got me through it I never felt so close to him, but yet so close to the enemy as well I just felt it was a battle for my life. I definitely feel, Yes, I have anxiety and OCD, but there was some massive spiritual warfare I’ve never felt anything like that ever and it’s only by the grace of God that I got through it.

Just prayer, prayer, prayer, talking, I talk to a lot of Christian friends and that’s one thing that I think is a strong suit in me. I don’t have money, but I’m an open book and I tell people I just spill my guts. I think a part of that was a big part of my healing process, just letting it out, letting people know I’m not ok.

Letting them pray for me and I got baptized when I was pregnant was a huge thing for me it was like a rededication. My faith is stronger now than it has ever been, and I’ve never felt closer to God during that time it was wild.

Carrie: Absolutely. That makes a lot of sense. The harder circumstances and his sufferings lead us closer to God and we discover more about who he is through those really hard times in our life. Then you felt led to write this book titled Pregnant and Drowning. Can you tell us about that?

Amber: While I was pregnant and going through all these things, I so desperately wanted something to relate to. I could find little tidbits here and there about women that had suffered from postpartum. Some are a little bit similar to mine, but not a whole lot.

I didn’t find a whole lot on harm OCD when I was going through this, and I don’t know if I wasn’t navigating correctly or how I was searching, but it just seemed so taboo to talk about and I just wanted people to know that you are not your thoughts. One thing that I really struggle with, and this is just strictly my opinion.

When I see a horrible headline where a mother bills her children, I think that is not postpartum in my opinion, that is evil and from the enemy. The devil does all these things to make you think that you’re going crazy and that you’ve got to do these things I’ve never had that desire. When I see that and I see postpartum, I go, I don’t know if can postpartum go that far to where you could harm a child like that.

I don’t know I just wanted to tell my story because I would never do something like that, and I felt like a monster and I was ashamed of it, but I know now that wasn’t me those were just thoughts that I invited in and I just could not get them off of the OCD wheel in my head.

Carrie: I appreciate you being so vulnerable about some of those specific thoughts that you had, because I think a lot of people, even people who come to therapy that I see, it takes a little while before they can even open up and talk about some of the things that are going on in their head because they feel they’re so horrific.

And then if I start talking about it, I’m going to possibly start obsessing about it, it can be really tough for them and I think that other people will be listening to this and find it very relatable of some of the things that they’ve had. I appreciate what you said earlier too, about how you can have a thought come in and it doesn’t have to make its home there, like you don’t have to continue to dwell on it you can notice there’s a separation that we can create. I’m having this thought, but one that’s not a reflection of my character which is so important and then two, it’s a thought. I can separate myself from that and say it’s not the same thing as a desire that doesn’t mean that I want to engage in that.

That’s why we call them intrusive thoughts because they intrude when you think about something that kind of pushes its way in, that doesn’t need to be there. That’s something that a lot of people, especially when they’re first kind of getting to know themselves in OCD that they really struggle with.

They think, Oh because I had this thought about hurting myself, my animal, my kids, whatever that means, somehow there’s some deep-seated secret desire that I want to do that, and that’s not the case so it’s important for people listening to this to know that.

Amber: There’s such a difference and it took me forever to realize that because I thought I don’t want to do these things, but why are they in my head because I won’t let them go I’m giving them value. I’m creating this monster that’s under my bed, and I can’t get rid of it until I can figure out that there’s a difference between a thought and who I am as a person, and that doesn’t reflect me.

Carrie: Your book is about your personal story and some things that were helpful and beneficial to you during that process.

Amber: It starts off in my earlier anxiety and then it moves on to my pregnancy, and there was so much darkness in that time and just the struggle I went through to try to get me in this baby through that journey also, I ended up having another baby and I was on medication the whole time. It was a great pregnancy as far as mental health goes totally opposite.

Carrie: That’s so hopeful too for people to know that they can have a different experience than they did the first time, even if they had difficulty with their mental health.

So you just kind of knew going into the second pregnancy, okay, I know what I’m dealing with I know what thoughts could come up, I have some more tools, skills, or resources to be able to separate myself from those and distract myself and move on. Did you ever get any good therapy in this process to specifically deal with the OCD?

Amber: I went to a couple of meetings. It was kind of far away from where I lived and I should have done the group thing I think it’s helpful. I am interested in joining one now cause I think it’s so important to support each other and to realize you’re not alone and that we can all get through this together, just hearing each other’s testimony, each other’s stories, helping each other through struggles.

I know that for me, I don’t have a lot of friends that struggle with the same things I do. I have one friend that has pretty bad anxiety, so to be able to relate to her is medication and therapy. Just to be like, “Hey, oh gosh, you do that too oh, okay I understand how that feels.” Just knowing that you’re not alone is such a game-changer I think.

Carrie: Amber, you have such a powerful testimony and I appreciate you coming on and sharing this with us, I hope that people will get your book if this is something that they’ve struggled with and so that they can kind of relate and relieve a sense of shame that they may be having over dealing with some of these thoughts.

Amber: Well, thank you so much for having me.

89. Personal Story of Spiritual Abuse and Chronic Pain with K.J. Ramsey, M.A.

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, Counseling, Personal Testimony, Podcast Episode. No Comments on 89. Personal Story of Spiritual Abuse and Chronic Pain with K.J. Ramsey, M.A.

Therapist and author K.J. Ramsey talks to us about her healing journey from spiritual abuse and chronic pain.

-How K.J. realized that she was in a spiritually abusive situation

-Wrestling with questions about why God allowed her suffering

-The importance of emotional safety in a church or community

-Her process of leaving a spiritually toxic environment 

-How connecting to her body helps in her healing

-K.J.’s books, “The Lord is My Courage” and “The Book of Common Courage”

Related links and Resources:

www.kjramsey.com/

Transcript

Carrie: Welcome to Hope for Anxiety and OCD episode 89. I had the absolute privilege of interviewing KJ Ramsey. This was a situation where I didn’t realize before the interview how much we had in common. We both have a background as trauma therapists with more of a somatic lens. We both graduated from the same seminary.

It was very interesting to see her perspectives based on her own experiences and understanding of scripture. Kj, welcome to the podcast.

K.J.: Hey, thank you for having me.

Carrie: I know that with authors, you guys tend to have a lot of podcast interviews. It’s almost like you’re on a virtual book tour nowadays, right?

K.J.: Basically what it is, it’s an extensive virtual book tour. And an introvert.

Carrie: Oh, no. Well, at least you don’t have to meet as many people face-to-face then.

K.J.: I guess in a way, especially during cold and flu season, and there’s still COVID all around. It’s nice to minimize some of that, but it is good. I get to talk to a lot of really interesting people.

Living with a Chronic Illness and Wrestling with God to Understand Her Suffering

Carrie: So my understanding from scoping out your website is that you talk about your personal story on there, and I imagine that is what you write about as well. You’ve written a few books. Is it an autoimmune condition that you have or some issue that causes chronic pain?

K.J.: I have several autoimmune diseases, but I started with one, which is a way that it typically goes if you have one; it kind of blooms into more. I’ve had ankylosing spondylitis for 14 years, and AS is the shortened version of that, which is better on the tongue. Last year, I got COVID-19, which turned into several more diseases I will have for my life under intense treatment. I have a lot.

Carrie: So you ended up with the long haul COVID symptoms?

K.J.: Yes. Because of it, I had long covid and new diseases, which is hard.

Carrie: I’m curious because you also talked in your story about spiritual abuse, and I’m processing, as well, a lot about healing just in general because my husband was just diagnosed last year with a permanent neurological condition, and there’s no cure for it.

I’m curious if you could share some of your thoughts on healing. I think it helps our audience with anxiety and OCD as well because there’s a lot of struggle in wrestling. Why am I having to deal with this? Why won’t God heal me? Why can’t he take this away from me? He’s all-powerful. He has the ability to do that. Can you tell us about maybe some of your wrestlings with that?

K.J.: I was 20 years old when I suddenly got sick and went from being a fully functional young adult to barely walking and could barely hold a pen or drive myself across campus. I was a college student at the time, and that persisted.

I entered adulthood wrestling with this question of why I have this suffering that doesn’t seem to go away. What is the point? And also, what does God care? What is God going to do about this? And really, my better answers are in the book, my first book, this Too Shall Last. I will say that I’m more a writer than anything else, but I’m a trauma therapist learning how to listen to my body and respond to my own sensations with kindness, compassion, and movement.

I really do believe that there is healing in the way that I would say, the capacity to live as fully as we can, even for some things to be reversed. And that’s with me saying that with a person with a lot that’s wrong on my test results.

And a lot of ongoing pain still in my life that I’ve seen things change, and I’ve seen my capacity to show up in my life grow massively as I’ve learned to listen to my body and what she has to say about how safe I feel on any given day or moment. From both a theological and a trauma perspective, I believe there is possible healing in how we face ourselves with compassion and face one another with compassion. And I caveat that by saying how I define healing might be different than sudden spontaneous removal of all of your symptoms. I think that, actually, pain prompts us to pay attention and bear witness to the pain in our lives.

And when I say pain, I mean all of it. Emotional pain too, struggles, the very inconvenient experience of having intrusive thoughts. That’s painful. Pain prompts us to pay attention and can point us to the places where parts of us still need to be unfolded with the care that needs to be held.

And it’s in that process that we experience more fullness, more joy, that’s healing. There’s a difference between healing and curing. The difference is between good removal of all of your problems and experiencing wholeness, and I think we all can experience wholeness even in a body that continues to have a disease continues to have a mental illness.

Finding Emotional Support and Connection

Carrie: That’s incredible. I don’t think that I could have phrased that better because I think that aligns with some of the process of what I’ve been thinking about with my husband. It’s like we haven’t gotten the healing from, or the cure, like you said, from the diagnosis, but we’ve been healed in the sense that we’ve been healed from isolation.

We have support and other people we’re connected to who are going through this. We have a support system outside of those that are going through it. We’ve been healed from the financial stress of paying for medical bills, and God has provided. That’s something that I want to write about a little bit more.

When we started this journey, it was kind; a lot of people were praying for him, and he was having eye issues, and they were praying for him for healing. That in itself is somewhat of a miracle because even though he has a degenerative condition, his eyes haven’t changed in a year, which we are just really celebrating; that, and so thankful that he hasn’t lost any more of his vision, but it’s been a process of, I think his eye doctor’s probably not a Christian and doesn’t know quite how to make sense of that. I thought when we first started going through this, God would take healing in any form that it comes in.

However you want to do this, if you’re going to heal him physically or if you want to heal him emotionally, and there’s the level where he’ll talk about how, even though he likes to be in the background, he has this walker now that puts him in the spotlight. People speak to him, and he’s able to encourage them. Or even people with mobility issues say, “Oh, tell me about this walker.” It’s just a little bit different from your typical walker. How do I get one of those? Those types of things. It’s been very interesting to see how God’s used him differently with this struggle and suffering because it’s definitely changed him a lot. It changed me a lot and drew us closer to God and each other and those things. I’m really thankful for it.

K.J: I love that you started that off office saying God has healed you of; I don’t know if you put it exactly like this, but your individualism. I think that’s one of the core things that we’re all being invited into, whether it’s with struggling with something like OCD or Ankylos Spondylitis or complex trauma, there’s this invitation to be more fully human, which means to be in relationship to others, to be connected. There’s something about our struggles that invites us in a way that is harder to decline, to be connected, and to be supported, to be seen. The way that my body works, I can’t do life on my own.

I can’t. There are many stretches where I can’t take care of myself fully; beyond that, I need the emotional support of the people around me. I don’t love experiencing that, and I love that my body pulls me into a story where I don’t have to be self-sufficient, and nobody else has to, either. And I think that is the healing in which we’re all being bound.

We’re all being invited into. It’s the space between each other. That’s where Joy is. That’s where wonder is through love; our struggles take us to go there.

How K.J. Discovered that She was in a Spiritual Abusive Situation

Carrie: And we’re entirely too isolated and disconnected from each other in our society. I’m really curious about this. It is kind of totally switching topics, but your story regarding how you discovered that you were in a spiritually abusive conversation just gives us a picture of the warning signs of that or when it starts to click like, “Oh, this isn’t healthy.”

K.J.: In my previous book, the Lord is My Courage, I share a lot of my husband and my story of waking up to the fact that we were in a spiritually abusive faith community in this church and choosing to leave it and trying to heal from it. Dealing with the ongoing effects of religious trauma is so hard about spiritual abuse that it’s often quite subtle.

Of course, there are going to be things that are not subtle. But I think the whole, does the fish know what the water is around them? It’s just, you’re in, you’re swimming in the water, and that’s the water. For us, waking up to the fact that the water we were swimming in was toxic was a slow process of paying attention and sensing our pain.

For us, it was noticing how other people were being harmed. My husband was a pastor at this church, and his coworkers would come to him in tears after being yelled at in the pastor’s office. So hearing other people being belittled or overworked, noticing how people are subtly mocked in staff meetings, and being disturbed by that is part of what woke us up.

At first, we weren’t the people being directly attacked because we were doing the stuff that the pastor didn’t want to do himself. My husband was over pastoral care and counseling, and I ran my counseling practice at the church. This pastor wanted to preach, so we were in good graces because we did something that made the church look good and took stuff off his plate.

That favor you can get with a leader can blind you for a while to how they might be treating other people. But as soon as we started to confront, I don’t love how you yelled at that person; that’s when you become the problem, too. I don’t so much to categorize warning signs or red flags.

The most important thing is that we should know, especially in white evangelicalism, that we have been taught to dismiss our own bodies’ signals about how safe we are in our environment. And call it definitely faithfulness that you should serve no matter what, volunteer, and believe the best of your leaders because of so many things.

The inheritance of Nastheism down to the more recent effects of purity culture. We have internalized and ingested a spirituality that says the body is bad and your emotions are untrustworthy. And I’m here to say that’s not scripturally true, theologically true, or physiologically helpful.

Carrie: Yeah, it drives me bonkers.

The Importance of Emotional Safety in Churches and Communities

K.J.: Yes. It’s terrible. And that in itself is, those are the seeds of religious trauma right there. But your emotions and your sensations about being in church and being around other Christians are actually telling you really important things about how safe you are and how safe everybody is in that community, and learning to listen to your own sense of distress and being disturbed by something is actually what helps you move into more safety.

Sometimes, your body has wise things to point out about whether somebody’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Our bodies helped us over time. Very slowly, our bodies begged us to listen. I know it was listening that got us free.

Carrie: This is something that really bothers me, that when people comment in church, and I’ve heard it repeatedly with pastors, you have to choose faith over your feelings.

Those are interacting with each other all the time. God gave us a body and emotions for a reason, and God has a wide range of emotions. That statement, to me, I feel is very unhealthy, but it’s something that I’ve heard repetitively.

K.J.: You can walk around in public and see people wearing shirts that say faith over fear. It’s so prevalent that we don’t even need to understand how it’s been co-opted by certain political movements. But faith over fear is self-harm because fear is your body’s wise response to show you that you don’t feel safe and help you move into safety and connection. And I know this is bold to say on a podcast, especially about OCD.

Fear is not the enemy. Fear is there to move you somewhere. All emotion is energy meant to move you. Emotion, energy, and motion. It’s intended to prompt you to pay attention to yourself as somebody who deserves safety, connection, fear, and faith. Fear drives you to treat yourself as a friend of God. Fear doesn’t have to be something that we fight.

It can be something that wakes us up. Fear makes you quite alert, and often for those of us with mental illness. It might prompt us to be way more observant than we wish we were all the time. The experience of hypervigilance is not necessarily pleasant, but it is a prompt. It is not the problem; I think it’s the space that goes back to talking about healing.

That’s the space I love seeing people get to make a shift because when you start to treat your fear, which is part of your body’s physiological response to danger and the perception of danger. You start treating your fear as a friend with something important to tell you. Your life changes. There’s room for things not to feel as terrible as they do when you’re fighting part of yourself.

Carrie: It’s so rare that I get to have conversations with somebody that’s this mindful because essentially what you’re talking about is mindfulness. This sense of being curious about our emotional state instead of trying to judge it and say, oh, I shouldn’t be afraid. The Bible says, fear not, so I have to cut that piece off and go with God’s given me love and power to sound mind. And it’s this bizarre Christian CBT, is what I call it, where we try to do some thought replacement, and we’re all going to feel better now, and it just doesn’t work.

Healing Through Embodiment

K.J.: I would say, what I’m saying more than mindfulness is that embodiment is the practice of non-judgmentally paying attention to and responding to our sensations.

I take it one step further because I think that even with mindfulness, we can stay detached from our physical experience. What’s happening? I’m making this little movement you can’t see me. You keep making this movement with my hand, like cutting ourselves off at the neck. Basically, what happens when we feel afraid, or when we feel overwhelmed, we feel ashamed?

Any of these activating big feelings that come up is that the way your body works, you’re temporarily cut off from the regulating power of your prefrontal cortex. So your brainstem is very active, your limbic system and your brain is very active, and your body is quickly mobilizing you to seek safety, and you can’t actually access the part of you that’s, well, God is love, and Christ dwells in me. Therefore, I am actually okay. You can’t access that. So we’re talking about a bottom-up approach to belief, which is that response to the sensation happening in your body; that’s what I mean by bottom. So, the lower half of you, starting with your body, responds to this sensation with curiosity and compassion.

That is what brings your body and mind back together so that you can return to that place of faith, of mentally accepting an ascent and receiving that Christ is with you. Embodiment this non-judgmental, which is easier said than done, paying attention to what’s happening inside your body.

Leaving a Spiritually Toxic Environment

Carrie: When you were leaving the spiritually toxic environment because essentially you both had to leave your jobs, it sounds like that’s a significant shift. How did you recover from that trauma to become more embodied? Was that through your therapy process?

K.J.: The recovery began, I would say, I think something that feels in this moment important to point out is part of why we don’t leave is because we are so afraid of losing our livelihood and our sense of belonging; that’s why we took us so long to leave. Truthfully, the fear of how we will pay our bills and how we will afford insurance. That kept us extended our stay in the land of toxicity for years. And a lot of people don’t talk about the practicality of that. Having money to pay for your groceries and pay for your rent is pretty important. And whether you’re working for a church or maybe realizing maybe my community is unhealthy and you don’t work there.

The fear of losing your belongings is massive. Most of these kinds of churches prompt like they are ordered around the church should be your whole life. This is where you go multiple times a week. Your small group is your community. So what happens when you have to leave? You lose everything. And I no longer think your life should be ordered around an institution, but that’s a separate conversation.

Healing was started by leaving, and that was terrifying. And it was a rescue in many ways that God would lead us out into a broader place. And it was once we were out my body got even more vocal. And I was experiencing a lot of anxiety and tremors in my arms. I was falling. I thought I had had so many mysterious health symptoms over the years with my disease, and I’ve been tested for MS before.

I had a lot of tests done. I had at one point this whole brain and spine MRI done and saw this neurologist, and this was such a moment of grace, of God’s kindness. He showed me the pictures of my brain and spine and said, your brain is beautiful. There is no evidence of disease here. “My wife is a complex trauma survivor, and I think what’s happening is he had asked us questions about what’s been going on in your life.

My wife is a complex trauma survivor.” I think what’s happening here is trauma. The further you escape this situation, the better your body will feel; some of these symptoms will disappear. At that point, I was just a therapist. I hadn’t started to specialize in trauma, but to hear somebody named that for me was incredibly helpful because you feel it’s not; what I’m going through is not that bad.

It’s hard to even get to the point of letting yourself call something spiritual abuse. Because we’re so conditioned to be deferential to pastors, to leaders, and we want to be kind. We think that it’s not gracious to say something or use a word like that, but grace and truth go together. The truth is my body reacted with such violent, intense shows and displays of a lack of safety because I had been so gaslit, demeaned, and pushed out because I had been treated less than human.

My body was responding in kind, saying this is not okay. That was my body’s protest. I started there because I think it was my physical experience of such extreme distress of feeling terrible. That prompted me to seek more help to get into therapy again. I believe that, more than anything, put me on a path of studying somatics and beginning as a therapist myself into great somatics into my practice, and that’s now the foundation of everything I do. But I start there; I just gave you the version of if we would have this conversation for three hours. I always trust that you know what; sometimes, in these conversations, there’s always a reason that what comes to my mind first is what there’s an invitation to say. And so that’s where we went.

Carrie: How wise of that neurologist to be admitting. “Hey, there’s some psychological things going on.” But not make it, “Well, it’s all in your head because you’re kind of crazy.: There’s this balance where some have had either of those extremes.

K.J: Yes, I’ve been told it’s psychosomatic. It’s all in your head dismissively, and blames me like I am too broken. And I’m sure so many people listening have experienced this too, and maybe your husband did far before getting his diagnosis. There’s a vast difference between an acknowledgment of how our brains and bodies are connected that says your symptoms are real and they make sense based on what you’ve experienced.

And this is psychosomatic; if you can fix your mental problems, your body will feel better. That’s the sin right there of individualism. That kind of medical model that blames people’s symptomology on their struggle is why they feel these symptoms when our bodies are begging us to hear the truth about the broader systems that we’re a part of, our family systems, our church systems, our society.

I think the point is that these things we feel are such problems or separate us from those who don’t have struggles as much as we do. I say this as a disabled woman. I think there’s some fierce wisdom in the ways that we struggle that our bodies are trying to tell us. You and those around you deserve more love and support than you have received. All of the symptoms of stress that we experience in how they manifest are shouting to tell us we deserve to be seen, held and helped.

K.J’s Book: “The Book of Common Courage: Prayers and Poem to Find Strength in Small Moments

Carrie: Very interesting and definitely brought up some things I haven’t considered. I’m curious for you to tell us about the Book of Common Courage: Prayers and Poem to Find Strength in Small Moments. How this book came about and the importance of it. Why does it need to be out in the world?

K.J: Well, we’ve been talking about trauma and part of what happens when we’re experiencing trauma. Also, when we’re feeling overwhelmed, we talked about how your body is strongly mobilizing. Energy to keep you safe, but that is sinking you further away from your being able to access the language centers of your brain, for example.

The point is when life is hard, it’s hard to have words, and the Book of Common Courage is really my offering of words for the moments in our lives and the seasons in our lives when we feel wordless and when we don’t have words to pray, and we wish we did. When we are struggling to make sense of our lives, when we don’t feel strength, and we don’t feel seen. We want to that it’s an offering of presence, as I think that books are portable presence in so many ways that there’s something about a book that can enter into the private place of your home, your bedside, your living room.

And be with you and make you feel less alone in your life and story. I think we all need the reminder that we are not the only ones with questions and confusion about God. And when it comes to whether our stories are excellent. So this is just my offering to bridge that gap between belief and the body, between your hard day and the hope that’s yours.

I wrote it, not meaning to write a book. When I was writing the Lord as my courage when I was processing my own story of religious trauma. I started to write poetry and prayers for myself. Just to process the intensity of the story and really to help myself. There’s poetry is a really distilled form of language, so to help myself distill down, what am I trying to say in this chapter?

What’s the most important thing and what’s just for me and my spouse, and what needs to be out there for thousands and thousands of people to read? Poetry helped me find my way, and then, over time, I just shared it and shared some pieces on social media, mostly because I was tired while writing a manuscript and needed something easy to share.

People felt seen by the poems and the prayers. It was before I called it poetry because I didn’t even feel I could give myself that label. It was through other people’s responses to the words that I was like; I guess maybe this would be encouraging for people, not just for me. And it became a book.

Carrie: I love it. It’s based on Psalm 23.

K.J: Both The Lord is My Courage and the Book of Common Courage walk through the exact breakdown of phrase by phrase through Psalm 23. The book of Common Courage is an exploration. It’s praying through the Psalm, but it’s also praying through getting to receive, being in dialogue with Christ as the good shepherd.

Who is the person who that Psalm was pointing towards? Most of the prayers in the book are a colic, short form of prayer, which is intentional. It’s my trauma-informed way of doing less is more. We don’t need long prayers and lots and lots of words when we’re struggling. We need small, and we need a little bit of containment.

So they’re structured, and they’re a little bit of containment to help you feel held. But they’re mostly appointed at Christ to dialogue with Christ as the good shepherd who still is seeking you.

Carrie: I love less is more. We did an episode not too long back on breath prayers. That’s something that I’ve just been able to incorporate in my life at different times or seasons, and those are very short but very helpful.

If you could go back in time, what would you tell your younger self who is dealing with chronic pain or spiritual abuse?

K.J: I think that I would tell her your body is not bad. Your body is not betraying you by feeling all this pain and struggling so much. Your body has wise things to say, and I dare you to listen. Please listen to her. I think that’s what I would tell her.

Carrie: That’s definitely good. Your body is not bad. The people hear nothing else from this episode. I hope they receive that piece because, as you said, it’s somewhat so ingrained in our Christian culture to almost be scared. To be embodied, something like you’re getting too new age or something like that is not what we’re doing. And it’s not scriptural to be disconnected from ourselves.

K.J: It’s an expression of faith in God who put on flesh to dwell among us. When I treat my body with reverence, I worship Christ, who decided to become human in a body and still reigns in a body. This is worship.

Carrie: Thank you so much for being on the show today. Share your words of wisdom. I think this is going to be relevant and helpful to a lot of people.

K.J: Thanks for having me.

Carrie: I am currently reading KJ’s first book. I went ahead and picked up a copy after I did the interview, and I’m enjoying it. As always, thank you so much for listening.

Hope for Anxiety and OCD is a production of By the Well Counseling. Our show is hosted by me, Carrie Bock, a licensed professional counselor in Tennessee. Opinions given by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect the use of myself or By the Well Counseling. Our original music is by Brandon Mangrum.

Until next time, may you be comforted by God’s great love for you.

Related links and Resources:

K.J. Ramsey

88. Relationship OCD and Anxiety with Samara Lane

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, OCD, Personal Testimony, Podcast Episode. No Comments on 88. Relationship OCD and Anxiety with Samara Lane

On today’s episode, Samara Lane, a relationship and ROCD coach, joins me.

Samara shares her healing journey through relationship OCD. We also talk about how to overcome anxiety and OCD in relationships.

How does OCD manifest in relationships?

How to distinguish OCD from real feelings?

What can cause OCD to develop in relationships?

Some helpful ways to help you cope with anxiety and OCD in your relationship. 

www.samaralane.com

More Episodes on OCD:

87. OCD FAQ

26. A Personal OCD Story of Experiencing God’s Presence and Grace with Peyton Garland

13. Panic Attacks, OCD, and God: A Personal Story with Mitzi VanCleve

8. One Therapist’s Story of Discovering Her Scrupulosity OCD with Rachel Hammons

Transcript

Carrie: Welcome to Hope for Anxiety and OCD episode 88. I didn’t plan it this way, but it just so happens that this episode is coming out around Valentine’s Day, and it’s on anxiety and relationship OCD, so that seemed to gel together well. I have on the show with me today Samara Lane, who is a relationship anxiety and ROCD coach.

Been wanting to, for a little while, have this episode about relationship OCD because it’s a very hot topic. First of all, a lot of people don’t even know that it exists. Am I correct?

Samara: That is very correct, including the people who start experiencing all the symptoms and wondering what’s wrong with them.

Carrie: Right. There’s this very stereotypical view of OCD that it’s somebody like Monk that you see on TV concerned about germs and concerned with order and cleanliness of things, but that’s really only one subtype of OCD. There are several different subtypes, so it’s often that people will believe, “Hey, I have anxiety,” and certainly, anxiety in OCD is very related.

But often, I have people come to me and say, “Hey, I have this anxiety.” They start telling their story, and then I realize, do you know that you’re actually having obsessions? These types of thoughts and, do you know that what you’re doing, intense Googling on the internet that’s actually a compulsion or seeking reassurance from your partner all the time is a compulsion, and they don’t realize that until somebody kind of puts a name and a label to things and it helps so much being able to know kind of how to move forward with that.

Samara’s Personal Relationship Story

You have your own personal relationship story about what led you to become an anxiety and relationship OCD coach. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

Samara: Yeah, for sure. I mean, it was my own journey through Helen back, really, because I’ve never experienced suffering as much as I have with really intense spikes of OCD.

I’m sure all of your listeners can relate to that. For me, it comes on differently for everyone. It came on the worst; the biggest initial spike that made me realize something was going on here was right before and during my partner’s proposal. I could tell, I just knew that he was about to propose, and I had this wave of anxiety.

We were at this beautiful, lovely dinner he’d planned for us. Many years ago, I remember being flooded with thoughts like, oh no, I have to decide the rest of my life right now, and what if this is the wrong choice? Or what if I’m settling? There are some things that aren’t perfect in the relationship—so much pressure.

I felt I was hyperventilating, going to have a panic attack, while he pulled out the ring and popped the question, and I said yes at the moment. And I think also because the anxiety was so intense now in hindsight, the OCD thoughts were so intense, I felt really guilty and like I was faking it when I said yes because so many doubts were coming up.

So I felt like I was lying and just saying what he wanted to hear, but I was like, yes, and then I was like, I need to go home and sit down. It really our engagement; our proposal ended with both of us sitting on the kitchen floor, and I was crying and doing all the compulsions without realizing it, seeking reassurance, confessing everything, telling him all of my nitpicking, intrusive thoughts, all of my doubt.

That, of course, didn’t feel good to him. I don’t recommend doing that. And it wasn’t really the romantic engagement experience that either of us had planned on, and up until this point, we’d been together for over two years and lived together. And the relationship was great, right? We wanted to be together, but it felt such; it just whew flooded me with most people.

Yes, it was an unconscious compulsion. I just started Googling. I was like, what the heck is wrong with? Fortunately, at least the one good thing that can come from our initial Googling is finding help and education and realizing that we’re not crazy; we’re not alone. This is a thing. Relationship anxiety and relationship OCD are a thing.

I’m so grateful that relationship OCD is now even a term and is even recognized by so many more people as a subtype because for me, this was 12 or more years ago, I don’t even remember, 13 years ago, maybe now, I didn’t see anything on relationship OCD back then. It was one person was talking about relationship anxiety and had a blog, and that was it.

But yeah, that really started my journey, and I cut a long story short, I felt like I tried everything under the sun to feel better. I read books, and I saw therapy and counseling. I took courses and really was through trial and error because I didn’t have a set system that was proven that I knew would work. And frankly, I didn’t know what resources were available to me, even if there were any back then.

So, just doing my best, I pieced together a system that really freed me. It takes time, of course, and it takes a lot of practice cause we’ve been having these OCD tendencies for so long. But that’s the practice I now teach my clients. I certainly wish that I had known then what I know now, right? It would’ve saved me years of suffering because it was years; it was many years that I suffered without really knowing how to handle it. And now it’s night and day different, of course, but it was really hard.

How Does OCD Show Up in Relationships?

Carrie: I’m curious: before this manifested in terms of your relationship with your fiance, did you have other concerns about other relationships? Like close friends, teachers, or family members?

Samara: Yeah, like anxiety with other types of relationships? Great question, and one that I’ve done a lot of reflection on, and in hindsight, absolutely. I never thought of it this way because I think it stayed mild or moderate enough that I just kind of coped and worked, tried to cope, if that makes sense. But yeah, I look back and see now there have always been tendencies to, like, oh, my best friend gets me really angry.

Well, maybe I don’t want to be her friend anymore. Running away and avoiding the things that are triggering, upsetting, or make me feel bad. And I also did this in many romantic relationships with past partners.

Carrie: Avoidance is definitely a big piece of anxiety and OCD that people have to work through. And it’s hard because the natural tendency when we feel discomfort is to say, “Hey, let me pull away from that.” But it only feeds and heightens anxiety and OCD more to avoid things. I call it the avoidance cycle. It’s like the avoidance confirms that you really do have something to be afraid of versus facing that fear and walking into it, even though you feel uncomfortable, helps you know, I really can do this.

I can handle this situation that I don’t feel I can handle. I’m curious as far as when you’re talking with somebody because it’s normal. Everyone who’s been in a romantic relationship knows that maybe if you’re looking at getting married, it’s normal to have what people cold feet before the wedding and have some trepidation.

It is a big commitment, and we should take that seriously. Now, how does somebody know? Is it at a level where it’s problematic versus this is just kind of normal relationship concerns that everybody goes through?

Samara: Such a good question and one that we really struggle with when we’re trying to discern what’s the anxiety and what are legitimate issues or challenges that we’re having.

I think you’re absolutely correct when making a big life choice, especially for those of us who are prone to OCD tendencies or anxiety. of course we tend to overthink, but even anyone without OCD or anxiety is going to possibly, potentially have a cold feet, like you said there. And all relationships have challenges.

My partner and I have had to work a lot on communication and how to navigate a relationship and a partnership. How do we navigate conflict? So those are really common challenges that aren’t red flags. They’re just part of being in a relationship, and it tends to happen when there’s anxiety triggers us.

It spikes something within us. It could be thoughts without sensations. It could be sensations without thoughts. It could be both together—sensations, meaning facing heart, panic, fear, and things like that. Our body is different in the sense of how we respond to it. It’s not just like, oh yeah, we had an argument earlier.

I think we’ll revisit that soon and maybe continue talking about it and working through it together. The average non-OCD mind might think it’s more common if we’re in the ROCD to go immediately into, oh, it’s a bad sign. Maybe I don’t love them anymore, or maybe we’ll never make it work.

Maybe I’ve made a terrible mistake. Maybe I’ve already wasted the best years of my life trying to be with the wrong person. Maybe we need to break up, even though I don’t want to. There’s a part of me that really doesn’t want to, even though there’s also a part of me that feels that the only answer is to break up.

And so it’s this back and forth, this inner war within ourselves. I hate to use the word red flag because I think that alone can be overused, misconstrued, and highly triggering. The things we would want to take really seriously are untreated addiction, any kind of true abuse, ongoing, repeated dishonesty or cheating or something like that, of course, and anyone would want to take those seriously. But those aren’t the things that relationship anxiety glows onto the minutiae. Another thing I can share about this real quick is that there are two sides to the relationship anxiety to the ROCD coin. One side is the I’m not enough, and that’s how it’s expressed. It’s a little more obvious, in a way, easier to tell. This is a “me” thing. This is about my relationship with myself.

For those who have ever experienced it, my partner hasn’t texted me back. Do they like me? Do they love me? Something changed. For example, on the other side of the relationship, the anxiety coin expresses itself as What if my partner’s not enough? Or what if my relationship isn’t enough? What if this life choice isn’t enough?

And at the root of it, it still actually is an us thing, and it’s very clever how the ROCD is expressing itself, but that’s when we have intrusive thoughts like, am I settling? Is there someone I’d be a better match with? Am I really attracted to them? Do I really love them? I don’t feel the way I thought I should feel courageous enough to keep going within and practicing our mindfulness and our awareness; we’ll see underneath this is really, again, the same, oftentimes the same core issue. Am I enough? Is my choice enough? Am I safe? Is there danger? I must protect myself.

How People with OCD View Conflict in Relationships

Carrie: The need for safety, getting down to the root of the issue, and feeling unsafe. Not necessarily because your relationship is unsafe like you talked about; we’re not talking about abusive and unsafe relationships. We’re talking about safe relationships, but our perception due to intrusive thoughts can get that shaken up and make it feel unsafe when it’s okay. For example, conflict, all relationships have conflict, but if you have this high level of anxiety and intrusive thoughts, conflict can feel 10 times more threatening than it does to the average person. So you have to learn how to deal with those things and how to navigate them.

How long have you been together with your husband now?

Samara: It’s starting to be easy to lose count. We became a couple 13 years ago, almost 12 and a half years ago. We’ve been married for over eight of those years now.

Carrie: Was it a big learning curve for him to learn kind of how to navigate some of these issues?

Samara: Oh yes, absolutely. And bless him. Not everyone has his experience, but he was so confident in us and remained so confident and committed to us that even if I was in the early days of it, seeking reassurance or doubts.

“I don’t know about this. Are you sure he’d? Oh, I’m positive. We’re great. We’re going to do wonderful.” And of course, then my OCD just, instead of feeling grateful, it was just, well, he’s too confident. I don’t really trust his judgment. But he has been such really forgiving.

There have been times when what I expressed was really hurtful and really hurt him deeply and emotionally, and he has just stayed committed. I’ve done a beautiful job of just trying not to take it personally, acknowledging this is a thing, and being honest with me about his feelings and how it affects him, right?

I definitely learned early on not to divulge all the things anymore.

Carrie: I’m curious about your process, and I also have some thoughts about this. How do you feel this develops, or where does it come from, the bent towards relationship OCD specifically and anxiety?

Samara: Totally. Yes. I would say I have a predisposition to OCD. Not all of my clients, but I know for me, as an example, when I was little, in hindsight, I didn’t know what was going on, but I was ruminating and , really worried about moral scrupulosity if I’m saying that term correctly, something wrong, oh, I have to confess to my mom right away, and then I’d get immediate relief from it.

So, I see those tendencies in me from a young age. So, just in general, it can be a predisposition to OCD. In general, oftentimes people have had other OCD themes, and then it switches to ROCD or vice versa, or maybe they just always had social anxiety, and now suddenly it’s expressing as a more severe form of OCD or more noticeable form, other things that it can come from.

So again, just like biology, how are we wired right? Do we have anxiety in our history? Do we have any predisposition to this? I also often see that there is some wounding, some emotional wounding, that could be trauma, big or small, even things that we don’t necessarily think of as trauma. Sometimes, they’re very clear-cut and dry, but it could be when you got teased on the school bus, and that is still this unhealed part of our shadow self, right?

Our inner child really needs that love, compassion, and healing. It can also be wounds in our adulthood if our last relationship or one of our prior relationships ended badly or painfully. That can certainly affect things: attachment styles, anxious attachment, avoidant attachment, disorganized, and any kind of insecure attachment.

We sometimes see it as a factor. Also, just general life stressors, right? If we have a predisposition to OCD, then if we’re in college and it’s really stressful, or we’re moving or switching careers. Life stressors can bring up this feeling of being unsafe, unsettled, or in limbo. And then, often, it just wants to glom onto something outside of ourselves.

Oh, it’s the relationship. I know it is. It must be the relationship. I’ve had a moment of clarity. So there’s a lot of different things. And then, even when we are struggling with our self-esteem, self-trust, or self-worth, I have seen that play a role in it. It could be one, it could be a variety of those things.

Carrie: I’m glad that you brought up a few different things there in terms of working with many people with OCD and a trauma overlap connection. Yes, there is that propensity towards OCD, but then there are also these wounding childhood experiences. Sometimes it’s not as dramatic as abuse, or sometimes it is.

Sometimes, it’s not as big as being physically or emotionally abused or something like that. Sometimes, it’s more what you didn’t get. It’s more the lack of somewhat of emotional neglect or the lack of engagement by caregivers or others when you need it the most. And we’re looking at not just what people received but what they did not receive in relationships.

And there can be a fear of vulnerability of getting too close to somebody. And then, if I have to find a way, my brain’s trying to protect me and find a way that I won’t get hurt again. So I’ve gotta kind of push back against that and, oh, there must be something wrong or must be something nitpicky about this relationship that needs to be fixed or worked on. It also can be a perfectionistic tendency because we think, oh, well, this happened, or they did this small thing to hurt us, and they may hurt us in a really big way. Or maybe it means they’re not faithful in the future because of this one little thing they did to hurt my feelings. That type of thing kind of blows up. So, I think we have to conceptualize that anxiety in any form is trying to keep us safe from hurt. And that’s especially true in the relationship OCD aspect and past romantic relationships, whether it was a divorce. Whether it was a bad breakup or a toxic, narcissistic relationship you got out of. Those deep wounds can last for much longer than we would like them to.

That needs some healing and needs some attention. We can’t just gloss over that and say, well, now I’m with Joe over here, and he’s nothing like Bob. He’s not hurting me, or he’s not abusing me. You can tell your brain that, but your body may still be going haywire. This is unsafe. I know from our conversations before you said I’m not a Christian, but I have a lot of coaching clients who are Christian.

What have you seen in Christian clients, specifically those struggling with this relationship? Anxiety, OCD?

Samara: It can feel; the number one that comes to mind is this fear and this feeling or belief that this is God saying that they’re not the right person. And how do you know? Sometimes, there can also be a lot of guilt.

I seem to have lots of clients that find me, not all, but some of them may be exploring. They’re doing their religion, they’re practicing their faith maybe a little differently than how they were raised. They can also feel this guilt and shame, and is this relationship bad? Or if they have premarital sex.

Then, they can really feel a lot of guilt and shame around that. It can really fuel a lot of the OCD if that’s not something that they believe is right. But the number one that I see is, how do I discern between is this God telling me this isn’t my person, versus this is just anxiety.

Carrie: That’s a really huge one that I run into and hear a lot is people say, is this God, or is this OCD, or is it the devil?

What is this that’s going on in my mind? How do you help people discern some of that?

Samara: I think each of us, it’s really coming to our own discernment and understanding and what resonates with us, what my clients have found most helpful, and what I personally believe is God doesn’t communicate through OCD.

Carrie: That’s not God.

Samara: It is different. And the more we learn about the OCD mind, as I’m sure so many amazing listeners here learn from you all the time and how it works and the signs that we’re having intrusive thoughts, signs that we’re doing compulsions and feeding the cycle, the more easily it’s we’re able to identify this is the pattern, this is the thing, and that’s not God.

I believe that God communicates. God can communicate in a firm way sometimes, but not through riddling us with crippling fear. And I believe that God is a really loving being and forces there to meet us with compassion as we go through these things, not to beat ourselves up. That’s really the mind.

Carrie: Absolutely. I like how you put that. I know you mentioned mindfulness a little bit earlier. Is that something that you practiced as part of your process?

Samara: Absolutely. Yes. It’s such a critical part of it. The way that I love to think about it and describe it is when we’re in active OCD thoughts and panic, it’s we have forgotten that there’s just a story playing in our mind.

It might as well be a movie that we’re watching, but we’ve gotten so sucked in and hooked by it that we feel like we’re a character. We think the movie is real, right? It’s like a bad dream. Like, oh no, all these bad things are true or might be happening or might happen in the future, and we forget that we’ve just fallen into this story that’s totally made up.

It’s just a story, and we have the choice and the ability to step back and really look at the thoughts, watch what the mind is doing, observe the judgments that it’s making, observe the sensations and emotions in our bodies and just let the movie play without hooking into it.

Carrie: Almost like you fall down into this Alice Wonderland world, but everything feels super real when you’re in the midst of the OCD thought storm. That’s definitely relatable, I think, to a lot of our listeners who have experienced that. I think this has been very informative for us because a lot of people may be listening to this and realizing I didn’t realize that those were OCD obsessions that I was actually having about my relationship, and now this will be able to help them kind of find a pathway towards healing as I think is really important.

Samara: Absolutely. I mean, I suppose the good news, if there is any, is ROCD is a subtype of OCD like you said, and so we heal it in a lot of ways, just like we would other types of OCD. It can, and I think one of the trickier parts about it is all the societal conditioning that is so perpetuated and prevalent in movies and media, Hollywood and fairytale stories that we grew up with, and social media memes all over the place.

So weeding through the relationship myths and unlearning and debunking those along with, like you said, any trauma or wounding, whether around relationships or anything that’s coming up around this. Usually, it is related to other people. In my opinion, these are what make ROCD one of the most, if not the most, complex OCD subtypes to weed through because we’re also sent all these messages that no doubt mean don’t you really do have to leave. You should leave. I would leave, right?

And that’s a lot to weed through, but it’s a beautiful invitation and doorway to breaking free, recognizing and breaking free from the OCD cycle, and practicing deeper and greater levels of self-trust because no one knows what’s best for you, better than you do.

Carrie: At the end of the podcast, I like to ask our guests to share a story of hope, which is a time in which you received hope from God or another person since we’re called Hope for Anxiety and OCD.

Samara: I’d be happy to share. I’m sure there are so many that I could, but the one that’s coming to my mind really has to do with my relationship, but not necessarily the ROCD because it happened after I had really come to a level of mastery around the ROCD.

But a while back, my husband was diagnosed with OCD and ADHD. We’re a fun bunch over here sometimes, and he had a really rough mental health year after just a trying time in his life, and his mental health was really struggling. I noticed the toll it was taking on me and our family, and there was a point at which I just felt some hopelessness as a part of me knew.

Of course, we’re going to get through this. Of course, as a resilient human, everything will work out and be okay. But it’s almost it was more of a surrender. I don’t know how to solve this. I’ve tried everything I can. It’s really many ways out of my control. And I wrote a letter to God, and I just journaled and wrote out in present tense words like how I was deciding my life was now, and the ease around it and the joy around it.

Not that it was perfect at all, but there was a lot of connection, and it felt healthy and grounded for me, him, and a kid for everyone. I believe that this wasn’t a coincidence. Literally, two or three weeks later, his prescription had changed. This was a prescription that was really common.

It’s always been known about his psychiatrist already knew about it. And he just got on this prescription that managed it to the extent that it was night and day different. He was then able to, and the tools he used to manage and regulate himself finally worked. I’m not saying medication is for everyone, but I felt my letter had been received and then just kind of forgot I even wrote the letter.

The energy of practicing that surrender and being it’s, I can’t do this alone. I need help. Our family needs help. My husband is in pain and struggling, and just seeing the difference night and day and feeling so much better. It’s been a gift and a blessing.

Carrie: Thank you for sharing that.

Glad that your husband is doing better, too. Well, it was great having you on the show today, sharing your wisdom, and having a dialogue about this. I think it’s an important conversation. And what better time to put it out than around Valentine’s Day?

Samara: Exactly. A triggering time here for many.

Carrie: Yes.

I’m glad we were able to have this episode because relationship OCD doesn’t get talked about enough, and probably more people struggle with it than they actually realize.

Regardless of your relationship status this Valentine’s Day, I want you to know that you are fully and completely loved by God regardless of what you’re struggling with or how you feel about yourself. He’s absolutely crazy in love with you.

As always, thank you so much for listening. If you haven’t received our free download yet, Five Things Every Christian Struggling with OCD Needs to Know, please check it out at hopeforanxietyandocd/free.

Hope for Anxiety and OCD is a production of By the Well Counseling. Our show is hosted by me, Carrie Bock, a licensed professional counselor in Tennessee. Opinions given by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect the use of myself or By the Well Counseling. Our original music is by Brandon Mangrum.

Until next time, may you be comforted by God’s great love for you.

85. Anxiety FAQ with Carrie and Tiffany

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, Counseling, OCD, Podcast Episode. No Comments on 85. Anxiety FAQ with Carrie and Tiffany

In today’s episode, returning guest, Tiffany Ciccone, an author and English teacher joins Carrie in a Q&A about anxiety. 

Here are some of Tiffany’s questions answered by Carrie.

  • What is anxiety?
  • How do you respond to someone when they say that anxiety and depression are just spiritual warfare and lack of faith?
  • Everyone says to try deep breathing when you’re anxious. It doesn’t work for me. Why?
  • Should I take medication for my anxiety?
  • I pray but why I’m still anxious?
  • How do I know if I need help for my anxiety?

Tiffany Ciccone

Transcript

Carrie: Welcome to Hope for Anxiety and ocd, episode 85. Happy New Year everyone. Happy 2023. It’s hard to believe that I started this podcast towards the end of 2020, so we’ve been going strong for a little over two years now. If you are new to our show, we’re all about reducing shame, increasing hope in developing healthier connections with God and others.

Today on the show, we actually have a returning guest from episode 41, Tiffany Cicconi. I’m very excited that you are here today, Tiffany, thank you. Very excited to be here. I brought you back because I thought beginning of the year, let’s break down and do just some very, like get back to basics. Just do some question and answer about anxiety. And I thought it would be kind of fun to have you read the questions. So that’s where we’re going today if everyone’s wondering.

However, before we get into that, I wanted to ask you to give us a little update since we missed you being a part of episode 80 on updating previous guests about what you’re doing now.

So you were writing a book about anxiety when we interviewed before.

Tiffany: How is it coming along? It’s coming along really well. A book is called Anxious with Jesus, and I have a little subtitle for it now. A memoir from the Messy Intersection of Faith and Mental Health or Mental Illness. I forget God, basically provided me with some time to just hunker down and work on it.

So I would say that my manuscript is basically finished and I’m in the process of submitting proposals to a couple publishers, and if they don’t bite, then I’m going to self-publish it. I don’t have a date yet, but it’s kind of new, exciting, unexplored territory for me. That’s where I’m at. Hey, when it comes out, we’re blasting it all over Instagram and get shared on the podcast.

Carrie: I’m very excited about it.

Tiffany: Oh. Thank you.

Carrie: If you need someone to read it and write you an Amazon review, you know where to find me.

Tiffany: Definitely will be doing that.

Carrie: I think it’s so relatable to people who deal with anxiety, because sometimes in their lives they feel like people around me just don’t get it. Even unfortunately, it happens a lot of times in the Christian community. Where if they read a story or hear a story about someone else who’s also struggled, it’s just that relatability is so helpful to be like, “Oh, okay. They’re a Christian. They’re trying to follow the Lord, and they’re also struggling too. And I don’t feel so alone anymore.”

Tiffany: Yeah, that’s definitely a major goal in my book because when I first started, I was diagnosed 15 years ago, and at that time, mental health was not as openly discussed as it is today, and I went through it very much alone. And so one of my goals now is to kind of reduce that.

I’m sharing my story so other people don’t have to live through theirs with a sense of doing it by themself.

Carrie: Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Fire away. What’s the first question? Or FAQ? Episode.

What is Anxiety?

Tiffany: Gladly. Let’s start with the beginning. So Carrie, what is anxiety?

Carrie: Anxiety is a bit of a broad term, so I want to kind of break it down into different aspects, right?

So there’s mental aspects of anxiety, like worry, thinking about the future, oh, something bad’s gonna happen. Being really convinced of these types of things. And we also have a physiological aspect to anxiety. In our nervous system, we have a part of our nervous system called the sympathetic that revs us up.

That’s the fight or flight response, and we have a parasympathetic that calms us down. We call that rest and digest. So people who struggle with anxiety, they’re their fight or flight systemis overactivated and their rest and digest is underestimated. So part of what we do in things like therapy is help people tap into that calming aspect of their nervous system that’s already in there.

We can have spiritual aspects to anxiety where we say, okay, maybe I’m not trusting God with my worries, or I’m closing him off, or not bringing them to him. There’s these different aspects of anxiety that I think sometimes people just look at it at only one aspect, like, oh, anxiety is a spiritual problem.”

It’s not, it’s a physiological and emotional issue. And because a lot of times the emotional components are tied to negative past experiences, times where we’ve been hurt, times, where we’ve been ridiculed, so we’re afraid of those things happening again. That makes sense. Our brain remembers things for a reason, like, don’t touch the hot stove again, don’t speak in front of people because when you were in the fourth grade and you were giving your presentation, everyone laughed at you.

It’s a multifaceted issue. So I think that that’s important for people to know. It’s not just like one simple thing, “Oh, I’m a person who worries or all of that.”

Tiffany: And I think the lack of understanding of anxiety as a multifaceted thing has been the root of so many misunderstandings I’ve had with people, especially believers.

Unfortunately, they might say, “Oh, how are you?” And I might say, “I’m okay, but I’m feeling a little anxious.” And then they come back with a spiritual interpretation of that saying, “Oh, well, when I’m anxious, I learned to give it to the Lord and he takes it.” And I wanna say that’s not what, I mean, that’s not my issue right now. It’s physiological. So I really appreciate that multifaceted definition, and I’m excited for that to kind of spread,

Carrie: Yes. For more people to understand like how our brain, how our nervous system works and that God make us robotic, but we have these complex systems in our body. And let’s face it, they’re not perfect.

None of us have a perfectly functioning body, not until we get to heaven anyway, so things are gonna malfunction and we’re active sometimes.

I Pray But Why I’m Still Anxious?

Tiffany: Absolutely. So this next question relates. It’s, “I can quote scripture and pray, but I’m still anxious. Why?”

Carrie: I think a lot of times there’s this sense of cognitive behavioral therapy that has infiltrated the church. They’ll even quote scriptures like, there’s a scripture in Proverbs and it’s probably not gonna come to me, but it’s something like about a thought process and that being a part of a person. Do you know what I’m talking about?

Tiffany: I don’t know. The first one that came to my mind was trust in the Lord with all your heart leaned out on your own understanding. But yeah, I’m not sure.

Carrie: Okay. Well anyway, scratch where I was going with that. But there’s this infiltration that if we just control our thoughts, we’ll feel better. Like just, okay. So when you have that worry, you are supposed to pray about it and let it go and move on. But going back to the multifaceted approach, we can change our thoughts about something, but that doesn’t mean that our body accepts that fact as true. There are so many people that I’ve worked with that and I think of even in my younger years, There was a very loving mentor that was like, “You just need to know who you are in Christ, Carrie, like that’s gonna change your life.”. And I knew mentally who I was in Christ, but because of previous negative peer experiences, verbal bullying, those types of things, I didn’t have that sense of confidence of who I was in Christ.

I had to heal past garbage and shame and negative experiences in order to really be able to embrace and feel deep down who I was in Christ. So with anxiety, scripture is very powerful and certainly we’re not minimizing that at all, and I do believe that you need to hide that in your heart. But I’ve met so many Christians, I’ll never forget I was, speaking at a conference on the National Alliance for Mental Illness.

It was a statewide conference they have every year on anxiety. There was an older man in the audience during the question and answer time, and he said, “I know like I’m supposed to be anxious for nothing because I was talking about how to help anxiety in all these different areas and it wasn’t a Christian conference, so I did have spirituality in there.”

He said essentially like, “How do I do that? Because I feel anxious my whole life. I felt anxious, and really what I did was I pointed him back to people that were anxious in the Bible and I said, “Okay, so do you think that Gideon was anxious before he tore down his father’s altars? Really going against the grain of society.”

I think sometimes we look at these heroes of the faith and we think that they never had any anxiety, and that’s not what the Bible says. They had anxiety, but they still acted obedience. They still followed God and Jesus’ sweat drops of blood in the garden of Gethsemane over going to the cross. He still went to the cross.

He still obeyed God, but he didn’t wanna do it like he was like, “Take this away from me.”. If there’s some other way to go through this, let’s go that way. People forget that or they overlook that a lot of times. And how I see those scriptures is not as a command of like, don’t be anxious. I see it more as like, okay, God is in control.

God loves you. You’re his child and like, so there’s not anything you need to be afraid of. Like if you can rest in that security and know that like, okay, I can bring these things over to him when we pray and we let things go. I don’t think that that’s an easy process a lot of times, right? , like there are some things that really we have to wrestle with in prayer that’s very scriptural going.

And praying about something and saying, okay, God, this I don’t understand. This is really bothersome to me, or what do I do about this situation? And we don’t always get an instant answer. In fact, a lot of times we don’t get an instant answer, right? Like, okay, God, what do I do about this decision?

It’s not like there’s this shining light that comes down and says, go left. We really have to continue to meditate and pray on that. Talk to wise counsel. Search the scriptures. Okay? Is what I’m doing lining up with the Bible? Okay. It’s not a moral issue, but where do I sense the Holy Spirit leading me?

It’s not a quick thing, so I don’t know why we would think that if I just pray about something that I’m worried about, that all of a sudden I’m gonna have like, I don’t know, a warm fuzzy feeling and just be like, “Oh yes, that’s great. I have complete and total peace.” I do think that God gives us peace to where we can move forward to where we can get through to the next thing, but I think sometimes it’s oversimplified. Let’s just put it that way, in terms of how Christians view it.

Tiffany: Absolutely. I just started to look up a verse actually in Philippians when you just said that. I’m not sure where it comes from. This belief, that expectation that we’re supposed to get instant relief from our anxiety when we bring it to God.

And I think there it is a verse in Philippians. And it says, oh, it’s actually in the be anxious for nothing passage, I think. Right. Pray with Thanksgiving and the God of all peace will I forget.

Carrie: You’ll have basically, you’ll have the peace that passes understanding.

Tiffany: Yes. In Christ Jesus. And so I think that a lot comes from that and I love that they write the fact that we have to look at the entire Bible. We can’t just single out one verse and blow it, zoom in on it, and forget everything because life is complex. Scripture is complex, and that’s why I think conversations like this are really important.

Carrie: And God’s complex. Why are we trying to make God simple? He’s huge.

Tiffany: Yes.

Carrie: He cannot be simplified.

How Do I Know If I Need Help for My Anxiety?

Tiffany: Yeah. I have another, I like the next question. I feel like I’ve heard it from other people. How do I know if I need help or my anxiety? Where’s the line?

Carrie: Of course, we’re talking to a therapist and I’m very biased towards therapy, so I truly believe that anyone can benefit from therapy.

I think sitting down with someone and having an objective perspective on your life, I know as a therapist. I practice this stuff, that it’s been transformational to me to receive that support and love and acceptance from another believer who is able to affirm me and validate me, but also at the same time challenge me and say, well, have you thought about it this way?

Maybe you’re only looking at one side of the story and not the whole thing. However, when we’re talking about medication counseling, those types of things, getting help, I think we’re looking at the domains of a person’s life. Are the domains of your life impacted? So those would be things like your relationships.

Sometimes people come to counseling because they may say, “You know what? I know, like I’m driving my spouse nuts, and it’s to the point where they don’t know what to say to me. They’re trying to be supportive, but they kind of said, Hey, like maybe you need somebody more professional to talk to about this, because I’m kind of like at the end of my rope, I don’t know what to do.” Or

the anxiety is affecting their ability maybe to go out with their spouse and have a good time or be able to enjoy life with them. It may be it’s impacting work or school. So the anxiety has gotten to a point where I can’t complete my assignments because I want them all to be perfect and I’m super stressed myself out over.

I’m not sleeping, so we’re also looking at symptoms. Things like sleeping, eating too much to cope, not eating enough because you’re so anxious I can’t eat. Same thing with sleeping. Typically with anxiety, people sleep less or they’re waking a lot during the night. That can be another issue. Those types of things. Daily functioning. Is it hard for you just to get out of bed in the morning and get going? A lot of times if people have been anxious for a long period, they’ll get depressed because it’s really hard. Same with OCD.It’s just really hard to wrestle with it every day in and day out, every day, and that can really lead to a place of depression.

So sometimes when you treat the anxiety, develop some better coping skills for it, then the depression will relieve. Or sometimes antidepressants can help and different things with that too.

Should I Take Medication for My Anxiety?

Tiffany: Well said. I love that you mentioned antidepressants because that begs a whole, whole new question. New topic to explore here.

Should I take medication for my anxiety?

Carrie: Yeah. I think there is the stigma in the church about taking medication for mental health issues, which is really interesting to me because there are a lot of people in the church who take medications for other things like blood pressure or cancer or diabetes, or they have some personal family members that I know that take medications for these types of things and,

I would never say to my relative, “Well, you shouldn’t be on that high blood pressure medicine. Really what you need to be doing is exercising and eating right.” Well, they need to be doing that too, but at this point, since it’s not managed very well or their high blood pressure may be genetic, cuz sometimes it is, then that’s a medication that’s helping them live and helping them function in day-to-day.

If I have high blood pressure that is can be dangerous. So when we look at anxiety and talking about it as a multifaceted issue, if it’s affecting my physical body, then why should it be wrong for me to take something to help my physical body? Just like it’s helpful to take these things for other issues, medications for people. I always say it’s a personal decision because medications, sometimes people have had negative experiences with them or they’re like, you know what? I’m the person that gets all the side effects from the medicines and I have a hard time with them. So there are people, even though I will say there’s different options, just talk to your doctor about it.

If one thing doesn’t work well for you, you can look at something different. But some people say, “You know what? I’ve tried a medication or two, I just wasn’t happy with it, or I didn’t feel like it really helped me the way I had wanted it to.” And so they try counseling. Sometimes we try counseling for a while and then we roll back around and say, it’s really like hard for you to engage in these positive activities because of the anxiety. Your depression is so bad like would you be considered taking medication for it? And so those can go either way. I always think obviously, it’s a very personal decision what you put in your body, so I never tell people like, oh, you have to be on medication to see me or anything like that.

It’s just, “Hey, this is something that could be helpful for you. If you’re interested, why don’t you talk to somebody about it?” Whenever people initially come in, if they haven’t had just like a general blood work screening for things like vitamin deficiencies, thyroid, iron, that’s another thing that can cause issues, although that’s probably more on the low energy side rather than the anxiety side.

But anyway, the point is all of these things we talk about in a very early episode with a nurse practitioner about how all of those things can contribute to anxiety. So always like people to have a blood work rule out too. And we don’t wanna assume it’s all emotional if they’re also could be something physiological going on that could be contributing to the symptoms.

Tiffany: Absolutely. Yeah. That holistic approach is really important. And I’m gonna mention it’s just so on topic with a lot of things I’ve thought about and wrote about. One of my chapters in my book is called Therapy and the one after that is called Medication because that’s my story and I’ve been on medication for over 10 years now.

And like what you’re saying is absolutely true. In my case, I’m able to actually engage with life, engage with people, engage with God better because my mind’s working the way it’s supposed to with, you know, a boost from the medication I take. But it definitely was a journey. I know people who all over the place.

A couple good friends actually I saw go through hesitation with medication. One because of breastfeeding issues. Another because of one thing you mentioned with the, oh, I get all the side effects from everything I take, and it’s been a blessing to be able to walk with them, just kind of watch their story unfold.

And like you said, it’s not for everyone, but actually they both ended up trying it because when things get really hard, for me anyway, I end up at a place where it’s like anything to stop the anxiety. There’s something that can make me feel better. I’ll try it. That’s just my story.

Carrie: I talked about this in my first episode as like when I was going through my divorce, I was like, I’m not functioning.

I mean, I just remember periods where I would like, I’d be trying to write something for work, like a progress note, and I’d literally just stare at the computer screen for 30 minutes and all I could think about was you know my marriage that was ending. . It was very tough. I remember that was my realization moment.

That was like my wake-up call. And it was interesting because I think either that week or shortly after my therapist had said, “Have you thought about getting on an antidepressant, at least for this period? Like until you can get over this hump?” And I saw my doctor and ended up taking one for six months and it was probably one of the best things I did at that point in my life.

I think that’s another thing to tell people too, is not everybody has to be on it forever. I don’t know why people think this, because like I said, it’s not true for other medications. There’s people that might start taking medications because they’re pre-diabetic and then they can come off of. They manage with diet and lifestyle, those types of things.

But for some reason, when it comes to mental health meds, people think that somehow they’re gonna get sucked into this vortex and they’re gonna have to take it for the rest of their life. I don’t understand, cuz we don’t believe that about other kinds of medication. , it’s so bizarre. But that’s a thing that I hear a lot from people.

“Well, I’m gonna become dependent on that and I’m gonna have to have it all the time.” Plenty of things that you can take that are not addictive, right? Certainly for anxiety. Now there are some that can be potentially addictive. Those are typically prescribed more for like short-term relief, panic attacks, those types of things.

Even with that, there’s, you know, other options as well. It doesn’t mean you’re gonna get addicted if you get on an antidepressant or anti-anxiety medication.

What Do I Do If I Have No Idea Where My Anxiety is Coming From?

Tiffany: Right. Yeah. Thanks for diving into that. Let’s see our next question. This is a good one. I’ve been there. What do I do if I have no idea where my anxiety is coming from?

Carrie: Yeah, I think this is a good one because people are always trying to find like the answer, right? So like if I’m anxious, there must be some kind of reason that I’m anxious. Let’s face it, because we’re both females. Sometimes you just feel stuff, , and you have no idea why. I don’t know. Hopefully, men could resonate with that too, but I really believe like there’s some hormonal components at times that we don’t know are working behind the scenes.

You know, maybe we ate something that wasn’t agreeable. Maybe it’s just something with our nervous system that’s malfunctioning and to really be able to say, you know, “Okay, I don’t know why I’m anxious right now. Like you, you may know. And if you do know, then you can acknowledge it and go, “Okay, like, yeah, I’m really worried about this test that’s coming up on Friday.

It’s worth like three grades. I’m afraid I’m gonna fail it.” and then I can approach that several different ways. Obviously, I can breathe into it, I can pray about it, I can study, I can say, you know what? I’m gonna do the best I can. And if I fail, you know, I fail.” And then we’ll have to regroup from that.

But most likely if I study, I’m not going to fail. I’m not gonna get to that point, but if you don’t know and you just feel that, especially the physiological sense of anxiety. Sometimes it can be because something from the past is triggered that something going on in the president has kind of reminded us of a previous time, and our cognitive brain is not necessarily able to link it.

But it’s stored somewhere in our body. A lot of times trauma can be stored in in the body. When we realize that, I think it’s just, we lean into it and we say like, okay, I don’t know why I’m anxious right now, but that’s where this place of awareness and acceptance comes in. So I’m gonna acknowledge it first of all, like, “Okay, I’m acknowledging that I’m anxious right now and that we can’t snap my fingers and let that go.”

But what I can do is try a coping skill. I can try to think about something positive. I can breathe, I can go outside for a walk, you know, I can pet the dog. I can think about vacation I wanna take, that would be really peaceful. Those types of things. Even though that can be scary because we feel outta control, it’s like, “Oh gosh, this is just coming up

Seemingly out of nowhere.” A lot of times it’s not really as out of nowhere as we Think it is. If we’re able to kind of like dig in and do some work in therapy. But that’s kind of what I would recommend. I think

Tiffany: That’s good. I once had a therapist recommend to me if I’m interested, if you would agree with it, recommended, you know, if you’re feeling your anxiety physiologically, if it’s just a, I think she said somatic thing, then you should attack it on the somatic.

She recommended like a jog, try yoga, you know, breathing those things. Because you have no thought to work with it. It does make it a little more challenging. Right. And I’ve actually just went through a bout of that about a month ago I was unemployed and I was shocked by how much jogging actually helped work it outta my system or something. Nothing else would get rid of it. I just go run it off and then I feel better.

Carrie: Yeah, exercise is really great. It’s really, really good for anxiety and depression and does wonders for our body, but I would agree with that. Yeah. I think a lot of times this is another problem that people have if it’s physiological, then a lot of times what they’ll do is they’ll sit there and they’ll go, “I have no reason to be anxious.

I’m fine. My life is good. It’s okay. Move on. Like what’s the next thing?” Instead of like using something physiological to help themselves calm down. Take a deep breath, quiet your mind. Meditate, walk. Good.

Everyone says to try deep breathing when you’re anxious. It doesn’t work for me. Why?

Tiffany: Yeah. So speaking of taking a deep breath, the last question I have when I got from, a friend, this one says, “Everyone says to try deep breathing when you’re anxious. It doesn’t work for me. Why?”

Carrie: This is a good question, and I think there could be a few different reasons. Some people have get really weirded out focusing on their breath, or they start to have some obsessions about it or doing it right, something of that nature. So it really trips them up to kind of have that focus is one thing I’ve seen.

Another thing that can happen is people are not breathing in a way that’s activating that calm-down response. So like we were talking about the rest and digest, there’s something called your vagus nerve that is around that diaphragm area that if you’re breathing from your diaphragm for anybody that’s. Taking choir or anything like that, it’s right above your belly button.

So if you’re breathing into that area, you’re pressing on the vagus nerve, and that’s gonna trigger that calm down response. Sometimes when you see people take a deep breath, it comes from their chest, and it’s like, if it’s way up top, then they’re not activating that parasympathetic nervous system response.

So that’s a problem. It also could be because if you’ve had a lot of trauma or negative experiences, it may not feel safe to be at a place of rest. And this happens a lot for clients that have experienced chronic developmental trauma. So for example, growing up in a home with an alcoholic parent, I come home.

Dad’s been drinking. Dad gets violent sometimes. I don’t know. Is he gonna hit mom? Is he gonna throw something? Is he gonna just gonna be passed out in the chair? I don’t know. But I need to somehow be on high alert when I get home because I need to be prepared at all times for whatever it is that I’m gonna face.

And so that will linger in people’s nervous systems and in their body. So even though they’re a grown adult, they have a good spouse. They have kids, like their home life is actually okay and can be, you know, reasonably calm. They may wonder, why do I feel so anxious? But they’re still keyed up from all that stuff that happened to them earlier that they haven’t been able to clear out of their nervous system in some way, shape or form.

So when you try to teach relaxation skills to these people, you say, “Okay, like take some deep breaths.”. It’s almost like there’s this part of their body that’s like, “Nope. We can’t do that. Not safe. Okay.” . And it almost like, sounds this like secondary danger alarm, like, “Nope, nope. It’s too dangerous to relax.”

So in those types of situations, we really have to like ease into it and kind of like dip our toe in the water and even like recognize that anxiety and like acknowledging and validating that like, “Oh, okay, it didn’t feel safe when a kid to relax or didn’t feel safe to let your guard down.

Sometimes vulnerability is super hard for people, so it may take them time to open up in therapy or time to be able to feel comfortable enough. Sometimes it’s like having another person in the room. It feels too vulnerable to relax in the presence of another person. That can be another issue that comes up with those types of things. Multi reasons. Someone may have difficulty using breathing to relax.

Tiffany: Thanks for sharing. That’s all really interesting. I’ve never been in that place myself like the deep breathing, I have positive reactions to it. I find that really interesting. It makes a ton of sense. I also didn’t know that about the vagus nerve, about that being a reason why it helps calm down.

How Do you Respond to Someone When they Say that Anxiety and Depression are just Spiritual Warfare and Lack of Faith?

Tiffany: The last question comes from a friend of mine, and it’s something again that I’ve heard plenty of people say when I’ve come out about my anxiety. Basically, what do you say or how do you respond to someone when they say that anxiety and depression are just spiritual warfare and lack of faith?

Carrie: Yeah. Okay, so there’s two different aspects to that, right? , I think we have to address those one at a time because they’re two different responses. So our anxiety and depression, spiritual warfare, I think they can be, sometimes. , but I don’t think that they always are. So that’s really the defining piece. I think that there are times where I have like a feeling of oppression on me.

That’s the only way I can kind of describe it. I can verbally say like, “Okay, this is not from God. I don’t know where it’s from. I don’t know if it’s from Satan or if it’s just depression, but it definitely feels like, okay, this is something that’s trying to pull me down. If you acknowledge that, kind of going back to the multifaceted view of anxiety.

You know, there can be spiritual components to it where you say, “Okay, I have put my faith and trust in say, money, for example.”. Maybe you are a person that was like super financially secure and then you lose your job. Well all of a sudden you’re like trying to do it all on your own. You’re not like necessarily praying about it and you’re just, you’re getting super stressed out cause you’re like, I have to make it happen.

Pride can get in the way or not trusting. So can anxiety be a faith issue? Can it be spiritual warfare? I think it can be. However, it’s just not always going back to people like, I think to give simplistic responses to more complicated issues because they don’t. What to say or how to respond. So going back to looking at people in the Bible who were anxious or who were sad. I mean, there were people in the Bible who wanted to die, you know?

Because they were so sad about their situation. So I don’t think that those individuals had a lack of faith. When you look at faith, You look at like David prayed for his son that was sick and then the baby died. Did the baby die because David didn’t have enough faith? No. That’s not what the Bible tells us. Or there are other situations you look at Paul with like the thorn in the flesh. So did Paul not have enough faith that he could be healed from this? Well, no. It was something that God used in his life as part of his sanctification process. Mm-hmm. . One of the things that I’ve really come to learn is that the things that we want God to take away in our lives, the things that we say, Hey God, I need this.

Like I need this tho removed and I need it removed right now is like the very thing that God may be wanting to use in our life to make us more like Christ.

Tiffany: Amen.

Carrie: My husband was recently diagnosed. I’ve talked about this on the show before, but he was recently diagnosed last September with basically a life-altering neurological condition and it’s degenerative and there’s no cure.

And so I think it, it’s been interesting kind of to see some similar responses to it. Like, “Okay, well we’re gonna pray for you and we’re gonna lay hands on you and God’s gonna heal you.” And he has had people lay hands and pray for him, and that’s been incredible. But also what I’ve really seen happen over the last few months as he’s, you know, walked out his life in his struggle to walk with a walker in his forties is that other people look at him and become inspired or their faith is increased.

I don’t know how you are so positive while you’re going through all of this. You know? So I would say if somebody’s struggling with anxiety or OCD, never underestimate how God may use that in your life. Or may use it in someone else’s life. When my husband was diagnosed, I remember just sitting there and telling God, like, “I don’t have the prayer life for this.”

You know, it’s definitely transformed the way that I have depended on God. It is transformed how much I’ve realized I need community and the body of Christ instead. You know, living in a lot of independent pride for a long time saying, ah, I don’t need your help. No, we got this. Like, we’re good now. I’m just like, yes, I need help. I raise my hand. “Can I have some help over here?” And that has been incredibly humbling, and hard.

This is, none of this that I’m talking about has been easy, but I’ve been reading in Olympians and Paul talks about being in Jail. He’s like, Hey, I’m in jail. And it’s totally like advanced the gospel all over the place.

Everybody knows like I’m here because of Jesus. And that’s what I really pray over my husband is that when people see him and they see his positive attitude that they’ll see like, This is Jesus, you know? In him. And that’s how he’s able to get up every day and do the things that he’s doing and have hope and to keep moving forward each and every day.

That’s a long response and some, you know, extra personal info in there. But I think if we run around every corner and say, you know, that must be Satan, or you’re not trying hard enough, because I think the lack of faith response, my husband gets really, , tiffy about this one because essentially, it’s saying, you’re not a good enough Christian, essentially, right?

well, you don’t have enough faith to be healed, then you know you’re not a good enough Christian. And we just don’t know like what God is doing behind the scenes. So many times in our life, we just have no clue. Like if you never had anxiety in your life, And this happens to people. I’m not saying it doesn’t, but like if you went forward at a prayer service and someone laid hands on you and you never felt anxious again, you and I like, we wouldn’t even be sitting here having this conversation, like trying to give hope to other people.

You wouldn’t be writing a book to encourage other people. You just never know. We don’t always see the purpose in it when we’re suffering, especially in the beginning of our suffering, we do not see, we’re like, whoa, this is awful. Take this away. Right? God’s at work all the time.

Tiffany: Amen. That’s beautiful. And we see it in Jesus himself. So, yeah. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that.

Carrie: I kind of shared a little bit of a story of hope at the end, but a lot of times I like to, I didn’t prep you on this ahead of, but do you have, you have any recent story of hope, like where you received hope from God or another person?

Tiffany: I like that. Sure. I know I do. There’s been a lot going on lately. I think there’s a girl who’s kind of recently come back around, a church, church that I meet with, and she struggles from anxiety and trauma growing up. She’s in her early twenties. Context. I’m 40 in a month, so we have a bit of an age gap, but we’re in the same small group together.

And she called me one night asking if she could have a ride to the emergency room, and her anxiety had been so bad recently that she got to the point of throwing up the hospital visit. They said that there was more going on than just anxiety there, but I see hope in that. She called me and I stayed there with her in the hospital until 2:00 AM.

Carrie: Wow.

Tiffany: When we got out, you can’t explain that other than Jesus, like we don’t have a whole lot in common. We both really like coffee. We both have anxiety. , but, but that’s Jesus. Like, I don’t think I would’ve stayed if I didn’t know how it might feel to be in anxiety alone.

Carrie: Right. And I didn’t want that for her. And there was another occasion before that where she texted me, “Hey, I’m really anxious right now. Can you pray for me?” And I texted her back, “Yeah, should I call you?” And she said Yes. And so I called her. And I don’t often pray for people over the phone, but this is just one example, like how your husband’s, how his

disease has reawakened your prayer life. I guess that’s kind of a micro example of that. Her reaching out to me saying just like you, you know, I need help that awakened my prayer life. And reminded me of years ago when I was like much more practiced in my intercessory prayer life. And you know, I feel like God used that to kind of start nudging me back toward that and she’s, I’m going to her birthday party in a weekend or so. So that’s definitely a story of hope. I can definitely see hard things bringing people together and the body of Christ coming together in community to support one another.

Yeah. That’s awesome. I love it. I’m so glad that you joined me on this episode. It’s been a lot of fun.

Tiffany: Me too.

Carrie: It’s good to have like your insights and your feedback as well. That’s awesome. Glad we could work this out. Well, like I said before, let us know when the book comes out. We want all the details and all of the links and people can go follow you on Instagram too to keep up with you.

Tiffany: Yes, absolutely. It’s uh, Tiffany and some Italian last name, .

Carrie: I’ll link it in there for you all so you can just look in the show notes.

Awesome. Thank you so much, Carrie. I really enjoyed this too.

Related Resources:

Tiffany Ciccone

84. How Do I Set a Boundary? with Kristen D. Boice, LMFT

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, Counseling, Podcast Episode. No Comments on 84. How Do I Set a Boundary? with Kristen D. Boice, LMFT

In today’s episode, I’m joined by Kristen D. Boice, LMFT, a psychotherapist, coach, speaker, Close the Chapter Podcast Host. Kristen and I talk about how to set healthy boundaries:

  • Signs that you need to set boundaries
  • Why is setting boundaries difficult 
  • How to determine and communicate boundaries
  • Examples and scenarios for setting boundaries

Related Resources:

Kristen D. Boice, LMFT

What are Boundaries and Why are they Important? with Erica Kesse, LPC-MHSP

Support the show

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Transcript

Carrie: Welcome to Hope for Anxiety and OCD, episode 84. if you’re just finding our show, I am your host, Carrie Bock, and our podcast is really focused on reducing shame, increasing hope, and developing healthier connections with God and others. Today we’re really focused on that third goal as we do a follow-up episode on boundaries.

So back on episode 70, wee had an episode about What are Boundaries, and Why are They Important? with Erica Kesse. That was more of an ideological episode, more on the theory of boundaries, and this episode is going to be more practical. So I’m really excited to have found a guest who can. Walk us through the practicality of what it means to set boundaries.

I know that this is a very important topic for people who struggle with anxiety and something that I’m constantly working with clients on because when we don’t have healthy boundaries, we end up being, we take on too much and we end up becoming more anxious about it. It’s interesting. Kind of before we get into this conversation, I am in the season of No right now, which has been very interesting for me because.

I have had to say no to a lot of different things. I’ve said no to professional events and trainings. I have said no to personal meetings with people and it’s just reminded me how saying no to all of those things because in my season of life right now, I have a six-month-old. I have a husband with some health issues and some other family things going on that this has allowed me to say yes to the people and the priorities that are most important to me, even though sometimes it hurts to say no because some of the opportunities that are coming my way are really good and things that I want to do, and sometimes it’s just not the right season to do those things.

So today I have with me Kristen Boice. So Kristen, welcome to the show.

Kristen: Thanks Carrie for having me. And in your intro I was thinking this speaks to so many people to have the season of saying “no” so you can say yes to what matters the most in your life. And it’s not always easy.

Carrie: No, it’s not. So tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do.

Kristen: So I am a licensed marriage and family therapist and I have a group private practice with 15 clinicians. We specialized in trauma, EMDR, and brain spotting here in the Indianapolis area. My passion is helping people feel centered in who they are, that it’s okay they have their own thoughts, feelings, opinions, and they’re able to have a voice without feeling guilt and shame over what they need, what they want. And having more clarity, confidence, compassion, calm in their life.

So that’s really what I feel passionate about helping people really find their center, find that anchor point within themselves so they can feel more confident in their decision-making and self-doubt.

I find a lot of people doubt even when they set a boundary or make a choice, and they’re like, “Ooh, are they gonna be upset with me? Did I make the right decision? Was that what I should?” The “should” Is that what I should have done? So that’s what I feel really passionate about. And then I have a podcast called Close the Chapter where we focus on closing, what doesn’t serve you and opening the door to possibilities.

Carrie: Good. I like all of that. That all sounds really great. 15 people is a pretty sizable group practice too. I’m sure that did not happen overnight. You have stuck the course and built the thing.

Kristen: That was definitely Holy Spirit-led. That was not me. I’m just the vessel and my team is very centered in that, and that’s really at the heart of what we do.

It’s we’re just the vessel to help people find healing. So it’s not one of those things that I went out and created. It kind of created itself, so to speak. I mean, yes, I’m managing it. Really, I never solicited one of the clinicians

Carrie: Wow.

Kristen: That’s all God-led. So it’s really been remarkable to be a part of it and it’s been an honor and a privilege to walk clients through the healing journey.

Understanding Boundaries and Their Importance

Carrie: Absolutely. So I’m curious for you, like when you know, like we were talking last episode in terms of identifying that a boundary needs to be set, like maybe an internal feeling of anxiety or anger, what internal cues like do you personally experience when you know like, “Okay, it’s time for me to set a boundary here.”

Kristen: My body will tell me the cue, so I might get a pit in my stomach. I might get that. Oh, I can see, for example, you have a family member that you know is gonna activate your nervous system and you can see them texting you or calling you, and I can immediately feel that in my nervous system, that butterfly in my stomach, or that adrenaline rush or that.

My body might even tense up in my shoulders or my jaw might get tight. Yeah. So my body is the first thing, my nervous system to tell me to check cuz it can zap your energy that if I’m not protecting that energy, that can wipe me out from being the mom I wanna be from being the partner, I want to be the wife, the leader of the team, the best clinician I wanna be.

If I’m putting my energy towards something that’s gonna zap. Yeah, so I’ve learned energy is so important and if I don’t honor that, then I don’t have it to give where it’s most important to me. Yeah, and that’s so relevant in terms of self-awareness of just us being tuned in to what our body is trying to communicate to us.

I really believe that God gives us that for a reason, just that internal sense to be the first. And I’m just curious, I know I’ve talked with clients who have said, I just don’t even feel like I have the right words or the right language because maybe boundaries were never modeled for them in their family or in other relationships.

Practical Steps to Setting Boundaries

Carrie: And what kind of help would you give those people in terms of like tone of voice and word choice that we want to use, like when we’re setting boundaries? This is the one thing I feel so passionate about. We’ll even do role play, like, okay, I’ll be like, You’ll be you. I’ll be the person you’re setting the boundary with so they can get more comfortable in their own nervous system to say it.

Kristen: So the first thing I recommend, kind of the first step is take a deep breath. Hmm, that’s good because we wanna anchor in and feel centered. So I like feeling your feet on the floor, kind of feeling yourself present in this space, in this time. So it might take three or four breaths to get kind of centered to get the courage to say what you wanna say, to get the clarity.

And I encourage people. The second thing is, if you’re nervous about it, to write out what you might wanna say, for example, So let’s say your mom is blowing up your phone, . You’re like, I love you. So I will say the acknowledgement sandwich. I love you and I can’t talk right now. I will text you when I have a moment, something like that.

And the “I love you and it’s not, I love you, but because the “but” kind of take it, erases, it kind of feels manipulative. So I like to do the acknowledgement piece first. You don’t always have to do that. Or let’s say someone invites you to do something at school and you’ll say, Thank you so much for asking.

And right now I can’t, let me know the next time and I’ll see if I have the. Or the time. So what you’re doing really is creating a positive on the front end and the back end for people. I’ve heard some people say this, I don’t know if they call it the compliment sandwich or the criticism sandwich, something like that.

I called the acknowledgement sandwich where you’re acknowledging that the person’s intention was pure on the other side, like they want, And it’s not always, but for example, if like the school wants you to volunteer for something, you can understand that they need it. Sure. I know you really need a volunteer and I so wish I had the time to help and unfortunately right now I don’t.

Thank you so much for asking that. Acknowledging that intention on the front end and setting the what you can and can’t do. That’s the boundary. What can and can’t I do. So it might even look like, thank you for asking for me to bring, I don’t know, xyz. I can’t bring that, but I can bring chips and salsa like so I’m saying what I can’t bring, like I can’t make a homemade dish right now and homemade brownies.

However, I’m more than happy to bring chips and salsa. So you can’t say I’m giving you kind of benign examples, but you can offer like, Here’s what I can do, here’s what I can’t do. Those are nice f. And the tone of voice. So if it’s more of a harder boundary, for example, it might be a family member might feel really activated or triggered by that family member and really taking the deep breath.

And if you cannot respond, where you’re gonna be more intense and maybe have more of an angry response. Where it’s, you’re not gonna be real regulated. I always recommend take a pause. When you do feel like you have the, you’re more centered in your response. Maybe you pray over your response, you feel more clear in your tone of voice texting so hard.

But if you’re saying it verbally, where you can soften your voice a little bit, you can still be clear and direct. People are afraid. I don’t, I don’t wanna be nasty. You don’t have to be nasty at all. I can be very loving, but very clear and direct in my boundary. So I know you really wanna connect right now cuz that’s why they’re texting you and I’m not available.

I will reach out when I have a moment and I’m not sure when that is, but I’ll reach back out when I have a moment. Or if you’re on the phone with somebody, let’s say they’re getting really intense on the other line and you can feel your nervous system kind of getting really activated. You’d say, I love you and I need to get off the phone right now.

Overcoming Challenges and Reaping the Benefits

Carrie: That’s good. So sometimes nasty. I’m just clear and sometimes you can plan your boundary setting if it’s an ongoing issue that you know that happens such as mom gets into rages on the phone, and then you can say, Okay mom, I just want you to know when if you start to escalate or if you start to raise your voice at me, I’m going to get off the phone.

Just so that you are aware of that, and then you can tell ’em kind of ahead of time and then when it happens in the moment, like you’ve already prepped the person, right? So then when it happens, it’s not a surprise to them anymore. You’ve already, then you’re just enforcing the boundary that you’ve already said.

Okay. You know, remember when we talked that if you started yelling, I was gonna get off the phone, I’m gonna get off the phone now going through the next thing I. A lot of times when people don’t have the confidence, they come, their boundary comes out like almost like they feel like a mouse is talking like, Oh, please don’t, Well maybe if you could not do this, and it’s this long drawn out thing.

What I’m hearing you say is really keep it short and more direct, so we don’t want anybody to miss what we’re trying to communicate to them in these situations. Just be short, clear. And one of the things I think that I really wanna emphasize on the back end is people think, well then they won’t be upset with me if I just say it a certain way.

If I just, And that’s when we go on and on and on cuz we’re trying to manage their response or their reaction or their emotions and we can’t. So when we go, okay, they may respond well and they may. and I can’t control how this is gonna land for the person. I can only manage how I say it and feel really good about how I said it and feel like I came with a regulated as much as I could, nervous system, and I said it in the most centered way I could.

Kristen: So what was my centered message? My centered message is It’s not okay. Maybe it’s not okay to yell at me and I’m gonna get off the phone. Now. We had, I kind of explained the ba, you don’t even have to say the word boundary. I explained if you start yelling, I’m gonna get off the phone. I love you and I’ll talk to you later.

It’s more your centered message and your centered in your nervous system. Those go hand in hand.

Carrie: And even, I think adults and children respond similarly because when we think about setting boundaries, a lot of times we think about that in terms of discipline with children, No, you’re not allowed to run in the house.

Those types of things. And. If you give this long, drawn-out explanation about now if you run and this could happen, that could happen, and your message of what you’re trying to convey can actually get lost in the shuffle, rather than just saying, This is the line in the sand, and I think adults are similar.

I mean, would you agree with that? Like just respond similarly to the message? For sure. I think one of the most important things is if we aren’t clear and direct, the person has no idea. I’m working with couples especially, they’re like, Well, you were, I know you’re really trying to be helpful, which is nice.

Kristen: That’s a good front-end kind of acknowledgement. But then they go on and on and on and then they’ll say, And I just wish we could have a little more connection time. And I’m like, “Okay, what are you exactly saying?” Oh, you want the person to put the phone down when you’re at dinner, turn the phones off so you can have more connection time.

So that’s more clear and direct rather than making it this big, broad invitation where the other person feels so overwhelmed and lost and not clear on what you’re saying. So it can be helpful to the other person’s nervous system, even though they may not like it to be more specific. Then they can decide whether they wanna do that or.

So if someone says, I would love to have where we put our phones away for dinner, would you be willing to do that? And they say No, then you’ve got it. Then you have to deal with your own feelings around that.

Carrie: Yeah. I think this is good because I know that I’ve worked with a lot of women who think that they are communicating something to their spouse.

And I won’t understand it, what they’re trying to communicate that they’re saying. And I’m like, Okay, so let’s boil this down to like, what is it that you actually want? Knowing what you actually want can be a really good precursor to setting a boundary or communicating with someone else about something.

And that I think you can kind of queue in just being more mindful internally. What is it that I would like in this relationship? I want more connection. Okay. So if you had more connection, what would that look like? Oh, he wouldn’t be texting on the phone during dinner. Okay. Well, that’s a pretty clear behavior that could be changed by someone that you’re asking.

I think sometimes If a man hears, I want more connection. Well, I mean, that could. 20 different things, you know, what does that mean? So I think that this is a really good concept for people to, when they’re creating the boundary. I like what you said earlier, and I wanted to circle back around to it and not miss it.

You talked about writing down what you want to say, and I definitely have made some bullet points on a post-it note for things that I wanted to make sure that I communicated to people in my life, especially when I knew they were gonna be hard, heavy, emotional conversations. Sometimes you can’t be a hundred percent regulated, you know you’re going to be nervous in that conversation or you know it’s gonna be hard.

And you may forget things because of that emotional reactivity you were talking about. So just having those one or two points, that’s kind of like the bottom line message that you wanna come across with, I think is so valuable and beneficial.

Kristen: Yes. I’ve worked with several clients where they had an emotionally unavailable parent.

What does that mean? Like they didn’t, the parent wasn’t available to acknowledge their feelings or hear what they had to say. Really be attuned to them. So I had one client and what I had typically as I’ll do a letter writing exercise where you’re writing, this is not to give them, this is for you to get clarity on what are you wanting specifically from like what are you hoping to get out of this conversation?

Right? Yeah. So they write the letter and then we do three bullets of what are you asking for? What are the three central messages, what are your centered messages that you are trying to communicate? And you put it in the three bullet points. And then when you go into the conversation, it’s okay to take the letter.

It’s okay to take the bullet point, post it. It’s okay to take those or put it in your phone to have something to re. Because your brain will then cue when we get anxious, sometimes we can go and fight-flight, freeze Fawn. Fawn is that people-pleasing response or even flop, or you kind of just faint, like your nervous system gets overwhelmed.

This can help you kind of cue the brain on, Oh yes, this is what I was trying to say. You feel more confident and clear. And what you’re communicating, and that can be really helpful when you’re having hard conversations or trying to communicate a boundary, what’s okay, what’s not okay with you, or what you’re wanting or needing. It’s more clear and specific.

Carrie: Yeah. So I wanted to go through a couple scenarios and I think you’ve already gave us some great examples and language and talked about the acknowledgement sandwich. So I’m gonna give you a couple maybe that are hard, more in terms of relationally, right? Like if someone we don’t know ask us to do so.

Might be a little bit easier to say no to it versus when someone asks something of us that we really want to please that person, or we have a close relationship and we’re afraid that somehow that relationship might get threatened if we set a boundary. So I’ll read you one of these and then just, I’d love for you to just respond how you would respond.

Kristen: That sounds wonderful.

Setting Boundaries: Saying No to Close Friend’s Request

Carrie: So let’s just say that your close friend asked you to help with the school fundraiser coming up next month, and now this is not just showing up for it, but it’s planning, there’s preparation, and then actually showing up. And so due to family and work commitments, you don’t feel like you can add one more thing on your plate right now. What do you tell?

Kristen: Thank you so much for asking for me to help with the fundraiser. I know you’ve got a lot on your plate. I so wish I could help and unfortunately, I can’t right now. Let me know in the future if you need help and maybe at that time I’ll be, I’ll have more bandwidths.

Carrie: Good. I still feel like you like me when you said that.

Kristen: Oh, good because maybe that’s feel connected.

Carrie: Yes. Like being able, to keep the relational connection because if someone’s asking you to do something, They know that you would be a good person for that. Probably like maybe you’ve done fundraisers in the past, or maybe you are a person that they know is going to show up and actually get the work done that needs to be done. So that is somewhat of an honor to be asked to do something like that.

Kristen: It is, and it feels good to us if we’re honest. A lot of times it feels good that we’re chosen because maybe our inner child says, Well, I was always picked last in gym class, or no one ever wanted to sit with me. And so that little part of you inside says, “Oh, that feels so nice to be picked.”

And yet we know we don’t have the energy or the time cuz it’ll take us away from what we want, need to pour into, which might be our child, our newborn, our husband that needs our attention, our friend, our another family member, or even yourself, right? Maybe you’re just at a burnout. And you’re feeling really run down and your tank is empty, you don’t have it to offer.

And that’s okay. We are so conditioned to be givers. And when the tank is low, I’m not at my best self. And then that brings shame of I’m not a good enough mom, or I’m not good enough wife, or I’m not a good enough boss. Fill in the blank. And. I don’t have the energy to really kind of recover cuz I’m sleep deprived, I’m exhausted, whatever.

I’m giving out too much and my tank is too low, so then I don’t have it to give what matters most to me. Yeah. So it’s so important that we are giving ourselves permission to identify when your tank is low, A boundary is necessary..

Carrie: I interviewed a cancer survivor recently who talked about accepting your limitations, but also not being defined by those limitations. Finding a balance and just respecting his energy level and what he has to give, and he has to say no to a lot of different things due to still being on a maintenance dose of chemotherapy and so forth. It was interesting to have that conversation because I think that it’s hard and somewhat painful sometimes for us to admit our limitations, to admit that we have a low level of bandwidth, or that we’re exhausted right now, or because of our mental health struggles, we’re not able to do something that’s a hard admittance sometimes for people.

Kristen: It is because the shame tells us you should do it. You should be a giver. You should be a good Christian, you should be a good person, you should be a good mom, you should be a good volunteer. The shame stories that we have and the conditioning block us from actually taking care of ourselves. Because once we get to the body shut down, we are really depleted. If we are getting sick, we are getting run down like we are. The body has tried to give us signals all along, but we’ve pushed through and now the body is saying, screaming at us. I am begging you to set these boundaries. I am begging you to listen to me, that I can’t keep going.

But the shame says, “Oh, but what are they gonna think if I say no?” See, the shame stories are big. Yes. And they block us from having the healthy boundaries many times. Absolutely. So watching the shame stories though should, and that guilt really is an invitation for us to go, Okay, I need to kind of regroup here.

I need to take a pause. And sometimes taking a pause to give you some time to come up with how you’re gonna respond is okay. Thank you for asking. Let me check my calendar and I’ll get back to you. So that pause can give you the space to then reenter and come back with. Thank you so much for asking. I wish I had the time. Unfortunately, I don’t Keep me in mind for next time, or you don’t even have to say, keep me in mind for next.

Balancing Work and Personal Boundaries: The Challenge of Saying No

Carrie: I have to admit that we’re gonna start talking about work boundaries right now, and I admit that I’m my own boss and I imagine you’re your own boss and have been for some time right now. But I have had many bosses in my day.

Don’t be fooled. I remember what it’s like to have a boss. Don’t worry. And I think a lot of times people feel like I can’t set a boundary at work because my job is my livelihood and I cannot threaten my livelihood. Will you talk to us about that piece a little bit? Because I feel like we are in the day and age where employers will just push and push and push the envelope to burn people out and sometimes don’t care.

Kristen: This is a whole different world now with the phones and we are mobile. Yes. So the boundaries feel very diffuse and like we feel like we should respond to the email right away, or they’re gonna think they’re, I’m not working, or they’re gonna think I’m not doing my job. So there’s a lot of fear in setting with authority figure, so to speak, where it feels like your livelihood is tied to your performance. And oftentimes I’ll work a lot with clients on, okay, let’s really take a look at what’s realistic for you to be able to do and what isn’t. And the lines are very blurry there, right? Because they feel like they should be doing all of this. And then we’ll walk into, okay, what are you really wanting to say to your boss? pretend like, or I’m your boss. What would you really wanna say to your boss? And it’s. So their brains kind of have to fight flight or freeze response or fawn, right? like we talked about, that survival state response, that they don’t feel like they have a voice. And so we’ll work on, okay, what if we said something along these lines, and this is just an example.

I am so grateful for this job. I love working here, and maybe you don’t. So you have to tweak this based on what’s real and true for you. So it’s authentic. We don’t want it to be inauthentic. Authenticity is good. Yes. So important. And I’m just feeling this sense of overwhelm and here and be specific.

Here’s what I think come up with solutions. What I think would be helpful is if we. Here’s what I think I can still meet deadlines with, and here’s what I’m not sure. I’m not gonna be able to meet this deadline realistically. So I come up with a solution. Here’s some ideas on how I could have so and so really help me with this piece or that piece.

Oftentimes we get into, I’ve gotta do it. Without thinking about other solutions or options. Yes, that’s very true. Not knowing how to delegate or how to work as a team or ask for help. Those are all very important skills to have in these situations. Well, we can say I feel overwhelmed and I kind of feel like I’m knocking at the door of burnout.

Overcoming Shame and Guilt: Setting Boundaries for Self-Care

Those are important conversations now that really a lot of companies are talking about because their employees are burned out. And is this a healthy environment? This is the other thing sometimes we have to explore. Is this a healthy environment for you? If not, and this can be a journey, this is overnight.

Do we start looking for other options that might be a healthier fit for you? Yeah. That you’re gonna be able to have some limits. And so at five o’clock you’re. So some folks just need a healthier environment and it depends on, So it depends on the health of the organization too. So if you have this conversation and it’s not received well, then we have to process on the back end, what comes up for you?

Is this the best fit for you? Is this the best job for you? Now, that’s not always. Sometimes that’s what is a great job, and it is a great. And it’s worth exploration to say, what is my fear if I speak up? A lot of times it’s, I’m gonna lose my job. I’m not gonna get the promotion. They’re gonna think I can’t handle it.

I’m just naming a few, right? Sure. They’re afraid of rejection, they’re afraid of failure. And when we can process what’s really at the root of that? Then we start having a voice. So there’s an important concept here. I think when we talk about boundaries, it’s not talked about often that is essential. And as therapists, you’ve heard of this before, but we look at the human developmental continuum.

I’m gonna throw this out there cause I think it can really be helpful for people when they’re looking at workplace boundaries or boundaries in a family system or in a marriage or in a partnership. There’s a concept called individuation and separation. Okay, This is differentiation.

Boundaries in Family Dynamics: Codependency and Setting Limits

So in a family system, if you’re allowed to have your own thoughts, feelings, and opinions, and it’s okay, it’s celebrated. It’s a normal part of human development. It’s not a threat to the system. The system can say it’s okay. This is normal for you to question things, for you to kind of integrate what your own thoughts and feelings and opinions about it to land on, what resonates for you.

If we weren’t allowed to do that in a family system, we are gonna struggle with boundaries. That makes a lot of sense. So if we weren’t allowed to differentiate ourselves from the, like the thoughts and feelings and opinions of the family, you weren’t allowed to have your own kind of questioning and exploration and question things, and you could do that in the family and you could feel differently about something and that was okay.

It wasn’t a threat to the system. You’re gonna feel more confident having a boundary. Yes. If you didn’t get that and it was, which a lot of people didn’t right, that it was threatening to the system. You were disciplined, you were punished, you were ashamed, you were not allowed to kind of explore your own thoughts, feelings, and opinions.

It’s gonna be very scary to say how you feel. So a lot of times what we work on is being able to have your own thoughts, feelings, and opinions without. Threat. Like you’re scared that you’re going into a survival state and trying to fawn or people please, Right? Or you shut down and you just go in a freeze.

If someone gets upset with you, you have, you’re, we’re building that window of tolerance that to tolerate that it’s okay if they have a different opinion. It’s not okay if they yell at you, but it’s okay if they get sad over something that you’re like, Ooh. It’s okay. You’re not responsible for managing that emotion.

So in the workplace, when you can go, it’s okay for me to say, this is what I can do and this is what I can’t do. Yeah. We then have more centeredness and a voice. So that individuation process is very important to explore what we set boundaries.

Carrie: Yes, absolutely. In the sense of, you know, a lot of family dynamics.

There’s a level of codependency, not just in homes with people who have substance abuse issues, but in other homes as well, where it was like, well, we had to do. Please mom at all costs or please dad at all costs. And then if we went against anything on that, there was maybe harsh punishment because it was Dad’s way or the highway.

I find that in those situations, yes, boundaries are very difficult and a lot of times I work with my clients on. Kind of like goals of adolescence maybe that they never achieved. Because I really feel like what you’re talking about is part of a goal of adolescence is like you go out, you explore the world, you decide what you like and don’t like.

You decide what things you wanna take from your family and what things you don’t. And in some situations, That was not allowed. Kids were very sheltered or shamed for having a difference of opinion or thinking on their own. This is definitely very relevant. So let’s say that your boss asked you to take on a large project for work.

It’s not a requirement. But it definitely would help. Your career might say, you aced this project, it would give you a promotion. You’re also in the process of caring for your elderly mother. Don’t feel you have the mental and emotional energy to give your best work to this project, require additional work hours, additional stress, and you don’t want to disappoint your boss and are afraid of maybe hurting your career or not getting that promotion.

Kristen: This is so big to unpack So many, lots of layers. Lots of layers, and it depends on what do you want, Like how badly do you want the promotion On a zero to 10, I have people do a lot of scaling so they can get more clarity on their internal needs in wants. So I’ll go on a zero to 10. 10 being, I’ll do whatever it takes.

A hundred percent. I want the promotion zero. Nah, don’t really want it at. So sometimes we don’t, even if we weren’t allowed to differentiate, we don’t even explore. Why do I want that? It’s like the first step. Yeah. Or are we doing an automatic response, like that’s the next step. I need the promotion and that’s like my next thing.

I’m not even looking at, do I really want it? Why do I really want it? Can I even handle it? So let’s say you do really want it just to play this out. Let’s say you really want promotion and you’re still taking care of your elderly mother. Here’s the bottom line you’re gonna need.

Carrie: Yes,

Choosing Priorities: Balancing Career Goals and Caregiving Responsibilities

Kristen: I am much more rooted in reality and the reality rather than the fantasy of what we think we can do.

The reality is you won’t be able to do both well, I mean, you won’t be able to do it all. We know this. It’s a fantasy. If I think I can do it all, something’s gonna give and it’s gonna be my health, it’s gonna be, I’m gonna feel resentful towards my mom. The job I’m gonna go to burnout. So I think the first thing when we look at that is, am I willing to ask for help?

Yes. If I’m not, I’m probably not gonna be able to do this promotion well, and it’s probably gonna be a cost to me. So I think the first thing is asking yourself, what do I want? Am I willing to ask for help? And let’s say you are. Let’s say you’re like, Yes, I can do it. Okay. I think being transparent with the boss and saying, Here’s, and I know this is feeling very, I’m about authenticity, requires transparency.

And that the truth self set you free. Now it’s a healthy work environment. They’re gonna go, Oh, I, that makes sense to me. If you say something like, I really, really would love to take this promotion. This is something I’m passionate about, I really am excited about, and I wanna let you know I’m taking care of my elderly mom.

And so there may be times where I might have an emergency and I’ve gotta buzz out, or I have to take care of my. I’m going to be seeing if I can get some help with my mom. I wanted to let you know up front to be transparent. So my nervous system then goes, Okay, I’ve told them up front. I was transparent up front about my what’s going on so they know, and maybe they’re not comfortable giving you the promotion at that time.

That’s a risk you run. But transparency leads to. If we’re hiding, we’re maneuvering. We’re trying to act like we have it all together. That will lead you down the road to exhaustion. Yeah. It will lead you down to the road to unfulfillment and dissatisfaction and resentment. Every time I’m like, play the movie out, I’ll say something to a client like, I’ll go, Okay, play the movie out.

Like you get the promotion and you’re taking care of your elderly mom. Tell me what you see in the movie. They’re like, I can’t do it. I’m burned out, exhausted. I’m like, Okay, so what would you need in order to take the promotion and take care of your mom? So we get more clarity when we play the movie out of what is real for me, What will work for me, what won’t work for me.

And now we have to work on the courage to say it out loud. That’s the hardest part, typically. Mm-hmm. is saying it out loud cause we’re scared we’re gonna, then they won’t consider us for the promotion. But real in the reality of things, when you’re transparent, builds trust, transparency builds trust. It’s whenever there’s a betrayal, we know that transparency is essential to rebuild that trust over.

So when you’re with a boss and you’re transparent, the boss goes, Oh, I really appreciate you sharing that with me. Yeah. If you have a healthy boss, right? I mean, this is mm-hmm. . So there’s a lot of layers to this to consider when setting a boundary. Yeah, for sure. And I’ve definitely been in environments where I was transparent and it was used against me, and of course that made me pull back and not want to be transparent.

So recognizing what your relationship is with your supervisor. How that information is gonna be utilized. I do find that people are much more understanding when we’re upfront about things versus when we’re not. We don’t have to overshare. That’s the other key. It’s you don’t have to give every detail.

It’s a high level, I’m taking care of my EL elderly mom, and if it’s not received well, that’s information for us. , Yes. Evaluate whether the long term, this is gonna be a healthy place of employment. And that’s key information. So like you said, it’s used against you, which has the, which happens, which definitely happens.

Is this gonna be a long term healthy environment for you to continue to work in? Right. And that’s scary for people to think about changing, Right. Their place of employment. And it can also be empowering when they do decide to make a change, whatever that looks.

Carrie: I was in a, what I would consider a toxic work environment for a period.

And what I realized in that process was there were a couple times they would vacillate between, We love you, we hate you. And when they loved me, they loved me. And when they hated me, they hated me. But when they were on the downswing, they would say, Well, we’re just not really sure that this job is a good fit for you.

And I think that I took that inadequacy shame piece, like, Oh, I’m not enough. I’m not living up to the expectations. And it’s so interesting to be out of that environment and to be on the other side now saying they were right. That job wasn’t a good fit for me and there’s nothing wrong with that. It just didn’t fit the fullness of who I was and what I wanted and how I wanted to show up for clients that wasn’t me.

And it’s okay that it wasn’t. Made for somebody else. I could see you even lit up. Like the freedom you felt like they were. Right. That wasn’t the right job for me. It was stifling you. It was like it wasn’t expanding you. Yes. Full gifts was stifling you. Yeah. But it’s hard sometimes when you’re in the middle of it, and I think that’s why talking to someone like a healthy friend, family where a counselor can help you process through some of these things to know like, this is what they’re saying and this is what I’m sensing, and what’s your objectivity on it? Cause you can feel in those type of toxic work environments where the expectations are too high, sometimes you can start to feel a little crazy or inadequate like, Well, I mean I see other people maybe doing this or they’re expecting that I do this, so I must able to do it and that’s just not always the case.

Kristen: Yes. And I think talking through it, cuz sometimes our work environments mirror our family dynamics that we grew up in. Yeah. So it’s hard to see clearly cuz we’re reenacting almost like the same system we grew up in. We just don’t know. Cause it just seems normal to us.

It seems familiar until you start doing your own healing. And then you’re like, Oh, I recreated the same family system dynamic at work. Oh, and I did that in my other romantic relationship. Yes. And there’s the light bulb. That’s why that self-awareness piece and understanding families, not to blame anybody cuz that’s not the idea.

The idea is empowerment to go, I can break the chain of this dynamic. I can see now the parallel between my work environment and my home environ. And how I put myself in that same role and didn’t recognize it. So I wanted to kinda shift gears. I know we’re cramming a lot into this episode. It’s so good. I know that Christians a lot of times struggle feeling like I have to say yes, I’ve gotta help people.

God wants me to be giving. God wants me to be hospitable. And how would you really encourage these individuals that it is okay to say no sometimes. And you’re still a good Christian. I love the and in both. So I can be a loving, caring, compassionate person. As long as I’m having boundaries, I can still be that, but I might be resentful.

I might be worn out. I might be angry because now I’m giving and I might take on a martyrdom role. God doesn’t want us to, like, you’ll have some people, maybe your family system that they were like, I’ve done everything I’ve given, I’ve given here, I’ve given there, and now they’ve taken on this. Look at me.

I’ve done everything role. And they feel bitter and resentment, and it comes in between their relationships that matter the most, Maybe. With their child, maybe with their partner, maybe with their church group. It doesn’t, so that can lead. If we don’t have boundaries, it’s hard to be our best-giving self cuz I’m giving, and there’s resentment tied to it.

We wanna be giving because we are led to be like, Oh, I want to do that because I feel filled up. I now have enough to pour out and I don’t expect anything. There is no ties to needing anything back. I’m doing it because it’s pure agape love, like I’m just letting it flow from my soul. If I’m doing it out of a, I should be doing this consistently, you’re gonna be on the road to resentment and expectations or resentments waiting to happen.

We are just going to feel a level of burnout. And resentment that doesn’t feel good to us, and we’re gonna be like, Why am I even doing this? No one cares. No one even acknowledges me. And when we get to a thank you is wonderful. And I love a good, and, and we don’t wanna do it to get a thank you. Yes, that’s true.

It’s icy on the cake like it feels. That’s why I love acknowledgement cuz it feels so good to our nervous system cuz we all wanna feel seen, appreciated, understood, and loved so much. And when we are filling our tanks up, we can give that out freely and it feels so amazing to just give it without any expectation back icy on the cake.

Carrie: So tell us a little bit about where to find you and what you have going on.

Kristen: So close The chapter podcast is probably the best place to find me. And then on Instagram and Facebook, you know, all the socials at Kristen d Boyce. And then if you want a free journal that I love to give out to my clients and it’s free, you can reuse it. Beause I’m a big journaler and I believe in it in terms of getting clarity from the Holy Spirit. Like it just is so powerful to get centered at kristendvoice/free resources and it will be emailed to your in. And what I love about that is I love how God gave us the breath to kind of come back.

Yeah. Reground us in nature and all these gifts. And if we can come back to ourselves and listen to the leading and have clarity, that is the leading, that is in our fear talking. That’s the Holy Spirit talking. Our nervous systems are freed. And there’s so much healing that can take place when that happens.

So I’m a firm believer in journaling. I love it. That’s why I wanna give it to everybody. I’m like here, cuz everybody’s like, Well, I don’t really like journaling, and what am I gonna write about? And this helps kind of guide the process.

Carrie: That’s awesome. I like that. So since this podcast is called Hope for Anxiety and O C D, we like our guests to share a story of hope at the end. A time where you received hope from God or another person.

Kristen: There’s so many. Really what came through to me when I was praying over this question, I was thinking about a client just came through, and I’m not gonna give specifics, but when I work with people that you feel like, how are they ever gonna recover from this loss or this trauma?

And you think, how can they get up in the morning? How are they gonna move when you’ve lost all your children due to a tragedy? How are you going to ever recover from that? And I’ve seen over and over and over again how God like pours into the pain. And once we work and acknowledge the pain, God can tend to it and walk alongside us in it.

I always think like Jesus walking hand in hand with us going, I know honey, I know it. And I know this is so painful and you can’t understand it right now. Yeah. And I’m right here with you just holding the pain for you. And that’s the privilege of seeing God’s transformation was some of the most painful things anyone could ever go through.

And the second piece that came to me is as a community, we had a school shooting back in, Oh yeah. It was several years ago. No one would’ve ever expected that to happen in our backyard. And as a community, it opened us up in such a way for healing. For us to come together, love one another, and acknowledge each other’s pain and fear.

Yeah, and just so there was so much transformation that happened in a whole community. And as a result, I do a, every other week, this is about me, but as a result, not of just the shooting, but at the pandemic. Mental Health Monday with our mayor on Facebook, and now we’re talking about mental health. We’re talking about all these hard topics that’s transformation.

Like here we are trying to hold the pain and acknowledge people’s pain in the midst of all of this. And we came together despite trauma and tragedy. So those are the two things that came to me when you were asking that question.

Carrie: Mental health Monday with the mayor. That’s a lot of ems, but I like it.

It is. It is. We don’t say with the mayor. I just was adding that piece. It’s just called Mental Health Mondays.

Well, thank you so much for coming on and sharing all of your wisdom. I think this is gonna be very practical for people who are looking to set boundaries and then also identifying throughout.

We kind of identified some things that get in the way of people are struggling with anxiety of setting boundaries.

Kristen: Thank you so much for having me on, and the work you’re doing.

79. Personal Story of Anxiety with Dr. Sherri Yoder

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, Personal Testimony, Podcast Episode. No Comments on 79. Personal Story of Anxiety with Dr. Sherri Yoder

Today on the show, I’m joined by Dr. Sherri Yoder, a former clinical psychologist and the founder and executive director of Thriving Thoughts Global. Dr. Sheri talks about her personal story of anxiety and how it led her to her work now in her non-profit organization.

  • Dr. Yoder’s story of struggling with anxiety 
  • Strategies she used to work through her own anxiety 
  • How she got involved in mental health prevention and education
  • More about her non-profit organization, Thriving Thoughts Global 

Related Resources:

Thriving Thoughts Global

More Personal Stories

Transcript

Carrie: Welcome to Hope for Anxiety and OCD episode 79. Today on the show, we have a little bit of a unique episode. I mean, we’ve done these kinds before, but it’s kind of a combination of personal story and professional, um, inform. So I have Dr. Sherri Yoder, who is a former clinical psychologist and the founder and executive director of Thriving Thoughts Global, which is about mental healthcare prevention.

From Clinician to Patient: My Battle with Anxiety

So I’m really interested in that conversation that we’re gonna have Dr. Sherri.

You wanted to start out by talking about kind of your own personal story of anxiety.

Dr. Sherri: Thank you so much for having me Carrie and giving me the opportunity to share a little bit. I think it’s so important for us to not just normalize anxiety, but normalize how we respond to it.

Thanks for giving me the chance to do that. Years ago when I was practicing as a clinical psychologist. So it’s been almost maybe 10 years now. I had my first, what I would call major episode with anxiety. That was pretty chronic. It was both acute and chronic at the same time. It lasted a long time. It had to do with a lot of things.

It had, my thoughts had to do with some spiritual fears, but also some professional fears. Somewhat related to being an imposter and that sort of thing. But being found out just irrational fear of being found out, what am I gonna be found out about? I keep up with my CE’s. I do the things I do therapy. Like I’m good.

I’m good at my business, you know, all of that, but there were certainly irrational fears that started to develop. And so what happened during that time is it got so bad that the only time that I wasn’t having a spiraling thoughts that would kind of physically take me out at the knees was when I was in therapy when I was doing therapy with other people because I was like, I was zoned in, I was focused on them and it was like a freedom to a degree because I didn’t have to be inside my head.

I could be outside of my head. And so that was really the only relief that I got during that time. And I’d say that that ran about four to five months to the point where I knew it was unsustainable, I knew I had to do something. I had to respond to it differently, or I was gonna have to check myself in somewhere because it was getting that bad.

I say that to say that I was never formally diagnosed. I was a clinical psychologist. I was the one that diagnosed other people. And certainly, I could have met the criteria for a number of different anxiety-related disorders. But what happened during that time is what served as the catalyst for the work that I do now. And it was a deep, intimate understanding of what it’s like to deal with potentially debilitating anxiety. And so what happened is I became a stronger clinician in that regard, but I became a more compassionate human as well. So I’m thankful for that experience. And since then that set me on the path to realize that everything that I go through, no matter how scary or so badly I wanna avoid it or painful, it is. There is a way to use that. Not just to help other people, but to grow me.

Carrie: That’s good. I’m glad you brought up imposter syndrome because I think that’s a thing that a lot of people who are in professional careers have and it’s something that people think well, okay. I’m really educated.

I’m functional. I mean, I go to work every day. Like, not just that, but like I’m my achiever. And they don’t necessarily always recognize that anxiety within themselves or that thought process that is really fueled by anxiety of I’m never quite good enough. I’ve always gotta kind of do better. There’s always more that I could be doing for myself.

Dr. Sherri: Yeah. And as a clinician, I think, you know, this, Carrie. You have a serious responsibility on your hands, right?

Carrie: Sure.

The Importance of Recognizing Vulnerability and Its Connection to Anxiety

Dr. Sherri: You’re dealing with the personal lives of people. And there is a level of, there’s an onus that comes with that to honor that, to be reverent of that. And I think that led to one of the things that I since learned about anxiety for myself and for other people I’ve now, since I left the field, I do some individual work called thought coaching. So I help people with their thoughts. But what I’ve learned is that there’s two things that happen with anxiety. One is that I had to know when I was most vulnerable.

Carrie: Oh, That’s good. Right.

Dr. Sherri: I had to be aware of that. When I was most vulnerable was when I was alone. And that was particularly problematic for me because I was single and didn’t have any children work was like, “Yay. I’m not alone.” And then when I got out of work, that’s all I was, was alone. And so there’s a tendency there to not want to be alone, but I had to be alone in my vulnerability in order to address it because if I avoided that. I was never gonna get to a place where I could address it. And to be clear, I didn’t do that work alone. I employed the help of some friends and things, but to know where your vulnerability is because if you’re gonna respond to it differently, you have to prepare. Yeah, right. And so my vulnerability was in the alone spaces.

So that’s the first thing that I needed to be aware of that helped me through that. And then the second thing was to understand that all anxiety, I don’t care how irrational it is. I don’t care how out of the blue, the thoughts are. They always stem from some nugget of truth. So going back to this, like, oh, you’re gonna be found out. You’re a fake, you’re a fraud. Like what? No, I’m actually a licensed clinical psychologist. Right. I have my doctorate. There’s nothing for me to be found out about. It related back to me to the negative truth of that onus of that responsibility that you have in that role.

And so I think about parents, mothers that I’ve worked with and they have responsibilities for their children. And very much of some of their thought worlds and the anxiety-related thoughts that they have are related to fears of something happening to their children. Right? Well, that is where that little nugget of truth. I have this responsibility here. So, whether that’s in a job or whatever it is, whatever kind of has your attention, has your focus, that’s also your vulnerability and the source of that kind of nugget of truth for the thoughts to spiral into total opposite of truth thoughts,

Carrie: Right? So it’s like teasing out. What is the actual negative truth, which for you was, I do have some responsibility to care for people. However, the fear piece was you’re gonna really screw somebody up. You’re really gonna mess this up, being able to separate those out and tease that out was helpful for you. It sounds like.

Replacing Anxiety with Truth: The Power of Thought Coaching

Dr. Sherri: Oh my goodness. Yeah, because then I was able to. When I gave myself permission to say, okay, this makes sense, but it doesn’t make sense that it’s gone, like so far to the left of where it was, right. So far from the needle of truth. But it makes sense now that is a source of my worry. And so then I could stop berating myself. “What’s wrong with you? You’re just crazy.” No, no, no, no, no. My mind just took this idea and kind of blew it way out of proportion almost without my permission. And so to be able to kind of step outside and see that is really what my saving grace was, because then what I did, I’ll share with you really quickly, what I did, which I didn’t know then would become my life’s work of learning to take the thoughts that we have in our minds and evaluate them for veracity. Are they real? Or are they lies? That’s what I say, are they truth or are they lies? And if they’re lies, okay, then they’re not serving me. Well, how do I replace that with truth? So what I did during that time, a friend of mine had asked me. He said, “Sherri, I want you to write down for me. I’m a woman of faith. I want you to write down all of God’s promises. And so I did, and I didn’t believe half of them at the time because I mean, there was stuff going on in my mind and so I wrote them all down. And so then what I did is I pulled out the language that I used with myself in those moments of anxiety, of heightened anxiety, the phrases that I said, you’re a fraud you’re gonna be found out. You don’t know what you’re doing, whatever the thoughts were.

I wrote all of those down on one side of the paper. And then on the opposite side of the paper, I wrote down the truths of what I knew to be true. Even if I didn’t. Yeah. Then what I did is every moment when I was having these anxiety thoughts instead of letting it spiral out of control, I immediately opened that book and I scanned down to the one that, the thought that came into my head and I looked to the right of it and I said aloud the corresponding truth and why was that important.

I didn’t know at the time that that was important that I did that, but it was important because I understood and came to realize this about anxiety. And depression or anything like that, something that was so liberating for me to know and something that just enlarged my compassion for people was when you’re in that space and people say “it’s all in your head or whatever. ” Yeah, you’re right. It is. And I can’t get out of there.

Carrie: I’m stuck. I’m trapped. Yeah.

Dr. Sherri: Right. And so what I learned was having a physical, external reminder was what I needed because when I was in that space, I couldn’t think of anything else. I needed something written down outside of my head that I could ground me to a degree because if left to my own thoughts, it was just gonna spiral out of control. Having that external reminder was key to fighting that battle of anxiety and that composition notebook fell apart Carrie. I mean, I opened that thing. I must have opened it every, when I was alone, like every minute because it was nonstop.

Open it, read it, open it, read it and then shut it down. Okay. I’m okay. Nope.

Carrie: You would ike carry it around with you?

Dr. Sherri: Everywhere. And I’ve carried that habit. With me to this day for different, like, I have sticky notes. I have everywhere. I have them in my car. I have them in my wallet, in my kitchen, in my desk, wherever of just different things to remind myself of.

I choose to speak kindly to myself. Different things to remind myself of. And I move them around because our brain habituates to the same thing in the same place. Anyway, besides that it took work, there were times when I thought, “oh my gosh, this isn’t working. It’s not stopping,” but I remained faithful to that work to doing something different.

And what I learned is since then, this is 10 years ago. My tension, my tendency towards anxiety that hasn’t gone away. But what’s changed has been my response to it. And I taught myself, I taught my brain a new habit. It’s possible. It takes a heck of a lot of work. And a lot of perseverance, but to me it’s so worth it. And now it’s a lifelong practice that I know not to believe the first thought that comes into my mind to evaluate it and then decide what to do with it. So that’s kind of led to my work now.

Carrie: That’s great. We had another guest on that talked about having kind of like a “911 note” on her phone. She’s a health coach now, but she was trying to lose weight. And so she had various things on her 911 note. Yes. You know, note that she would just pull up and there were scripture verses and positive affirmations and so forth. And so every time she kind of wanted to slip back into all patterned, she got that out and went through it and I think.

I appreciate what you’re saying about it being work because unfortunately, obviously, like we live in a society of instant gratification and to really do something like essentially what you’re talking about is thought replacement. It does. It takes effort and it takes repetition. You know, anytime we’re trying to learn something new like our brain is literally creating new pathways.

Yes. And that’s not gonna happen just overnight or, oh, well, I tried to do that like one or two times, and I just wasn’t feeling it and I don’t think it’s gonna work for me. That kind of lingo is like, I want people to hear, like, it is hard to work through your anxiety, but you can do it. You can, you can work through some of these things and learn new behaviors and new patterns and new coping skills with life to have like a better outcome.

Did you end up going to therapy for yourself? I’m just curious.

The Lifelong Practice: Working Through Anxiety and Building Resilience

Dr. Sherri: I did not. Well, that depends on how you look at it informally sure because I have a lot of colleagues. I did process this with the number of people. And I did not keep it to myself. I think that’s the other thing that’s so important is, and unfortunate in the realm of mental health, I get it. We have HIPAA laws, we have privacy laws. But I think an unfortunate side effect of that is the propagation that I’m not supposed to have these problems. We kind of hide it in these four walls behind closed doors. I can only talk about this with my therapist, or I’m not even gonna go to therapy because if I go to therapy, then I admit there’s something wrong with me. I think it’s about shedding light on the normalization of our human, emotional experiences and understanding that we all have them to varying degrees, to varying intensities, varying propensities and varying seasons. I don’t claim Carrie to be out of the anxiety woods. Right.

I think that’s the other kind of faulty belief is like, I’m over it, but that’s the trick about anxiety and or depression is it comes back when you least expect it, but there are new ways that you can respond to it. And so I, for me, It’s not believing that I’m never gonna be impacted by it again, instead, it’s believing that I’m gonna be able to not only just cope with it, but to use it to be stronger.

I actually have this little sticky note here. I have to read it to you. It says, “A bird sitting in a tree is never afraid of the branch breaking because his trust is not on the branch but in his own wings,

Carrie: I can get up and fly if this branch starts to crack it’s okay.

Dr. Sherri: That’s right.

Carrie: How did you make this shift from, you know, mental health treatment to getting involved in mental health prevention and starting a non- profit.

Dr. Sherri: A  very, very intense story short, which I think was birthed in this season of anxiety that I just described to you. But I started having trouble sleeping at night, quite literally. And I thought, man, I think that people need to know that if they’re having these feelings, there’s nothing wrong with them because I think that’s the other thing that gives.

The feeling more power than it should have is that I’m not supposed to feel this way. Right. And so I said, how can I take this message to people that aren’t gonna go see a shrink? Cause listen, in my line of work, I can tell you how many times I heard people literally say, you don’t go to see a shrink unless you wanna be crazy or right.

That’s what you do. I used to have people walking into my office like this, like hiding their face, cuz they were ashamed of. And so I thought, how can I start a conversation about these common human experiences and emotional experiences and thought experiences that we have to bring a new sense of enlightenment of helping people understand that they have this mental and emotional health t take care of and how they can do that. And so I stopped taking insurance. I said, I’m gonna stop diagnosing, I’m gonna stop treating and I’m gonna start educating people. So I just started speaking for free. Then I kind of made my way through some organizational consulting stuff, cuz those are curated, captive audiences to a degree and speaking at various civic organizations, networking groups, that kind of thing.

And then I did that for about four years and then I ealized mid-pandemic first year of the pandemic in 2020, how do I make this movement? Something bigger than me and how do I make it reach further than what I alone can do? And so then the idea was start a non-profit. I started the nonprofit thriving thoughts, global.

The whole idea is to educate people through conversation and principle and thought strategies and things like that. But to educate women in particular, because I believe they’re the ones who are the influencers that talk to their families, talk to their best friends, talk to their kids, right. So if we can teach women how to do this, then they’re the ones that are gonna have that ripple effect.

How to understand and not be so blown away by the thoughts and feelings that we have, but to use them to their benefit, to use them to their advantage. And so that’s what we’re doing there, and we’re doing that through several different means. We’re creating webinars that we’re offering monthly, we’re creating a new podcast that has like 10 to 15-minute stories of women who have gone through maybe a challenging experience and how they used one of our, what we call thriving thoughts, pillars, to learn how to grow through that, to learn, to respond differently through that, so that it strengthened them mentally and emotionally and relationally as well.

And then starting conversations about just some of the things that in our Western culture. I think our foundational influences in depression and anxiety that started at a very, very young age that have to do with comparison and measuring up and that sort of stuff. So just helping offering and alternative conversation about mental health and teaching people that there’s a way to protect their mental health, to build it and to prevent things like deep experiences of anxiety and depression.

Carrie: I think that’s what you’re talking about is interesting. This concept that everyone has at some point or another, like some type of mental health struggle. And really, if you walk into a counselor’s office, they could slap any kind of diagnosis on you because I mean, if you just read the DSM, you’re like, “oh, I, yeah. I’ve had that symptom” and you’re reading some other symptom. I mean, don’t ever read it because next thing you know, you know, you’re gonna be like, well, I have this

Dr. Sherri: land it’s ike, don’t go to WebMD if you have a headache.

Carrie: That’s interesting. And I think you are right that, I mean, I’m definitely a big proponent of therapy and I’ve had a lot of therapy myself. That’s been super helpful, but I do also recognize there are some people that they’re just not gonna do it. They’re never gonna do that kind of work. And maybe they can be reached a different way. So a lot of education. And what is your podcast gonna be called?

Dr. Sherri: It’s called the Fortified Woman podcast. It’s helping people to understand that it’s possible to look at situations differently. And when you change the way you look at them through your thoughts, your outcome is different. Am I the woman who always expects the worst of a situation? Because if that’s the case, I’m probably gonna experience. There’s all sorts of psychological evidence for this confirmation bias and priming of our cognitions and what we expect and that sort of thing. And so it’s about having these. Let me clarify. Treatment has value and prevention has value and both can coexist and they should. Right now, unfortunately, the predominant narrative around mental health. If you look at, you know, May is mental health awareness month, right? It’s really not mental health awareness month, at least in the way people talk about it. It’s really mental illness awareness month.

Let’s talk about those people who have those challenges. No, no, no, no, no, no. We are all those people. We all have these opportunities to go down a crisis hole. And so let’s start having those conversations. Let’s talk about not how to cope with life, but how to grow through life. And it really is an idea of thriving over surviving.

Carrie: I mean, at some point or another, we’re all gonna hit a difficult challenge in life and you don’t necessarily know what that’s gonna be or when that’s gonna happen. But I think like what you’re saying is you can allow those things to crush and break you, or you can say, okay, how can I work through this and become stronger and become better as a result of that?

Yes. Do you feel like your faith has really impacted you in regards to that. Just, I don’t know, thinking about things in the Bible related to perseverance and going through trials. And did you really look at that stuff when you were going through the heavy anxiety?

Dr. Sherri: I think for me, it was more about God’s design for us. There’s all these promises in the Bible like your promised peace, you’re promised an abundant life. And if we’re promised that, then what are we missing out on if we’re not experiencing that. And a lot of. Really boils down to the way we think. I mean, scripture has a lot of examples with think this, not that right. Think about things above versus things below. And, and when you do that, you can kind of extrapolate and say, oh, this thing below has a purpose.

It can have an eternal purpose or a relational purpose, a discipleship purpose. So, yes, my personal journey has been deeply informed by that, but also deeply informed by my clinical training and expertise and experiences with people that have been so formative that have just allowed me to catch a glimpse of the truth is that we were made in God’s image, every person.

And if we’re made in God’s image, when we have these feelings, there’s nothing wrong with. If you look at the life of Jesus, Jesus had all of these feelings. Well with one exception and that’s anxiety, that’s probably a different spiritual conversation, but there are things we can do. Take every thought captive, right? Evaluate every thought. Is it true? Is it a lie? What am I believing right now? What rabbit hole am I going down right now? And is there another trail for me to follow? So, yeah, my faith has definitely informed my personal growth, but also my professional growth and help giving me insight into what people are facing up here, what women in particular are dealing with in their thought world. It’s been a very deeply humbling and gratifying experience. And I would say that for the thriving thoughts, global movement, it’s certainly faith informed because I’m the founder of it. Mm-hmm but it’s not faith-based. Our desire is to propagate hope with regard to the way that you are naturally designed to be able to take thoughts captive without necessarily speaking Jesus over you.

Carrie:  If you could go back in time, what would you tell your younger self who was dealing with anxiety?

Dr. Sherri: This is probably not the most popular answer, but I really wouldn’t tell her anything. I would say, keep doing what you’re doing. You’re discovering the right path for you. I would just be on the sidelines kind of cheering like “good job. You’ve got this.” You can do this. You can figure this out. I think that comes from the space nobody can tell us exactly what to do. We can give ideas, we can give information, you can offer something, but really, it depends on it’s up to that person to pick it up. And so when they pick it up, then they kind of go, “oh, now I’ve got some interest,” but that really has to be a thing of the self.

I don’t know that anything I know for me, I’m a very stubborn person have been since I was a kid. Reframe that as tenacious, but if you tell me something, I’m not gonna learn by it. I have to do it.

Carrie: I think that’s interesting that if we don’t go through these struggles, it doesn’t get us to where we need to be. You know, that’s just part of the life process. And so maybe that encourages somebody today that like, you’re probably on the path of where you need to be and you just don’t necessarily know it right now. You’re probably like, what am I doing here? And why am I dealing with all this anxiety here? Why am I dealing with this? O C D instead of saying like, okay, well somehow this is all gonna weave together and I’ll look back. Yeah. It makes sense why I had that struggle and something good and something beautiful. Grew out of it in the end.

Dr. Sherri: Yeah. And I would say you don’t even have to wait for the end. One of the things it’s really, it’s about the process. We live in such a culture. You were referring to instant gratification, but we live in such a culture. That’s always looking for the success story. And I think the success story is not on the other side. The success is in the doing it’s in the right here right now like what am I doing right here right now? That’s the win? That’s the success? Am I doing something to learn in this moment? Am I doing something beneficial for myself? Am I doing something to grow right now? Or am I doing something to regress? because this is it. This is all we have is right here right now.

Carrie: And sometimes getting out of bed is a success. Yeah,

Dr. Sherri: Yeah absolutely. It’s what am I doing? Right. And I will say this, that particularly in Western culture, we have this underlying belief that suffering is not supposed to exist.

Carrie: It’s a very unhealthy belief for us to have. But

Dr. Sherri: But it is a cultural narrative. I read once there was a woman from Georgia, an academic from Georgia. I can’t think of her name at the moment, but she said we have an epidemic of people who are unhappy about being unhappy. We’re not supposed to be happy all the time. we can just start to talk about that, have that conversation, then we’re not gonna be so blown away when we’re happy.

Carrie: Thank you for sharing your personal story and as well as your insights, we’ll put the link to your nonprofit in the show notes.

Dr. Sherri: Thank you so much. It was a good conversation today.

Dr. Sherri: Thanks Carrie.

 Carrie: I think there were several great takeaways that came out of this show with Dr. Sherry so I hope that you picked up a nugget that will help you kind of on your journey of progress. If you haven’t checked out our website, yet we have a website hope for anxiety and O C d.com that I just wanna encourage you to look at. We’re trying to do some updates to that and make it more searchable. So more people will be able to find out about our show. On the front page, you can sign up for our email newsletter and get a free audio file of color breathing, which is something that I’ve used with clients and they’ve really enjoyed it. They kind of can help you relax and calm down when you’re utilizing something like deep breathing. Sometimes it helps to have a mental focus. So this gives you that mental focus .

Thank you so much for listening.

Hope for anxiety and OCD is a production of By the Well Counseling.

Our show is hosted by me, Carrie Bock, a licensed professional counselor in Tennessee. Opinions given by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect the use of myself or By The Well Counseling. Our original music is by Brandon Mangrum. Until next time may you be comforted by God’s great love for you.

Bonus Episode: EMDR Intensive Therapy Q&A with Steve Bock and Carie Bock, LPC-MHSP

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, Counseling, Podcast Episode. No Comments on Bonus Episode: EMDR Intensive Therapy Q&A with Steve Bock and Carie Bock, LPC-MHSP

Carrie and her husband Steve are excited to bring you a bonus episode on EMDR Intensive Therapy. 

  • What is EMDR Intensive Therapy and what are the issues it can help with?
  • What happens in an EMDR Intensive Therapy session?  
  • How long does the session usually last?
  • How to receive EMDR Intensive Therapy?

If you want to find out more about intensive therapy, go to https://www.bythewellcounseling.com/intensivetherapy/

Transcript

Carrie: Welcome to a very special episode of Hope for Anxiety and OCD. This is a bonus episode that I wanted to get out to you earlier than putting it kind of in the lineup. Since we have several episodes that are already planned out for the next couple of months. And I have my amazing husband, Steve here with me. Say Hi Steve.

Steve: Hey

Carrie: Glad to have you here. You interviewed me once before on the show for episode 33 of What it’s like to be a Counselor. And I thought it would be good for you to interview me on our today’s topic, which is EMDR intensive therapy. Since it’s something that you’re not familiar with. When I get in the zone and tend to talk about therapy things, I don’t tend to always explain them for the lay audience to understand and break it down very well. So I thought it would be good. And you can ask little filler questions here and there that people might be wondering about, or you might be wondering about.

What is EMDR Intensive Therapy

Steve: Okay. My first question is what is an EMDR intensive therapy session?

Carrie: This is a session that is longer than a typical therapy session. It occurs either for a half day of three hours or a whole day, which is six hours with a lunch break and some small breaks in between it’s for a very specific purpose.

So someone that’s trying to achieve a very specific counseling. It may be that they know, for example, that they’ve experienced some sexual abuse that is getting in the way of their relationship with their spouse. Now it may be a situation where they’re trying to overcome a phobia or a situation where maybe they just know they have a lot of trauma.

They’re going to need to process in a sense, kinda wanna get a kickstart to that process. Another way we use an intensive therapy session for say anxiety or even possibly OCD is to work on some day-to-day level coping skills that people could use as maybe a baseline for them. So it doesn’t have to be used to process trauma.

The idea behind it is to have dedicated time and dedicated space to work on a very specific issue.

Steve: A long therapy session that seems like it might be kind of exhausting.

Carrie: It can be tiring, but it just depends on how you break up the day. Usually what we’ll do is we’ll have kind of a introductory period.

So to explain a little bit deeper, these are situations where I may have been working with someone for. Session a few sessions and they make a decision to do an intensive, or it could be that somebody wants to travel in from out of state and do even multiple days with me, which I would just have to make sure that I had all of the office space available during those days and times.

If people are traveling in and I haven’t met them before the structure, obviously of the day is gonna be a little bit different because there’s going to be a chunk where we’ll have to do a little bit of more history taking kind of getting a clear picture of the problem. Then we can go in and make an EMDR treatment plan.

Basically identifying what memories we need to target that are contributing to their present-day issues. When we go back and we reprocess those memories. In EMDR, we look at the past and then we look at how that’s affecting and present, and then how that person would like to respond in the future.

Typically, with a more condensed intensive session, we would probably process the worst memory that came up on that treatment plan. And the first memory that came up on that treatment plan, sometimes those end up being the same memory. If it’s a more recent traumatic event, we would structure it so that we would really just be focused on that recent traumatic event.

There’s restricted protocols with EMDR to help you process more like within the past month type of trauma. If we were able to get someone in that quickly, So there’s lots of different ways that we can structure it with, uh, phobia, for example, we can structure, you know, starting with, when did the phobia first occur process?

You know, usually like if, if somebody was bit by a dog, for example, when they were a child, they’re afraid of dogs, now we could go back and we could target that memory where they bit by the dog. Then we can look at potentially exposures and desensitizing the present triggers. So we could show them a picture of a dog.

How to stressing is that to you do some EMDR surrounding that as a present issue, we could, you know, show them a video of a dog. There’s different things that we could kind of target. I probably wouldn’t have a live dog, but, you know, I would encourage at some point or another, eventually, them working up to that process as kind of gradual exposure.

It’s kind of a little bit hard to get a live dog in a counseling office sometimes, but you understand where I’m coming from. There’s so many different ways that we can approach things depending on what the person’s presenting issue is. For example, panic attacks. If someone had a history of panic attacks that they would like to focus on resolving, we can often process their first panic attack and their worst panic attack, their most recent get that done in one day. And that will show significant symptom relief for them, preventing them from having future panic attacks.

Steve: Why did you decide to start offering intensive therapy?

Carrie: That’s a really great question. I was actually encouraged by two of my mentors. One of them was Laura Mullis who we had on the show on episode 21, Healing from Childhood Wounds: The key to Unlocking Anxiety. Laura, as well as one of my other EMDR mentors, Alice Strickland had really asked me, first of all, was I doing intensive therapy? And then if I wasn’t interested in doing it because sometimes they have cases they may not be able to take on or might not be the best fit for them that they may want to refer to me. So that was part of it. And the other reason was after doing a few with my clients, kind of during the COVID period online, I did some three-hour sessions with clients where we took kind of a 15-minute break in the middle to target very specific EMDR memories that they wanted to work on.

There’s a few problems that can come up, like in terms of weekly therapy, someone comes in and they may really wanna work through certain issues in their life. But then as we know, like life just happens, you know, then they come in next week and something’s happened with one of their kids or their coworker was really mean to them. Or, you know, somebody went off on them as they were driving their car. I don’t know. And they just feel like, okay, I need to really process what was going on in the present.

A lot of times we can tie that back into how that was a trauma trigger and sometimes work through some of those things. And that can be very helpful. Oftentimes, what I see is that we end up delaying the EMDR treatment process because a lot of times we’re having to go back and forth between working on these present issues and then working on past issues.

If we can devote specific time to working on the past issues. A lot of the present issues will be resolved because they won’t continuously be getting triggered by the same stuff over and over again, in these challenging relationships or situations. So much of therapy too is spent on helping people develop skills to manage their day-to-day present.

And like I said, if we can go back and just kind of clear out some of the junk, there will be less that they have to manage in the present, not to say that they won’t have anything. Going on, but at least it’ll get the symptoms maybe more to a manageable level. Once the trauma is resolved. So it’s really a combination of a couple of different things.

Sometimes another issue that we have in terms of processing memories with EMDR is that we will take some time at the beginning of the session to get the client into the memory to say, okay, now, as you bring up that memory right now, how distressing is it? Where do you feel it in your body? Even before we do that, the client will come in. They’ll say, “Well, you know, I had, after last session I had a nightmare” or they may be updating me on symptoms. Either of the symptom got better or symptoms got worse. That’s helpful for me to kind of know and guide the process as to where we need to go to next. That takes a little bit of a chunk of time, say that takes 10 to 15 minutes. And then at the end of the session, we really wanna make sure that people have time to calm down that they have time to contain, especially if they didn’t finish processing the memory. So then we’re taking another, you know, let’s say 10 minutes to say, “okay, like, you know, kind of ground, put your feet on the floor, take a deep breath, contain the memory.”

No, it doesn’t have to leave you here. When you walk out the door today, go to your safe place, whatever. There’s a lot of different ways we can do that. But the point is, is that we’re taking that chunk of time in the beginning of the session. And we’re taking that chunk of time at the end of the session, whereas in an intensive, you don’t have to do that because you’re not having those times in between sessions.

You’re actually saving time and energy and not interrupt that trauma work because the brain doesn’t know, “oh, wow. I only have about, you know, 30 minutes to work through this.” Your brain doesn’t know that. So it’s gonna kind of continue to be working on things even after that session is over, which can sometimes be distressing for people.

What are the Issues EMDR Intensive Therapy Can Help with?

Steve: Okay. What are some of the issues that you’ve seen be helped by intensive therapy.

Carrie: I talked about some of them previously, things like phobias, panic attacks, very specific recent trauma, definitely anything that we would consider to be a single incident trauma, not like, you know, I’ve had a whole lifetime of childhood, but Hey, my childhood was pretty stable and things were going well.

And then this thing kind of just completely shifted me off track, near-death experience or illness, injury, car accident, things like that. I know that you and I had talked about, even my experience in episode 10 of really building up the confidence again, to be able to go out dating after my divorce, I had had quite a bit of therapy and there were just kind of some lingering remaining things that I needed to process through. And I really needed to do that from a somatic body sense, rather than just talking about it because I had already talked nausea about it. So that’s another area. Theoretically, I could have done an intensive on for myself. I didn’t, but I went at probably 10 sessions had I had an intensive opportunity.

I might have been able to get that, that work done and say probably two days, you know, instead of 10 sessions over, I was probably going every other week. So you think about that if you’re going every other week to therapy too, that’s about say five months that it took me to get through that process. I know.

A lot of times, people are very interested in today’s day and age of getting better, and faster. We have such a microwave generation. This can be good and bad. Sometimes these situations work and you can find relief faster. It’s not for every person or every situation, but as you can see, there are lots of different ways that we can apply the intensive therapy model to help people get relief. Another example would be for someone who’s having difficulties setting boundaries. Oftentimes this relates back to either like very strong authoritative personalities in their childhood or just people were straight up abusive and crossed their boundaries.

So if we can go back to those places, help them process through that realize like, you know, you’re not a child in this dynamic anymore. This is an adult-to-adult dynamic. You have a right, like your needs are important, whereas they weren’t important. Then your values and your desires are important. And you have that takes a certain level of self-confidence to set a boundary, right. To be firm with. So that is something that we could target in an intensive, really like creating a treatment plan surrounding the difficulty with setting boundaries. A lot of times I see people who have emotional trauma that is feeding into disordered type eating, even though I don’t work with eating disorders.

So I kind of wanna make that clarification if you have serious eating disorder like anorexia or bulimia that I’m not saying that this type of intensive therapy is for you, but for people who, for example, would say, “Hey, I’m an emotional eater. I really want to eat healthy. I’m trying, I may have been on every diet under the sun. But just the way that I grew up, there was a lot of shame surrounding food, or there was even abuse situations involving food resolving.” Some of that trauma will shift the way that people approach food in the present. That’s one, depending on how much is back there, they may need a little bit more than one day. It just kind of depends. And we have to create a plan together. I think that’s, what’s really important. Intensives is having a very specific plan and intention that the client and I are both on the same page about what they’re wanting to accomplish so that there’s no confusion and that we stay very focused and targeted for that limited amount of time.

Steve: So who would not be appropriate for intensive therapy?

Carrie: If someone has a serious problem where they may need a higher level of treatment, such as a serious addiction, addictions are typically not something that I worked with. I’ve worked with a lot of people who had an addiction in their past, say a few years ago, and they’re trying to resolve the trauma that led to the initial addiction.

I do work with several clients that have experienced that, but we really want people who are clean and sober to be engaging in this work. I mentioned eating disorders. If somebody has a really serious eating disorder and where they need to be in some kind of hospital or treatment program, if someone finds that they’re dissociating a lot, they’re disconnecting from reality due to their trauma.

They’re losing a lot of periods of time or they don’t have any connection to their body or their emotional experience. Now I will say that if there’s a client that’s really having difficulty connecting to their body or to their emotional experience if they wanted to do an intensive, what we would really focus on is not processing the trauma, but we would more focus on developing that body awareness, developing that emotional awareness. Doing a lot of what we would call resourcing activities, which would be trauma preparation that may be incredibly valuable for that person to do that, and may help them really cope better in the present with that. But I wouldn’t say that they need to come in and, and just start processing trauma because they’re not gonna be able to do that.

You really have to be connected to your mind, your body and your emotions in order to benefit from EMDR, having. I’ve worked with a ton of clients that don’t have all of those things online. And so our first step in therapy is really building those up before they can go through and process trauma. If somebody has a personality disorder or something just very serious going on, then they’re probably not appropriate for intensive therapy.

Steve: And my last question is, are these covered by insurance?

Carrie: They are not. We don’t have a code for this type of intensive therapy session that we could code for insurance. I actually even asked Cigna the insurance that I work with and they, you know, I’m sure if we were sitting face to face, the lady would’ve looked at me, like I had four eyes.

I was trying to explain it to her, but she was just kind of like, “No.” They are used to typical things like individual therapy, group therapy and things that there are codes for. This is not something we can code and charge insurance for. It’s really more for someone who is looking to make an investment in their mental health and they, they know kind of what they want.

And they realize that this pathway is going to save them, you know, time, energy, and money. It’s hard for people to. Sometimes to coming to weekly therapy, they may get started with it, or they may start coming every other week and then childcare becomes a problem or work is adding on more responsibilities.

I can’t get off in time. There’s all kinds of barriers that can happen in terms of people getting the therapy that they need on a consistent ongoing basis. Sometimes there’s certain time limited situations where someone will say. I know I’m going to be moving or going out of the country. And I know this is some, or I’m getting married.

This is just something that I know I wanna resolve before. Maybe a major life event happens as well. And so these people are kinda willing to take that leap and invest in this process. And so also just really great for people who have had a lot of therapy, haven’t been able to get their goals achieved that they wanted to, but feel like this would be something that would help them just as a different approach.

Thank you, Steve, for helping me out by asking some of these questions and allowing me to explain intensive EMDR therapy.

Steve: Yeah. You’re welcome. And glad to be here once again. And it’s actually really good for me to hear that I got to learn something, so it’s good.

How to Receive EMDR Intensive Therapy

Carrie: Yeah. And if people would like to find out more about intensive therapy, they can go to www.bythewellcounseling.com./intensive therapy. If you get to the homepage By the Well Counseling, there’s also a button that you can click on for intensive therapy. There’s a form on the webpage that I’ll ask that you fill out in order to be able to, for us to have a, hopefully, a short video chat, where we can have a consultation, where we can talk about what you’re hoping to get out of the intensive, and I can share whether or not I think that that would be appropriate for you.

It’s really important that we’re able to make sure that you’re gonna be getting what you need from this modality if you’re investing the time and money in it. So I want to take a little time to make sure that that you’re appropriate and that this is appropriate for you kind of, as we talk through some of those things.

One thing that I’m really excited about with this intensive therapy opportunity is that I get a lot of inquiries from the people who listen to the podcast and they say, “Hey, I know that you do online therapy. Can you see me?” But they live out of State. They may live in Kentucky or Connecticut or wherever, and I can’t see them online due to licensure laws and limitations. I’m only licensed in Tennessee right now to see people there. So this will allow people to be able to travel if that’s something that they’re interested in and receive therapy from me. So that was kind of another contribution of why I wanted to do this, that I didn’t mention. Earlier, thank you so much to everyone who is listening to this podcast right now, I will tell you the very first people who heard about the intensive opportunity were our email subscribers.

And Steve, why should you get on our email list for the hope for anxiety and OCD podcast?

Steve: We’re giving away. T-shirts

Carrie: Yeah, Steve, it was actually your idea to start giving away t-shirts to encourage people to subscribe to the podcast newsletter. So since we have currently, as we’re recording 73 email subscribers, I want you to help me pick our first t-shirt winner by people who’ve already subscribed to the newsletter.

So pick a number between 1 and 70.

Steve: I’m gonna go with 14. It looks like Lisa D is our winner. Congratulations, Lisa!

Carrie: She is our 14th email subscriber. I will be emailing Lisa to let her know that she has won a t-shirt and once I get her size and address back, we will go ahead and ship that out.

You also get to pick which color shirt that you want. And if you are not a t-shirt winner this time, because you are not subscribed to our email list, then hop on the email list. We don’t have that far to get from 73 to a hundred. Right Steve?

Steve: That’s right.

Carrie: So once we get to a hundred, I will be giving out another t-shirt for somebody in between the 50 and 100 mark and maybe about every 50 subscribers or so we will give away a t-shirt.

I would love to have 500 subscribers on the email list. That would be amazing. So it’s a great way for you to know firsthand what’s going on with me and what’s going on with the Hope for Anxiety and OCD Podcast. You can subscribe by going to our website, hopeforanxietyandocd.com. You are certainly welcome to go through our website and buy one, If you are really itching for some podcast merchandise. Thank you so much, everyone, for listening. And I hope to hear from some of you soon.

Hope for anxiety and OCD is a production of By the Well counseling. Our show is hosted by me, Carrie Bock, a licensed professional counselor in Tennessee. Opinions given by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect the use of myself or By the Well Counseling. Our original music is by Brandon Mangrum. Until next time may you be comforted by God’s great love for you.

77. Postpartum Anxiety and Depression with Julie Lamb

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, OCD, Podcast Episode. No Comments on 77. Postpartum Anxiety and Depression with Julie Lamb

Julie Lamb, LCSW who is a life coach at julielambcoaching.com shares with us about postpartum depression and anxiety, and how to cope with it. 

  • Julie’s personal experience with postpartum anxiety and depression
  • How many weeks are considered postpartum
  • Difference between postpartum depression and major depression
  • What makes postpartum depression worse
  • How to cope with postpartum depression and anxiety

Related Resources:

Julie Lamb Coaching

How to Reduce Anxiety About Giving Birth with Carrie Bock

Transcript

Welcome to Hope for Anxiety and OCD, episode 77. I’ve been trying to do an episode for a little while on postpartum depression and anxiety because this is. Such a common issue in our society. And actually, as several of, you know, I have a young daughter, but actually, I’ve been trying to do this show way before I became pregnant. And it just didn’t work out with guests and so forth. But we have a guest today that has both personal and professional experience. So I’m super excited to interview Julie Lamb, LCSW who’s a life coach at julielambcoaching.com. 

Carrie: Julie, welcome to the show today. 

Julie: Thank you. I’m so glad to be here.

Carrie: Talk with us a little bit about postpartum depression. How would you define it on a basic level for people?

Julie: One of the first things I wanna talk about when it comes to postpartum, depression is we have to understand that birth is traumatic. It is a traumatic thing that happens to your body, and yes, we can say it’s normal, natural, whatever.

It doesn’t matter. It’s still traumatic to your body. It increases all those hormones. It increases all of that adrenaline within our body. The parasympathetic nerves kind of go out whack. And what happens is that every woman that has a child will experience it. Some symptoms of loss, sadness, and some anxiety, everyone will experience. However, postpartum depression and postpartum anxiety come into play. When those symptoms continue generally about two weeks after birth. And so the biggest thing to think about is. Everybody’s gonna have these normal feelings, but if they continue past two weeks is when postpartum depression and postpartum anxiety come into play.

Carrie: Okay. So it’s gotta last for at least two weeks.

Julie: Yes

Carrie: How would you say that it’s similar or different to someone who’s maybe going through a major depressive episode or a dysthymia

Julie: depression has so many different layers. And one of the things that are really fascinating about depression is that it’s not a one-size-fits-all.

It’s not a, oh, you’re sad. Therefore you have dyslexia or you are manic, therefore you’re bipolar. It doesn’t work that way. But there are certain categories that we say that would then say, this is the kind of depression that you have a major depression is essentially where for a period of a long time, you have had these feelings of sadness of overwhelm, perhaps not being able to sleep or having no desire to do anything.

Those continue dysthymia. You have to have that for at least a year. I mean, can you imagine, I have to feel this way for a year before I can finally say something’s wrong. And major depression tends to be a shorter period. So a lot of times people will be diagnosed with a major depression first because it’s something that you can diagnose quicker generally before six months when somebody’s had those experiences and SEIA says, well, you’ve had these a lot longer.

And this is what this looks like. Postpartum depression is just different from that because it’s quicker onset. Essentially you have nine months and some people will also experience depression during their pregnancy. And unfortunately, people will tend to people, meaning doctors will tend to be like, it’s just your hormones, just your body changing.

Women kind of get put to the side, basically. Like that’s not really a problem you’re just changing. And then what happens then is you may have had those feelings and then after the baby is born, they are magnified and they’re made so much bigger. And if you’ve ever had any depression in the past, then you’re more likely to have this postpartum depression and we’re talking any, you could have seriously a week of just feeling really down.

And then you’re more likely to have this postpartum depression that will hit and it will feel even. More triggering more sadness, more overwhelmed, more irritability, more feeling like you just can’t get up and do the next thing. And it all is because of that one event. And that’s having a baby.

Carrie: Yeah. It’s interesting. I’m glad that you brought up being depressed in pregnancy because I got depressed in pregnancy and I felt very isolated because there was all this conversation surrounding postpartum depression that it almost, I felt like a weirdo. I was like “I’m supposed to be happy being pregnant.” And was really struggling because I had a lot of friends and family members that either, you know, had infertility difficulties and I thought, well, here I am supposed to be. Really happy and thankful that I was able to get pregnant and give birth, but it absolutely wrecked my body. Unfortunately, it’s interesting that you said a little while ago, that birth as being traumatic.

And I necessarily wouldn’t have said that for myself and my situation, although I will say that just even the process of the pregnancy and the hormones and different things really mess some things up for me. And I’m still dealing. Some ongoing back issues and stuff that I’m trying to get straightened out because of the pregnancy stuff.

But I think in my situation was a little bit different because it was connected with chronic pain. That was really kind of fueling that depression. I’m curious too, about the onset of postpartum depression. Is this something that happens right after people give birth or can it have a later onset? Like when they go back to work, for example,

Julie: It can happen later and it can happen both.

It can happen almost right at birth, and then it can happen later. Part of my story with postpartum depression is I actually have had very difficult pregnancies when I had my first baby. I actually, my body started to shut down. And so I had to have her cuz it went into help syndrome. If anybody knows what that is.

So my body was shutting down, saying, you have to have this baby. I have an epidural. So it was all natural. She was about three and a half weeks early. So she was little, the whole. I had this baby feeling pretty good. I will say afterwards, you know, maybe a little bit of the blues, but then I had a significant loss.

I had a brother that died about two weeks after the birth of my baby. Wow. And so what happened is that that compounded all of those feelings. Here’s this supposed to be this happiest time? Which I think is a misnomer anyways, but supposed to be this happy time. And yet I’m dealing with this grief and I’m supposed to just move forward with it.

I’m supposed to just, you know, grieve move forward refined. And what I noticed is it was about four or five months later that I went into a real deep depression. You could say, yes, it was postpartum. You could say, yes, it was because of this grief. You could say it was cuz I went back to. You could give all those different circumstances.

The point is that I hit that depressive wall where essentially it was like, I wasn’t bonding with my child. I wasn’t viewing life could be any better and all, because essentially all those circumstances compounded together. And my body said, you have to deal with this one way and we’re gonna make you deal with it mentally.

It’s kind of how I viewed it. Looking back how I viewed it now.

Carrie: Wow. So it was just like, that’s how it felt. It just kind of a shut or like hitting a wall and like, you couldn’t go forward or do the things that you need to do. I mean, there’s a lot that goes into caring for a baby. It’s very time-consuming and it’s very exhausting.

Julie: Yeah, absolutely. And the thing with caring for a baby is that we all think, again, this is supposed to be the greatest time babies are so sweet and precious. You have a lack of sleep. You’re not eating well. You’re 100% focused on this little person and forget the whole idea of taking care of yourself.

Forget the idea of even having a relationship with your partner. Like any of that, it suddenly becomes, I am so focused on just a survival instinct of that day to day. And a survival of this infant, of this person that 100% relies on me. And that’s a lot of pressure. And if you are already not taking care of yourself with sleep with food, or even just rest like mentally resting, it just compounds more and more and more.

And then you throw in the idea that you have some depression in the past, you throw in any circumstance, job loss, financial insecurity, you throw in any of that. And suddenly our brains go, I just can’t do this. it’s just way too much. That’s when postpartum depression almost seems to flare a lot more.

Carrie: Yeah, this is pretty common. I think I read something like one in seven women. Just kind of from what you’ve seen statistic-wise. Okay. Mm-hmm cause this is a pretty common issue, but I think a lot of times people feel. Very isolated by it. If they haven’t heard other people talk about it or, or known someone that’s gone through it.

Do you feel that way? Like just the, what you were talking about, the shoulds and the supposed to that you feel like are on society.

Julie: Yeah. And there’s also this idea that this is what you’re supposed to do, so you should just be okay with it. . And so I think it also leads to a lot of women that are afraid to talk about it.

You mentioned something. And I saw this a lot when I worked with adoptions for years was the fact that there were women that felt guilty for having babies because their friends couldn’t. And I, again, I worked with adoptions and I felt guilty that I could get pregnant. And it becomes this fear of like, well, I should love this.

I should be happy. And if you suddenly feel like you can’t. That’s a huge amount of pressure that you put on yourself and that you put on everybody else around you. And I noticed something really interesting with me was this idea that I had to do it all. And so here I was with this new baby and I was like, I have to make sure the house is clean.

I have to make sure that I’m, you know, that I’ve got food on the table. I’ve gotta make sure my husband’s taken care of and that, oh, I have to go back to work and I’ve gotta make sure I’m working all these hours. And I’m doing all these things. And suddenly it was like, my husband was not good enough with the baby.

It was only me that could do it. And all of us as women. We have this idea that there’s a standard we’re supposed to meet, and this standard comes from maybe something we’ve been taught to, maybe something we’ve experienced, maybe it’s even something that we just inherently believe. And that standard is sometimes what creates this feeling of. Unworthiness this feeling of I’m not good enough. And when we feed on those feelings that it can lead to a lot more depression. And especially that can lead to a lot of anxiety because you’re not living up to that standard.

Carrie: Yeah. I know that that was hard for me more so when I went back to work of handing over more responsibilities to my husband, we had like a dramatic household shift in our world where I was at home for maternity leave for three months, you know, I was doing the majority of the baby taken care of, and he was very much involved and he would come home and spend time with her and spend whatever time we could together, so forth. But then it was like this light switch flipped.

He quit his job. And became a stay-at-home dad. So all of a sudden he was like the primary baby caretaker. And I was like, full-time household provider. And that role switch was just like very jarring for us. And it took a lot of communication and a lot of adjustment, but for me learning that I had to let go of some things and trust him to be able to handle the baby stuff that I had learned to do. Like he can’t actually do some of these things, but I think what you’re saying, like that sense of like, oh, I have to be the one to take care of this, or I have to be the one to handle it. Was it pretty easy for you to recognize that you had postpartum depression? Or were you kind of in a little bit of denial?

Like, no, that’s not me.

Julie: I was in denial because as a therapist, I knew all the signs. I even remember before I had my babysitting down with my husband and saying, here are all the signs of postpartum depression. So you are aware of it. You get to know what it is. And my husband (bless his heart) was like, okay, I get it.

I got it. I’ll know, and this will be fine. but a lot of people think postpartum depression is just that, like, I wanna kill my baby. That’s honestly like, we’re gonna go that extreme. And so here I was like, no, no, no. Like if you notice I’m crying a lot or you notice that I just feel more lethargic. I don’t have a lot of energy.

Those are things to watch out for. It was interesting because he was very aware of that. But I think because we had a death that got mixed in and very confused. Oh, He said he was really good at that. But what happened is that after I started to feel that way, my training kicks in was like, you can’t have postpartum depression.

You’re not allowed to have postpartum depression. So here’s what you need to do. And I remember trying to tell myself, do this, this and this, this, and of course, none of that worked. So I was still feeling really off. And I was like, well, I’ll go talk to a therapist. I went and talked to them, it was not a good therapist.

And I went, talked to a therapist who basically was like, you’ve just had a lot of things going on. Just make sure you get some. Make sure you let your husband do things, you know, whatever. And it wasn’t helpful because on the way home, I could acknowledge that I had postpartum depression and he missed it.

I feel like many times we, as women, we think we know something is wrong, but we almost discount it. Like I discounted because, well, you know, I’m qualified. I should know better. Mm-hmm but I also discounted it because it didn’t seem as severe as what I had thought it should look like. And it wasn’t until somebody actually did discount it, that I was actually able to say, okay, wait, maybe there is something going on here.

And I think many women go to their doctor afterwards. And the first thing they asked them was like, do you wanna hurt the baby? I’m like, no, no, I never wanna do that. Okay, then you’re fine. I

Carrie: just wanna tell you what my doctor asked me six weeks after I had the baby. Literally, this was a question and this was the.

You’re not depressed. Are you? And I was just like, I’m smacking my forehead, you know, as a mental health professional, I’m like, that is not how you ask somebody. And funny enough, the paediatrician’s office, I feel like has been much more sensitive and has given me a questionnaire. Like every time that I’ve gone in there, But, you know, if somebody says, well, you’re not depressed, are you, I mean, then you feel like, well, what if I was like, would I wanna open up about that right now?

Would I wanna tell you if I was, of course, I’m not gonna open up yeah. That was an interesting response. Let’s talk about anger connected to postpartum depression because maybe that’s a sign that sometimes people don’t necessarily like see as being connected and anger can be really connected to depression.

Julie: Absolutely. And anger, a lot of times are like, well, that’s just something that happened to you that made you mad. And they don’t actually recognize that there’s sometimes a rage. And that’s what that anger tends to feel like in postpartum. Depression is just this idea. I’m yelling. I’m screaming. You may not wanna hurt anybody, but you just feel like I said, this intense rage going on, and that is an irritability.

And the funny thing is, is that people will say, well, you just need to go get some sleep or you just need to go relax or something. Yes. Sleep is vital and important. And I wanna know any new mom that gets sleep. It’s more than that. It’s the fact that I want you to imagine all these pressures, all these feelings, all these thoughts being put into a kettle and they are just put pressure upon pressure upon pressure.

And then you have a doctor saying you’re not depressed, or you’re not anxious, or you’re not whatever. And you’re inside you’re bubbling. And you’re just thinking what I am like. You don’t understand. And it just feels like it’s exploding. And what’s interesting is that if you have experienced ever some postpartum anger, you will most likely experience it.

Every pregnancy after. And people don’t think that they’re like, no, no, you can overcome it. But realistically speaking, when your body naturally holds that it almost associates that with every next pregnancy, I had a client that came to me specifically while she was pregnant and said I’ve had postpartum anger, and I need to know how to deal with it now, because I don’t like who I.

So we worked with some very specific tactics that helped with anger. That would also help her as a new mom. And it was interesting. She went to her husband, she says, here’s what I’m gonna do. And she messaged me after she had the baby. She’s like, I have to just tell you my anger. Yes. It’s there, but because I can acknowledge it and it’s safe to say it just doesn’t feel like it’s overwhelming.

It doesn’t feel like that rage that’s gonna come out and just explode at any moment. She’s able to say I’m angry and it’s okay. That I’m angry. and these are the things that I do with it. And I think that’s, yes, anger is definitely a part of all of. Yeah, that’s really good. How did you get the help that you needed?

I knew that something wasn’t right. So I, I first went to my OB doctor and she is fantastic. She delivered all my kids. I’m a high risk pregnancy, so she very much, her and I are, are really good friends. She was like, Julie, here, you should take some Lexapro. You should take, you know, just take something. It will help.

And I will admit that I didn’t want to, because I was like, no, I can do this on my own, but she was there. That’s like, then talk to me, tell me what’s going on. And you need to make sure you have somebody to talk to that you have some resources in place. So it was really great that she was one. She prescribe the medication, if I needed it and wanted it. And there’s nothing wrong with taking that. But she also was like, if you don’t want to, here’s the things that you need to do. So I did go that’s when I went and found that therapist, I would recommend that you don’t go see a male therapist. That’s my number one mistake.

I think I know we should say no out. They’re all getting no, no, no. You need somebody that understands women’s hormones. And that specifically understands postpartum and understands what that is like when you have somebody that knows those feelings, those emotions, and can help you through that. That’s one of the best things I did do some cognitive behavioral therapy.

So with him, he didn’t help me at all. So I went to like with another therapist, friend of mine, And I said, okay, this is where my thought is and help me with my thought process. And so I did have that available, but at the same time, if it wasn’t available, I would have gone and sought out somebody else, another therapist, another somebody else to talk to.

So by all means, that’s kind of what I did. The other thing is, is I actually allowed myself to just take a break. And so I acknowledged that. I’m not okay. I’m not good. This is not what I need to do. And I told my husband, I said, I need to just get away for a little bit because I am not in okay. Place. I wasn’t breastfeeding.

So I was formula feeding at that time. And so I was able to kind of walk away and just like take some time to myself. I knew she was in good hands. When I say take some time, it was literally like a weekend. It wasn’t like I was gone for months on end. I’ve thought about it. No, it was just, it was like a weekend.

And I went and I just like, was able to just kind of relax into that. And I came back. I was really overly in love, I think, with my baby at that point, because it was like, I felt healthy. I felt good at that moment. And I think those are the things that really helped me, especially when I had my next. You and those next two were very difficult and there was a miscarriage in between.

I mean, there’s lots of stories there that just compound all of that. That essentially after I have had my third, I was able to look back and say, here’s the things you did that work. Do this again. Here’s the things that didn’t work. Don’t do that. And I implemented that a lot quicker with number three than I did with number one, obviously

Carrie: From what you’ve seen in your experience is postpartum more common for first-time moms or not necessarily?

Julie: Not necessarily. I’d love to say, oh yes, if you have it once, then you’ll never have it again. But, or if you’ve never had it, you’ll never have it. That’s not true. I believe that there is a chemical that does get impacted very much so with every pregnancy, I explained it kind of my first pregnancy, I left feeling like something was just incomplete within me.

My second pregnancy. I literally felt like all my hormones went back into place. It was like the weirdest sensation. And it was actually the healthiest, I would think after that pregnancy. But I got pregnant really soon after that one. And then it was like, I was depressed pre-having this baby because it was so close.

It felt so soon. I wasn’t sure I could handle this. And then that impact. I feel like my depression. Well, no, actually it was anxiety that hit me after the third one. Depression was the first one, but then I had anxiety the third one. And so I think that that’s important to recognize too, is that you don’t always have to have depression.

I had depression and then I had anxiety at the last pregnancy and they can also look very different. I think the second one, I did have a lot more of what we’re gonna call the baby blues because it was, you know, a new baby. It was hard. She didn’t latch. She was so difficult in that way. It was like some of that.

Whereas with the third one, she was in NICU and that escalated my anxiety escalated some of my concerns in that aspect. So I think you really have to look at the circumstances around each pregnancy to understand sometimes which one somebody may perhaps have.

Carrie: That makes sense. Tell us briefly about postpartum anxiety.

Like, how does that typically show up for moms?

Julie: Anxiety is a worry and it’s a fear almost this is fear-based. And so postpartum anxiety is where for moms, it’s like, you’re deeply worried something’s gonna happen to the baby. And so many moms may not sleep at night because they’re constantly making sure the baby is.

Like nothing’s gonna happen or they are afraid to leave the baby with anybody because something could happen to them or the baby they’re even afraid of. Sometimes they’ll leave their house because what if something happened to them and the baby. And so it becomes a fear-driven base where you are so afraid that something terrible is going to happen, that you then try to protect it and hope that nothing does happen.

Anxiety really shows up that way, shows up more. If that fear and that worry about the incessant, worry about the future.

Carrie: I think that that’s a good distinction to make. And this, we have some listeners who also have O C D. So it’s important for people to realize too, that OCD latches on to things that are important to you.

And so you may have different themes come up, either when you’re pregnant or after you have your baby. And if you start to have, you know, obsessions about harming them, Those types of things, that may be part of your OCD that you might need to get help for. How did you handle that anxiety? I mean, obviously, you felt like, okay, you know, you wanted your baby to make it through the NICU and be okay at home.

I know, like for me, I didn’t realize how still babies can be when they’re sleeping. I know I definitely did a lot of like breathing checks and was a little worried about SIDS, not to an extreme level, but I definitely was like, is she still breathing? Like, oh my goodness. She’s been like, so still she has not moved.

Julie: Yeah. I think what helped me with the anxiety is that actually, this is the same doctor when my baby was in NICU. She came and found me and pulled me aside one day and she. It doesn’t feel like this is a good thing, right? She says, but you know, your baby’s gonna be fine. And she said, you did everything right during this pregnancy.

I was like, of course, she would say that because, you know, she’s the one that delivered this baby, but she’d been with me through two other pregnancies. This pregnancy was more challenging and she’s like, we did everything, right? This is not your fault, which I needed to hear from that professional. Yeah.

And then she told me, you know, that this baby will be right. Be okay in the ni. Your number one focus she said is to sleep. She said “I want you to heal because you’ve had, again, this traumatic experience of giving birth, I need you to heal and Trust NICU will take care of your baby.”  And she said, “You will actually feel so much better”

And I really wish that we had more professionals like this doctor that actually were the ones that cared about us as patients. Not only to be able to say, yeah, this sucks. This is hard. This is not what you signed up for, but it will be okay. And here is what you need to do in the process. I did. I cried every single day when I had to leave the hospital, but my husband was so good cuz she also pulled my husband aside and said, you make sure she sleeps.

And so I would get home and that was my job was to just go sleep. He took care of the other two and he’s like, you just go take a nap. You just go to sleep and then we will get there as early as you need in the morning. And during the day I would have all the anxiety that’d be like are my other two.

Okay. And I lived an hour from the hospital as well. So it was like all those things compound. I just remember, as soon as I could bring her home, I was grateful that I’d had the rest because I knew mm-hmm it was like a blessing in disguise where I was able to get this rest where I could heal from giving birth.

And then I was able to bring this baby home and then I was able to know that she was okay and she could breathe. And it was fine. It was interesting though because she had one episode where I think like, I felt like she struggled. And that’s when my anxiety was like, came back in full force. And when I recognized it, I didn’t say, “Oh, Julie, just sweep it on, it’s fine.”

I allowed myself to say, of course, I’m anxious. Of course, this is difficult. And I allowed myself to say, it’s okay. And I cried. And I just, I allowed that. I think sometimes we are so used to just. Pushing through and being strong that you have to be okay to allow yourself to just cry, to allow yourself to feel that.

And there are, some other things that I did, if any of your listeners are familiar with tapping? I did a version of tapping for myself at that time. Okay. I also did some guided imagery just for my myself to kind of find my places that helped me. And those were things that helped a lot. And then it’s interesting.

So my baby isn’t such a baby anymore, cuz she’s seven. And I noticed that this summer my anxiety seemed to spike. It was like, I was worried about my kids, worried about something happening to them, worried like all of those. And it was interesting how I could recognize, of course I’m anxious because I’m worried and I love these children and it’s okay that I’m anxious about them and it’s okay that I then do something with it.

So I. Never ever tell yourself that my anxiety, my depression, my OCD is a problem is wrong. Like it hurts because it doesn’t it’s normal. It’s absolutely just a part. And it is okay to be anxious. It’s okay. To be depressed. It’s okay to have O C, D it’s okay. To tell yourself I have me. I’m alright. And then to be able to say, this is what I’m gonna do with it.

This is what this means. This is how I handle it. And what that may look like for you definitely is very different per person, but that’s, for me, that was the best thing you to be able to say. Of course, I’m anxious and it’s okay. That I’m this way as well.

Carrie: Yeah, it is. Okay. that you feel a certain way and so normal and so understandable.

A lot of times, like when we really look at the situation that we’re going through, it’s like, yeah, this makes sense. you know, that you’d feel that way. One question I like to ask people towards the end of the podcast is what would you say to your younger self who is going through postpartum depression, and postpartum anxiety?

Julie: I’d wanted to know that one, this was completely normal, even though we have those, you know, one in seven we’ll have postpartum about 50 to 75% will experience some sort of baby blues. So that’s definitely more than half. All of us will experience those feelings. Not only is that normal, but it’s also a sign that everything has gone.

Right. And I wish that I had told my younger self that even though the pregnancy felt like none of it went right. The delivery, none of it went right. Like nothing happened the way that it was supposed to happen. Everything went right. And that it was okay for me to take a step back. It was okay for me to not have to do it all.

It was okay for me to acknowledge that this could be somebody else’s response. Or something else somebody else could help me with. I didn’t have to do it all. And I think that would’ve been the advice I wish that I had gotten then. Yeah. Good.

Carrie: Thank you so much for sharing your personal story and your professional experience with postpartum depression, and anxiety.

I think this is hopefully gonna be a really helpful show for people.

Julie: Thank you. I love talking about this. So I’m hoping that this will help others as.

 I really feel like this is one of those. You are not alone type episodes. And I love it. If you are struggling with postpartum depression or anxiety, please reach out and get the help that you need. Whether that’s medication therapy, support group, friends, spiritual counsel, whatever that is, just make sure that you reach out and get the help that you need. If you like this episode or found benefit from it, let us know. You can always contact us on hope for anxiety and ocd.com. There’s a contact form at the bottom of the front page of our website.

Thank you so much for listening. Hope for anxiety and OCD is a production of By the well Counseling. Our show is hosted by me, Carrie Bock, a licensed professional counselor in Tennessee.  opinions given by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect the use of myself or By the Well Counseling.

Our original music is by Brandon Mangrum until next time may you be comforted by God’s great love for you.

75. God as Close as Your Breath: Breath Prayer with Jennifer Tucker

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, Podcast Episode. No Comments on 75. God as Close as Your Breath: Breath Prayer with Jennifer Tucker

Today on the show, I’m joined by author Jennifer Tucker. Jennifer talks about her discovery of breath prayer and how it helped her with her anxiety.

  • Jennifer’s experience of anxiety and depression
  • How Jen came across breath prayer
  • How breath prayer helps calm anxiety 
  • Examples of breath prayer
  • Jennifer’s Book: Breath as Prayer: Calm Your Anxiety, Focus Your Mind, and Renew Your Soul

Links and Resources:

Breath as Prayer: Calm Your Anxiety, Focus Your Mind, and Renew Your Soul

Jennifer Tucker 

Transcript

Hope for Anxiety and OCD episode 75. Today on the show, I’m very excited to bring an interview with Jennifer Tucker, author of Breath as Prayer. She will share with us her discovery of this practice of breath prayers and how those helped her get through a challenging situation in her own life. So here is the interview.

Carrie: Jennifer, talk with us about your story of dealing with anxiety and depression. 

Jennifer: Sure. So, my story of dealing with anxiety and depression is a whole lot of not dealing with my anxiety and depression. I think for a very long time, I wouldn’t even admit that I struggled as much as I did with anxiety and depression. I grew up feeling like anxiety was almost like a sin. It isn’t good. If you’re anxious, ’cause the Bible says, “Be anxious for nothing, do not worry about anything.” So that was crammed in my head so much. And so when I would struggle with feelings of anxiety or feelings of depression. I would really be filled with a lot of shame about that.

I tried to hide it. I tried to mask it for a very long, and I didn’t even realize what I was doing. I don’t think at the time, especially as a teenager or young adult, I really didn’t know that’s what I was doing with my anxiety. I came out a lot as. It is masked as perfectionism, overworking, and extreme people-pleasing. I felt like I needed to control every little piece of my life in order to keep those feelings of anxiety at that day. And then when things, of course, wouldn’t go my way or things weren’t quite perfect. Then, my anxiety would flare up, and I’d have a tough time emotionally. I just felt like I was just an emotional person.

Why do I feel this way? Why do I struggle so much? I’ve always leaned more toward a bit of melancholy, kind of just—more that way. Just my natural tendency is that way. Regarding the depression side, I did not recognize my depression for what it was: the symptoms. I didn’t want to have it, so I masked and hit it a lot. It wasn’t until my youngest daughter, when she was 13, started having very severe panic attacks, and that’s what sent us. Head first into the world of mental health and trying to help her through her severe anxiety disorder and panic disorder. I had to get real honest with myself and my own anxiety and my own struggles with my own mental health.

I’ve learned a ton in the last four years since we’ve been on this journey with her. Much of the work has been working on myself and addressing my anxiety and depression. I see a therapist regularly. I take antidepressants. And I love Jesus with all my heart when those things are not contradictory. I’ve come a long way. My whole idea of mental health has totally flipped and shifted since working with my daughter through all of her struggles and identifying and being honest with myself and with God about my own.

Carrie: I think your story is so relatable to many of our listeners who grew up with that church idea of, okay, well, the Bible says, “be anxious for nothing or don’t be anxious.” Don’t be afraid. And we take that the wrong way. We take it kind of like a directive, like a command, like do not almost like it’s next to do not murder, do not murder, do not be anxious, but really it’s more, I see it as comfort as God sharing with us. I have everything in control. It’s going to be okay. Right?

I don’t want you to have to worry about that. Just like I would comfort my daughter if she cries, it’s okay. I’d tell her everything’s fine. And God does that with us through scripture. It’s just that we don’t have a tone connected to the Bible. And so whatever tone gets laid on by spiritual leaders and others is the tone we take from it—many times. I like what you said about masking your anxiety as other things, such as perfectionism, as the person who’s the high achiever, the go-getter. That’s always moving, always going, the people pleasing. Often, people don’t recognize anxiety symptoms because they are so high functioning.

One of my friends was talking to me about this today, who’s also a counselor, and she said, “You know, so many people deal with high-functioning anxiety. And they don’t even realize it”. And she said, “People don’t think that I’m anxious, but there are times when I’m anxious because I look so high functioning, I look like I’ve got my ducks in a row and I have things together.” So maybe that’s a cue for some people who are listening right now. Perhaps they think they’re listening for somebody else. And they might realize, ” Hey, I have some of those things too. 

Jennifer: Absolutely. I think for many years, I kept myself so busy that I didn’t have time to pay attention to what was happening. It wasn’t until I had to slow down that I could identify and recognize those symptoms for what they were when I took away all those masks. I had to quit my job, my full-time job, and stay home. Well, then, I didn’t have that job to keep me busy and distracted anymore. And so I was left with myself in a lot of ways. And so, that forced me to pay attention to what was happening. And that’s what breath prayers that we’ll talk about later have helped me, too: to slow down and pay attention. And I think that’s been vital for me. Unfortunately, I had to do it. I didn’t choose to do it. I had to do it through circumstances, but I’m so grateful looking back for that. 

Carrie: And I love that you and other people we’ve talked to are trying to de-stigmatize going to therapy and taking medication as a Christian like it’s okay. For you to struggle with some of these things, it’s okay to reach out for help, whether that’s medical help or professional counseling help. So, I appreciate you sharing that with our audience. You can love Jesus, have a therapist, and take medication. 

Jennifer: Absolutely. Because I mean, a lot of this is tied to our brain and how we function, and your brain is an organ, just like any other organ in your body. And that’s one thing I’ve learned through working with my daughter, too. I mean, this is as much a medical issue as it is. Mental health is physical health. It is your health. 

Carrie: Yes.

Jennifer: And so treating that there are so many different factors and things. And so one of those could be needing professional medical health professional, psychiatric help. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s just like going to a specialist for kidney disease or a specialist; if you have a heart issue, you go to a cardiologist. We need to recognize that the brain is so complicated and there are so many factors. Yes. There are environmental factors and far thought patterns and things that matter, too. Still, it could very much be a physical issue with the brain and those connections there and those, so identifying that and recognizing that and design-stigmatizing that, I think, is critical because it’s not a sin to struggle.

We’re all; we live in a fallen world in broken bodies. They’re going to fail us in one way or another. And that’s just that we all deal with something different. But mental health is, unfortunately, I think, where it intersects with faith. We often feel very isolated and alone, and we don’t know how to talk about it in relation to our faith. And I think a lot of times it’s not talked about enough, and it’s not. And there’s that’s where, like, the shame, and that’s what I lived with for years; I had so much shame piled on me because of my struggles. And God doesn’t want us to live that way. And like you said, when he says, “Do not fear, or don’t be anxious,” it’s not a command. I saw it as a command for so long. But it wasn’t until my daughter was struggling. She’d come to me, terrified and afraid. I didn’t get mad or yell at her for being scared. I wrapped her in my arms, and I reminded her. You don’t have to be afraid. I’m here. You’re not alone. You’re safe. And that’s what God’s doing in the Bible. He’s telling us you’re not alone. I’m here with you. You’re safe. You don’t have to be afraid. And that’s the thing that’s shifted everything for me is realizing that difference there, turning how I perceived how the Bible talked about anxiety. 

Carrie: In this process of getting your daughter some help and then recognizing your anxiety working through that physically, emotionally, and spiritually, you came across breath prayers, right? So, tell us a little bit about that. 

Jennifer: Sure. Yes, this was in the middle of it; it was probably two years ago or so. One of the very first things my daughter’s psychiatrist and her therapist worked with her on, and incidentally, the first thing her psychiatrist told her was breathing is the bridge between the brain and the body.

And so, the breathing exercises were one of the first things they started practicing with her to help her manage her anxiety. I had never realized that before now, different breathing exercises don’t necessarily work for everyone; for my daughter in particular, when she focuses on her breathing, it makes her more anxious and conspires with her into panic. And so this isn’t something that works for absolutely everybody. 

So, she’s had to find other techniques for her, but breathing exercises help me greatly in researching. What are different things that can help her? What are strategies that both she and I can use? How can we learn to manage this anxiety? I did. I completely stumbled upon breath and prayers in a blog post online that someone I wrote, and I had never heard of before. It’s not common, at least not in my faith tradition. I had not heard about it very much. But it captivated me from the get-go because it incorporates and ties into your breath, which I already knew was significant in helping me manage my anxiety.

But it brought in the other element of connecting to God through prayer and focusing on his word. And so, when I learned about them, I scribbled down a few of them and even wrote a blog post about them. It was so helpful to me, and I just thought they were a great way to pray when you’re anxious because they are so short that it doesn’t require a lot of because when you’re anxious. A lot of it’s really when you’re anxious. I know for me, it’s hard to think, and it’s hard to process because you get so lost in the worries and the thoughts and the overwhelming feeling just of the anxiety. 

Breath prayers give you the words to pray when you don’t have those words to pray or when you’re feeling anxious in particular. And so that had helped me to give me words to pray when I was like, I don’t know, I don’t even know what to say. What do I say? But it wasn’t until last year that my daughter was hospitalized; she was admitted to the hospital last February. That night, I was just such a hard night because we were facing a new battle, and it was going to be, I didn’t know, would happen because she was very, very sick. And I was terrified, and I lay down on the, she fell asleep. It was like 2:00 a.m. in her hospital room. I laid down on this vinyl couch, and I was just overwhelmed with anxiety, fear, and worry. I was terrified; I didn’t know how the following days would go, let alone the next few months ahead. And I felt like in the last three years before that, I had prayed everything. 

I knew to pray for healing, strength, and all these things that didn’t happen. And I was like, I’ve said all the words I know to say, God, I don’t have any more words to pray. And at that moment, a breath prayer came to my mind that I had written down months before and was from Psalm 23. “The Lord is my shepherd. I have all I need”. And that’s the only thing I could think of when I had trouble catching my breath. I was crying. I was just so overwhelmed. But I remember those breath prayers, and I started just inhaling slowly. The Lord is my shepherd, and then exhaling. I have all that I need, and then I make myself slow down my breathing and focus on just those words. And that’s when I think breath prayer became significant to me because at that moment, as I focused on where I mean, I was in this hospital room. My daughter was so sick. I didn’t know what would happen, but I’m focusing on the Lord is my shepherd, and I’m a sheep, and he loves me, and he’s here. He’s present with me, and I have all that I need.

I have him. It doesn’t matter what’s to come. I have God; I have Christ. I have all that I need. It’s going to be okay. And I can’t explain the piece that I had at that moment. As I slowed my breathing, my anxiety eased, and I was able to fall asleep. That’s not to say my anxiety went away. Because the next day, I was anxious again. The doctors came in, and different things happened, but I found myself in those next few weeks as we were in the hospital, I’d walk the halls and breathe slowly and pray those, that one breath prayer. I think I just prayed that one mostly repeatedly, but it became my lifeline during those days. It became a prayer. I could pray when I was overwhelmed and didn’t have words. And ever since then, it has been a part of my regular prayer life. It’s not the only prayers I pray, but it’s become a significant way for me to slow down and be very intentional about trusting God and leaning into him when I’m anxious.

Carrie: Wow! That’s really powerful. I’ve had a lot of thoughts about this, and I hate to go too deep here, but when we think about it, the Holy Spirit lives inside of us. And I always just wonder about that. Yes. That’s like the Holy Spirit is somehow connected with our spirit as a person, that we’re spiritual beings. And I always wonder about the Holy Spirit’s interaction with our body. Because it says that we’re a temple of the Holy Spirit. So, I’m just curious if like breath is almost a way for us to connect. I don’t know if it is or not. This is not coming from scripture. It’s just coming from Carrie’s musings. But I wonder if in those moments, like when we slow down, and we breathe, and we pray if, that’s a way for us to just tap into the Holy Spirit that’s already inside of us, and we forget. That God’s that close. You know what I’m saying?

Jennifer:  Absolutely.

Carrie: God’s already here. 

Jennifer: He’s as close as our breath. I mean, man, he created man. That’s what created life. His breath brought Adam to life and gave him the soul created through God’s breath. And so our breath every day, every breath we take. It is a gift from him. He is giving us life. And he’s the one who sustains our life. And I  agree. The Holy Spirit’s in us, working in us; the Bible says he’s transforming us through the renewing of our minds. And I believe that these are ways he does renew our mind and brain. And there’s science to back this up; science and faith are not contradictory. No, no. We act like they are like, no science, but no, the science is only proving what God’s already said. And he has made our body and created our body in such a complex way. And our brain literally can create new pathways in our brain.

As we retrain our brain to, for example, breathe, prayer is one way I have changed how I respond to my anxiety. So, instead of immediately spiraling into panic, I can immediately turn to Christ. Breathe in deep. Remind myself of a truth from his word. And if I do that over and over and over again if I repeat it, it’s just like with any habit or any rhythm we create in our life; you’re rewiring your brain. God’s transforming us by renewing our minds by shifting how we think and shifting how we respond to things. But it takes intentional work, and that’s breath; prayers aren’t hard. They’re super easy, but it does take intentionality to slow down. Stop. And do it just for a few minutes. It doesn’t take long, but it can significantly impact how we think and process our anxiety because we’re rewiring our brains. It’s fascinating. 

I’m not a scientist; I’m not a doctor. I don’t claim to be an expert in any way, but I have researched, and it is more and more fascinating how God has created our bodies and even the act of breathing. It’s the one body process that we have control of. We can control whether we’re breathing rapidly and fast, or we can slow our breathing. But we can do that. By slowing our breathing, we connect to our parasympathetic nervous system, which tells our brain the whole process of how our body handles anxiety. It’s how God created us. And it’s okay. It’s not bad, especially if you’re going for a hike and you, a bear, come in your path; you’ll be thankful you have anxiety.

Carrie: Right.

Jennifer: Because your body is going to be the gear. That sympathetic nervous system kicks in, your amygdala takes over, and you will act and respond to that threat. That fear that’ll help you hopefully keep you safe because you’ll be able to respond to that. But many times, because of the fall, our brains aren’t always connected the way God originally intended, and our bodies don’t always process stimuli as we’re supposed to. Sometimes, the sympathetic nervous system will get riled up over something that isn’t a threat to us, and we’ll get anxious and worried. And so one way we can calm the amygdala down and calm the sympathetic nervous system down is through deep breathing because our breath connects to the vagus nerve, which connects to all of our organs, our major organs in our body. And so by slowing our breath, we’re telling our brain we’re okay, we’re not in danger here. Then, the brain can send signals to the heart, which slows down as our breathing slows down. And you really, you do feel calmer.

It’s a physiological thing that happens in our bodies and how God made us. And through the breath, we can do that. And when we connect, that’s the physical side of it. But then, when we connect prayer to that, we’re, at the same time, turning our thoughts to Christ, to his truth, to replace. Whatever those worries are, whatever those fears are, with some truth from his word, then we are connecting our mind, body, and soul all at once to Christ. And to me, that’s what makes the breath prayer so powerful. Cause there’s lots of breathwork. There are lots of different breath-breathing exercises you can do. And they are very helpful, and there are tons of scientific studies around that. But I also believe there’s just a significant power in prayer. Combining the two. To me, breath prayer is a powerful tool to manage my anxiety.

Carrie: I love that. I thought it would be cool if you could write a book. Do you put several of these prayers into a book? Breathe as prayer, calm your anxiety, focus your mind, and renew your soul. And I thought it would be cool to give people a little taste of one of those you put in there and maybe lead us through life, like one of those exercises. 

Jennifer: Sure, I’ll do my best. Breath prayers are just two lines long. Usually, I, there are.

Carrie: Okay.

Jennifer: There are a few breath prayers in my book in four lines where you inhale and exhale twice to get through it. But most of them are just two lines. You inhale on the first line, inhale slowly as you pray the first line, and exhale slowly as you pray. The second line of the prayer. All my breath prayers in my book are rooted in scripture. They’re all coming from the word of God. I’ve taken verses and made them into prayers, just short little prayers. 

So that way, we’re focused on the truth. And it’s from the word of God. Although you can pray, any prayers that you want are breath prayers. But one that I particularly like. It comes from Psalm 55: 22, which says, “Give your burdens to the Lord, and he will take care of you”. And so the breath prayer I wrote with that one says, “I give my burdens to you.” Cause I’m talking to God. I give my burdens to you. You will take care of me”. When you pray a breath prayer, the idea is to breathe in slowly and exhale slowly. And one, we typically breathe in through our nose and out through our mouth. And I like to remember that by smelling the flowers and blowing out the candles. It’s a common phrase that’s used with breathwork. 

So you pretend that you’re smelling the flowers slowly and then slowly blowing out all the candles on that cake as you exhale fully. There are lots of different patterns and rhythms to breathing that you can do. But my favorite is to inhale for five seconds and then exhale for five seconds. I’ll try to lead you in that by just saying inhale because I can’t talk as I inhale. So I’ll say inhale and then read the first line.

Carrie: Okay. 

Jennifer: Then I’ll say exhale and read the second line as you slowly exhale. And then we’ll repeat that just a couple of times.

Carrie: That sounds good.

Jennifer: And that’ll be it. Okay. Inhale slowly. I give my burdens to you. And exhale; you will take care of me. Inhale again. I give my burdens to you. Exhale. You will take care of me, and we’ll do it again. Inhale slowly. I give my burdens to you. And exhale, you will take care of me, and that’s as simple as it is. And you can repeat it as many times as you want. I typically try to pray them for at least three to five minutes. But you can start with just one minute; repeat it a few times. And you’ll find that just as your prayer aligns with the rhythm of your breath and you’re slowing down and focusing your mind on these words; it does help to calm your feelings of anxiety. 

Carrie: I like this because it’s short and you could use it anywhere you can use it in the grocery store. You can use it in the car if you start to feel anxious. If you’re driving home, you don’t even have to close your eyes. You can breathe.

Jennifer: Absolutely. 

Carrie: Breathe in and out. You can use this before going into an important meeting, say that you have for work or school. There are so many applications, I think. And I think you could even use this at the beginning or end of a longer prayer time where you’re giving your burdens to the Lord. And then all of a sudden, it brings up like, okay, well, these are some things that are on my mind that I’m thinking about that I want to talk to God about more in-depth or more fully.

I think we make prayer so much more complicated really than it has to be. Right? We believe it has to be a specific format or structure. That somehow God will be unhappy with us if we say something the wrong way, but God is longing for that connection with us. He wants us to honor him in our prayers and be respectful, but he also wants us to tell us exactly how we feel and what’s on our minds, etc. This is a great way to do that. And it’s simple; it’s a good strategy to integrate with, like you said, deep breathing, which is, this activity is a mind, body, spirit practice. 

Jennifer: And I found just what you said, the breath prayers. They’re not the only prayers I pray. Usually, more times than not, I’ll start out praying a breath prayer, but it leads right into a more profound prayer with God in a longer prayer with more specifics; it just helps set the tone. It helps me slow down and be intentional. It opens that door to prayer for me and really kind of centers my mind more on Christ, gets me out of my worries, in the middle underneath all of my anxieties, and points me more toward Christ. And that allows me to pray more honestly with God and be, you know, it does. It has helped a lot. And so, for those who don’t pray a lot or don’t know what to pray, this is a great way to start. It’s a great thing to begin with.

Carrie: It’s very mindful, too, in the sense that it connects us back to the present moment because we’ve talked about mindfulness on the podcast and how that can be helpful for anxiety. Just to bring us into the present moment with God.

Jennifer: Absolutely.

Carrie: That’s great. So, your book is coming out August 16th. I’m not entirely sure when this episode airs, but I know people will listen at different times, too. So, if it’s before August 16th, there are presales. And if you pre-buy the book, you get extra goodies and things like that. And if you catch this after August 16th, it’ll be out, and they can find it. I’m sure wherever they buy books. 

Jennifer: Absolutely. 

Carrie: Is there anything else you wanted to say about the book?

Jennifer: I hope it’ll be an encouragement to people. Even if you don’t struggle with anxiety, you know, somebody who does.

Carrie: Sure.

Jennifer: I mean, I think we all have struggled with some form of anxiety, and I do make the distinction in the book, the difference between anxiety, like your normal anxiety, and anxiety disorders; those are very different things. And I think that’s an important distinction, but if you have anxiety. It’s okay. God is not mad at you. He loves you. And he’s just inviting you to turn to him. And for me, anxiety has become, instead of an enemy that I felt like I had to fight or hide from, it’s become more of just a reminder to me. I need to turn to Christ. 

It’s become more of a trigger to turn to him rather than a trigger to spiral into worry, and panic becomes something. In some ways, I’m grateful I have it because it makes me turn to God and reminds me of how good he is and his presence in my life. It’s okay. I sometimes feel anxious, but God knows that I will. That’s why he says, you know, that he’s with us not to be afraid. What’s more, you don’t have to be afraid. He has to remind us a lot because we forget a lot, but I

hope this book will be an encouragement, even if it helps just one person. I’ll be grateful. I’m just thankful that you let me talk about it briefly.
.

Carrie: At the end of every episode, I like to ask people a question, and when it’s a personal story, I like to go into, like, if you could go back in time, what encouragement or hope would you provide to your younger self?

Jennifer: I always get a little tender. When I think about my younger self, she was full of so much shame and so much fear and denial about it all. And I would just, I think I’d, go back and tell her that God’s not mad at you or disappointed in you because you have struggles. It’s okay. And you don’t have to try so hard to be so perfect. My younger self was so determined to be that perfect—good little Christian girl. You know, I was raised in church, and I knew all the right things, and I wanted to do all the right things. And that caused me to live in so much shame when I didn’t meet my expectations or what I thought God’s expectations were for me.

But I think I would tell her that you know what God loves you, and you’re okay. And you don’t have to be so hard on yourself, and you can trust him. You can trust God. And you don’t have to have control over all things because he does. And you’re okay. Relax a little bit. I would tell her that I’m very tender toward my younger self. Bless her heart, too.

Carrie: That’s awesome. Well, thank you for sharing with us today. 

Jennifer: Thank you so so much. I really appreciate it.

Carrie: I like any time we can combine our physical, spiritual, and emotional health into a practice. And knowing that you’re increasing health in those different areas at the same time, we’d love for you to interact with us on Facebook or Instagram. And we will put those links in the show notes for you. 

Hope for Anxiety and OCD is a production of By the Well Counseling. Our show is hosted by me, Carrie Bock, a licensed professional counselor in Tennessee. Opinions given by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect the use of myself or By The Well Counseling. Our original music is by Brandon Mangrum. Until next time, may you be comforted by God’s great love for you.

72. How to Reduce Anxiety about Giving Birth with Carrie Bock, LPC-MHSP

Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in Anxiety, Podcast Episode. No Comments on 72. How to Reduce Anxiety about Giving Birth with Carrie Bock, LPC-MHSP

In this solo episode, Carrie deep dives into the topic of anxiety and childbirth and her own birthing experience.

  • Creating a positive birth experience
  • Carrie’s pregnancy process – asking God what she wanted but He gave her what she needed. 
  • 5 ways to reduce anxiety about having a baby
  • Trusting God through the birthing process 

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Transcript

Welcome to Hope for Anxiety and OCD, Episode 72. I am your host. Carrie’s Bock, a licensed professional counselor in Tennessee. 

I think a lot of times on this podcast, I love to create content for the younger version of cure. What that means is things that I wish people had told me earlier on in life or encouragement that I wish I would have received at different points.

So for example, we had a previous episode called sending hope and love to the, not yet mothers. And I did it for mother’s day. That is episode 27. If you want to go back and listen to it, but I know how hard it is to be in the church and not be a mother or be waiting for that time in your life to come. So, therefore, I created an episode about it, where I had stories of hope combined together. Some that had already been told on the podcast. And then I added some new ones in for people who had waited a long time to have a family either because they were single for a long time or they had gotten married and were dealing with infertility. 

One of the reasons I want to do this episode on reducing anxiety about having a baby is because there’s so much negative energy out there and communication about having a child. It’s very interesting because at least it’s this way in American culture. I know it’s probably different in different cultures, but in American culture, when you tell someone that you’re pregnant, of course, people usually say, congratulations, we’re happy for you, et cetera. But then the other material that you get from people is some version of some horror story surrounding their birth. “Oh, with my second baby, I was in labor for 30 hours. Oh, I couldn’t get the epidural. I progressed. too fast, you know? Oh, I just couldn’t sleep that last week of pregnancy,” whatever it is. It’s almost like we have this badge of honor, if you’ve had a negative birth story.

So I wanted to put something out there just saying that I had a positive birth. Just let that sink in for a moment. If nobody else has given you that message. I have had a positive birth story. Therefore I can have a positive birth story too. I made the decision early on that I wanted to hire a doula and I wanted to try for a natural birthing process.

Things did not play out the way that I had planned them to. So I’m going to tell you a little bit about my story. Some things that went well, some things that didn’t go the way that I planned, but still turned out okay. In the end. So I’ve broken the how to reduce anxiety about having a baby into five points.

Point number one, educate yourself on the process of birth, and what to expect. Naturally and medically, regardless of what kind of birth you want to have, this is so crucial and important because I know many women come into the process of pregnancy going well, you know, I’m just not gonna worry about pain management because I’m just going to get an.

However, unfortunately, many women don’t even know what that means or what that process is like and what to expect there. On the flip side, there’s some women who say, “I want to go all-natural or I want to deliver at home.” And they have certain things that they’re wanting, and they’re very held onto that, but then they don’t research the other things.

So. Yes, maybe you want to give birth naturally, but if something might happen where you would need an epidural or a C-section, you want to be informed about those things as well. You can do this by very simple ways. Just going on the hospital page, seeing if they have some type of virtual tour classes, and educate yourself about the stages of birth and what to expect in each state.

Ask a lot of questions. That is what your OB is there for or your midwife. If you have a doula, that was one of the best things about really having a doula was I had the opportunity to ask a lot of questions and I’ll tell you just for a moment on kind of hiring a doula, what that is, who that. We had so many people who didn’t understand us when we told them that we were having a doula, they automatically assumed that we were having a home birth and that wasn’t the case.

So what is a doula? A doula is a person who supports you through the pregnancy and the birthing process. So they’ll come out and they’ll meet with you ahead of time. They’ll talk with you about what your options are related to birth. They’ll find out what you want. They’ll help you make informed decisions by giving you information, but they won’t make decisions for you, obviously.

That’s your choice about what you want. If you want to give birth at home, they will meet you at your home. If you are giving birth in the hospital like I did, they will meet you at the hospital when you call them and tell them to come. Doulas are not medical professional, like a midwife. They have a lot of information and experience surrounding being with women who are giving birth, but they don’t actually have medical training.

So that’s an important distinction to know you will still need to have. A midwife or an OB, whoever is actually going to go through that birth process with you on the medical side of things. One of the things that I went through with my doula was hypnobirthing classes. And this allows you to teach yourself self-hypnosis how to relax and really get in a good state of hypnosis so that when you go through the birthing process that helps you with pain management.  The classes were super helpful, not just for myself, but also for Steve because he was involved in all of the classes. So he kind of knew what to expect in the birthing process since this was also his first time having a child and going through that with him.

You want to make sure that your education surrounding birth and what to expect is positive. You don’t want to get on and read horror stories of other people’s birth experiences. Like I was talking about that people apparently love. For example, I was in a Facebook group for first-time mothers over the age of 35.

And I ended up having to either snooze that group or get out of it. I don’t remember. Maybe I stopped following it for a time period. There were just so many women in there talking about. Negative painful, unexpected birth stories that I really couldn’t handle all of that information. I noticed that it was turning up a lot of anxiety within me to hear these people say, oh, you know, I had this horrible labor and this was why, and this is how it went.

And therefore are other people being negative surrounding natural birth, which was something that I was wanting. You will find that if you are looking to give birth naturally without an epidural, that you will face even more negativity, more criticism, more people telling you, oh no, you’re not going to be able to do that.

So just kind of be prepared for. But I will tell you from personal experience, it’s completely possible. One of the things that I did was I got on a site called I think it was a mom and natural, and I read stories, positive birth stories from other people who gave birth naturally since staff was something that I was wanting to do.

And I felt like that was important and critical to my process. I will say that some of the materials on the website more her articles were not as helpful. And there were a little bit more fear-driven in my experience have made me very afraid of certain things. And I’ll talk about that a little bit later, in addition to taking the class with our hip, no doula, which was a very extensive six-week class theme.

And I also took a very. Class from the hospital, more so to become aware of their procedures in their processes of doing things. This helped me know more about what my options were. So for example, I knew that the hospital I was delivering at had laboring tubs, but their policy is they will not allow you to actually give birth in those tubs.

So that was important to know. I knew that if I needed to have certain medications like Pitocin, that I wouldn’t be able to be in the laboring. One of the best pieces of advice I got from the hospital class though, was to bring my own pillows. They said the hospital pillows are terribly thin and plastic-y not comfortable at all.

So I was glad that I brought my own pillows to the hospital. For sure. Educate yourself sometimes on the medications that may be needed during the labor process. The stages of labor, how your hospital birthing center does things, or if you’re having a home birth, what that is going to look like? For me being a highly sensitive person, just having the opportunity to have the visual tour of the hospital, to see exactly how the birthing room was laid out exactly how the postpartum suite was laid out. That helped me tremendously. If you’re giving birth at a hospital, you can talk with other people who have had experiences at that hospital. For me. I knew that mine had very high ratings year after year for people who’d given birth there. I talked to some people who had tremendous experiences told me great things about the nurses.

And so all of that really reduced my anxiety for people to be able to say, wow, that hospital is really great. The nurses are awesome. They really love what they do. That helped to reduce quite a bit of my anxiety. And then just knowing the process. This is where you go. If it’s during regular hours, this is where you go.

If it’s after hours, this is what floor you need to go to. All of that was super helpful for me to just kind of know what to expect when you have anxiety. Just knowing what to expect helps so much. I had some anxiety surrounding my doctor not getting there or someone from her practice, not getting to the hospital and having my baby be delivered by just whoever the general on-call person was at the time.

More. So the anxiety about that person being male, I had, even though I’ve had male doctors in the past that have had positive experiences with, there was something about my birth space that I really only wanted female medical professionals in there. People who had actually had the ability to give birth.

That just felt most right. For me. I had a lot of questions for my doctor because I had heard a story about someone that happened to from their practice. She really provided a lot of assurance to me that either she or someone else from her practice who were all females were going to be able to get there.

And that they very rarely had someone from the hospital deliver one of the babies. That provided me a lot more reassurance. My second piece of advice on reducing anxiety is to create a plan, but also to hold on loosely, I think it’s good to create a birth plan. Some people say don’t create a birth plan because you’re just going to have to throw it out the window.

Anyway, that doesn’t make sense. That’s kind of like saying, don’t have a blueprint for your house just because you can’t put the kitchen on the left side because of where the water line is, whatever. You still want to have some kind of plan, but also know that things are not going to go exactly how you have it on your plan.

So it’s important to have some flexibility and to hold on to things loosely. One of my fears was that my daughter would not come and then I would need to have an induction. This was a fear because I knew that I’m older and when you’re having a baby, when you’re older, they don’t want you to necessarily always carry to 40 weeks.

So I was praying and really wanted my daughter faith to come at just the right time so that I wouldn’t have to be induced. I had some serious anxiety about Pitocin. I had heard a lot of horror stories from people who had experienced induction. Pitocin or not just inductions, but also like, uh, trying to speed up their labor with it.

I had read a lot on the internet about the horrors of it and how it’s overutilized in America, et cetera, et cetera. I had read a lot of information about inductions leading to C-sections different things. Here was all this anxiety. My plan was. To really do some early laboring at home. Get to the hospital, allow things to progress.

Naturally, not have medication, not having an epidural, be able to give birth more quickly and move on with. I was also planning to use my hypnobirthing for pain management, those things I just listed pretty much did not go according to plan. I had done a lot of research about Pitocin and inductions, even though those weren’t routes that I wanted to do.

I was able to actually advocate for myself when I needed an induction. I was able to talk with my doctor about the concern regarding inductions leading to C-sections. She was able to provide me some reassurance that her C-section rate was actually a lot lower than the average that I had read about online, because I expressed to her my concerns about Pitocin increasing pain of contractions. We were able to come to an agreement to start me out on a really low dose and to gradually increase that through my birthing process. One of the things that my doula told me after that experience was that, you know, my level was started on a two, whereas she had seen other people’s level, just be started out on a 10 and.

I’m so glad that I did that research and expressed my concerns because I think it helped me have an easier labor process. I actually never got up to a 10. I only got up to eight before I delivered and everyone’s different in terms of what their needs are. And I don’t know how it translates. I just know the number that I was seeing on the medication, but my point is that doing your research allows you to make informed choices later.

And in doing that research, understand that everything you read online doesn’t mean that that’s how it’s going to go for you in your specific situation. Same thing with experiences that you hear from other people. Just because they had that experience. It doesn’t mean that you’re going to have that experience in the end.

I’m glad that I had a birth plan, even though I changed it last minute to adjust it for the induction related to my health concerns that I had at the end of pregnancy. The things that did go according to my birth plan were really being able to advocate for myself about wanting to have as natural birth as possible.

That was really respected by people in the hospital. And they didn’t try to push medication on me, which I really appreciated in terms of pain medication or epidural. I had a request that there were to be no male medical staff in the room while I was giving birth. And that was respected. I had been told by my doula that they usually bring over a mirror to allow you to see what’s happening in that pushing process.

I told them I was not interested in that. And fortunately, the hospital that I went to already practiced some good afterbirth things, such as, you know, skin-to-skin, contact, delayed cord, clamping, those types of things. I didn’t have to worry about putting that in my birth plan as much. Although you may want to check with your hospital and to see what their policies are on.

My OB had a saying about birth. That’s the only thing predictable about it is the unpredictability about it. With that being said, it’s good to have a positive relationship with your provider, where you can talk about what you would like, what your plans are, and with the understanding that there’s some give and take about what’s able to happen.

What’s not able to happen. One of the things that I did not want. Was an IB and that wasn’t really a possibility. They said, you know, it’s really just hospital policy, even if you’re not getting these IB medications that you still need to have one in just in case of emergencies so that they can get medication in you quickly.

However, I knew that going in ahead of time, which was good for me to know. I also communicated on my birth plan that I had negative hospital experiences in the past. And wanted this to be a more positive experience. One of the reasons I felt like experience was negative in the past was due to lack of communication.

And so I really wanted to make sure that they were communicating everything to me, that they were explaining things to me before they did them. I know that other people I had heard from had had experiences where things just kind of happened, or they were given medication without being told about it ahead of time and so forth.

And so. So create a plan, but hold on loosely, pray about it, but also know that God is in control and it’s going to be okay. Number three, visualize what you want, not what you don’t. Our brain has a way of trying to protect us from danger and negative outcomes. That means that we’re going to create all kinds of what if scenarios in our mind, what if this happens?

What if that happens? And when we worry, we’re basically visualizing what we don’t want to happen. Right. So we’re dwelling upon. Okay. And, and I had this very negative vision of, I go into the hospital. It’s some kind of medical emergency happening. People are rushing in there. And so then I was able to kind of talk through with my duel a little bit about what if that did happen?

What if there was an emergency. You know, you would deal with it. You would make decisions based on the knowledge that you have and the knowledge you’re receiving from the doctors. And you would, you know, go with the flow in that situation. But what if those things don’t happen? What if things progress very normally or expectedly, then you’ve wasted all of this time with this worry and this negative visualization in your mind.

So it’s important to be able to sit and visualize the type of birth that you want, not the birth that you don’t want. You want to be able to visualize how you’re going to manage the pain and discomfort that comes up from giving you. For me, one of the things that I really wanted was to be able to have letters from friends and family read to me while I was going through labor.

This was actually the most beautiful part of my birth process. Steve did just an amazing job of reaching out to people. Talking to various friends and family members and saying, Hey, will you write a letter of encouragement for Carrie? Will you write a note? So beautiful. Just people that had verses that they shared in their notes, people that wrote things like.

A funny story, maybe that they had experienced. I know several people mentioned in their notes that they would be praying for me and talked about how really conceiving our daughter was such an answer to prayer for Steve and I and how God was going to get me through this process. One thing that happened that Steve didn’t know that I did was I created a little book.

And in the book, I put scripture verses of encouragement. I put positive birth affirmations. And then after that I put little post-it notes that he had written to me left around the house. This is just kind of something that he does husband award here. He writes just little positive encouraging things for my day.

And so I had kept some of those that meant a lot to me. And during the process, when things got difficult, I asked him to read those back to me and he said, this is very strange. Like I’m reading something that I’ve written previously to you out loud, but it was just such a good thing. One of the things my doula said was that when Steve would read those notes to me, she just noticed like that my whole body would relax and they were able to kind of see on the monitors and things while my blood pressure was doing.

And she just. It was really healthy and really allowed me to kind of get through the process, letting go of the, what-ifs. One of the things that I really loved about the hip, no birthing process was that there were positive affirmations that we listened to every day. And it was 40 minutes of positive affirmations.

And at first, I was kind of like, okay, this is really cheesy and cheeky because of. Someone repeating things over and over, like you deserve to have a wonderful, beautiful birth, you know, and a lot of times actually they were in the first person. So I’m trying to think of what some of them were. So they would say things like, you know, my body is healthy.

To give birth. My body knows exactly what it needs to do. One of the sayings in hypno babies is each birth wave. They don’t call them contractions. They call them waves, you know, brings me closer to my baby is all very focused on the positive. They changed some of the wording, so that. You don’t associate birth with pain and negativity.

They don’t call it labor. They call it birthing time because labor just sounds like it’s really hard work and their whole idea surrounding it is to have a more easy, more comfortable birthing process for them. So these positive affirmations helped so much in, even though in the beginning, I thought they were kind of cheesy.

They helped so much in being able to shift my mindset and just remind me that my body is prepared to give birth. And that that’s already hardwired in just like other bodily responses, like breathing and sweating. It knows what it needs to do. And if we’ll just be able to back up and stay out of the way, then we can allow our body to do what it needs to do.

But what happens when fear takes over is that we create tension, which then causes us to be in more pain. So the more that you’re able to relax through the process, the more your body will just, your muscles will engage and do the things that they need to do. But that fear. Slows things down. And that fear actually constricts you from opening up, which is one thing you need to do, right.

I’ts open up quite a bit. Once you’re able to like relax and open and be calm, then things will just kind of follow as they need to flow. It’s easier said than done. But the more that you practice and the more that you put those positives in, and kind of even, they talk about visualizing your cervix, opening and dilating, maybe even like visualizing as you’re going through the birthing process, visualizing, you know, your baby moving through your body, those types of things.

As I was going through different stages. My doula would talk with me about, you know, okay, this is like face, like she’s moving now. Like, you know, her, head’s almost about to be out. Just kind of like talking me through that process. Like, this is a good thing everything’s progressing. Well, you know, you’re doing what you need to do.

Number four. Understanding that everyone has anxiety at some level about giving birth. And that’s a normal thing. Anxiety is not always bad. And I think we often label it as something that’s bad. But one of the things that we talk about on the podcast is that anxiety at some level is informative for us.

Anxiety causes us to lean into God, more anxiety causes to really seek after God and pushes us to do bigger things than we would normally do on our own. So anxiety in itself is not always bad. It was understanding it is your body and your brain’s way of trying to protect you. And when you’re able to say back to them, You know what I am a child of God.

I know that he loves me. I know that he cares about me. I know that he is not going to allow something horrible and awful to happen unless it’s somehow part of his redemptive plan. So if something goes wrong and something happens to me or my daughter, that God still has a plan for the future. And that it’s a good plan and I can move forward in that.

That is huge. There were things that I found out about my body, my physical health kind of declined, unfortunately very rapidly towards the end, right before I gave birth. And that was really hard to deal with. I got diagnosed with something called holy state. Of pregnancy, that’s something I heard, Michael Phelps, his wife, I believe talk about on a birthing podcast.

I think she also had that with some of her pregnancies with Cola stasis. There is a higher rate of stillbirth and I was already at higher risk of stillbirth for being older. That obviously was hard to hear and was anxiety-provoking. There were two things that I clung on to though they would always tell me when they did ultrasounds and so forth, that my daughter looked healthy, that everything looked okay.

They didn’t see any issues. And so I thought, okay, this is a good thing. Even if my body isn’t reacting well to the pregnancy, my daughter is still okay. The other thing that I held on to was I really felt like God gave me this baby. And I thought if God has given me this baby as a gift, then I just believe and have faith that he’s not going to allow this to end negatively.

This is going to have a positive ending to the story, going back to the positive affirmations for a moment, that experience caused me to really think. What if we, as Christians selected some verses about who we are in Christ and listen to those or read those every day because I probably did this for well, at least six weeks that I was in the.

That’s a long time. What if we really meditated on some of those scriptures that said that we are loved, that we are a child of God, that we are a part of his family. Would that make a difference in how we live our lives? Out of that, a love and acceptance from God. I really think that it would, and I challenge you and encourage you, even if you find a scripture too, that encourages you, that challenges you to really meditate on it every day for a while and see if that changes.

Number five, don’t get so stuck on the process of pregnancy giving birth that you lose sight of the outcome is kind of like a wedding. Weddings are beautiful thing, but they can be really stressful. There’s all this planning that goes into it. And then same thing with giving birth, something doesn’t quite go right.

You know, the caterer shows up late, you have a family member that can’t find the venue. Whatever the case is, there’s always something that doesn’t quite go according to plan. But at the end of the day, you’re married. This is what I told our wedding photographer. And when she was shooting some pictures of our wedding, I said, we’re very laid back.

And we understand that regardless of what happens at the end of the day, we’re going to be married. Did everything turn out perfectly or as we planned? No, but the outcome was very positive. The outcome was what we were looking for. Apply this same thing to your birth, visualize yourself, holding your baby.

Even if you don’t know what they’re going to look like. Although I will say those creepy 3d ultrasound photos are pretty accurate. If you happen to have any of those, they kept trying to get a picture of face, face. I was like, I don’t care because I had to have all these ultrasounds at the end because of the coleus stasis.

It doesn’t matter to me, however, I can go back and look. And she had those same chubby cheeks on the ultrasound that she had after she came out. So those things are pretty accurate and incredible. Visualize yourself, holding your beautiful baby. That is what you want to be focused on. Don’t get so stuck on the process and all the ins and outs of what could happen, couldn’t happen.

And then understanding. It’s hard. I think to fall in love with someone that you’ve never met before. You’re trying to kind of do this ahead of time, but holding your baby is a great thing. It’s almost, there’s a verse in the Bible that talks about how after you’ve had a baby, it’s almost like you forget the pain of labor.

And I think there is some truth to that. When I look back on my process, I don’t remember necessarily or tune into the hard thing. I remember her coming out and thinking like, oh, wow, like this is over now. I remember Steve reading me, those encouraging stories and some of the things that people said. I remember some of the hard things, but they’re not attached to paying.

If that makes sense. I don’t know any other way to describe that. It’s like when I look back at the process, I see the whole thing is a positive experience because I was able to birth my daughter. She came out healthy and it was amazing. I will say that anyone who’s interested in a more natural or a non-epidural.

That there’s something very empowering about going through that process and knowing that you did that people say that I have a high pain tolerance now, or they think it’s somehow amazing that I did that. I don’t really see it that way myself. I think my pain tolerance probably is higher than it was before.

I’m more look at it as this was something that I knew I could do and set out to do and wanted to do, and had very specific reasons for wanting that. And I was able to achieve that. So did my birth story go according to plan? No, because towards the very end. My health declined. I was diagnosed with Cola stasis, as I explained earlier, had a higher rate of stillbirth.

So my OB really encouraged me to deliver at 37 weeks as I was in the process of going back and forth with talking to Steve about, do we take that recommendation or not? Do we let her mature in there a little bit longer? My blood pressure ended up spiking. And about a week before I gave birth, I am. Being diagnosed kind of at the last minute with preeclampsia too.

So having those two health conditions, God really gave me peace about the induction that this was what we were supposed to be doing. There was a lot of prayer that went into that process and honestly, a lot of anger towards God, because. I was so mad that he didn’t answer my one prayer that I had kept praying that faith would come in her own time and that I wouldn’t have to be induced.

However, is one of those situations where God gives you what you need, not what you want. So the process of becoming a parent is hard sometimes. Things don’t go according to plan, it’s a lot of trial and error. You just have to roll with it, but being able to have my daughter, the way that I did and the way that things happened, and yet she still turned out, okay.

She still turned out healthy, just really gave me an increase trust in God and an increased confidence that even though things don’t go according to my plan, that he has a plan and that he loves me to not always give me what I want or what I asked for in prayer. He loves me enough to give me what I need, even when I don’t know that that’s what I need at the time.

So that was something that God gave to me through my birth process. I think that’s helping me as a parent now to just be okay when things are a bit out of my control or faith is crying and I don’t know exactly what to do. Okay. Maybe. Try this or try that, you know, why is she upset right now? Or had expected her to take a nap at this time sounds small.

And she didn’t or so forth. It’s just helping me be more go with the flow because of what I went through. And how hard that was for me to accept being acceptance of all my plans changing. It’s also allowed me, given me the opportunity to be able to live more day to day in a mindful sense of in the moment, teaching myself that I can only deal with the information that I have on the table right now.

That was something that happened throughout my pregnancy process. I could only deal with what was in front of me at the time. At first, my levels were elevated, but they weren’t at the threshold of cholestasis. I just had severe itching on my hands, on my feet, other areas. Actually, I didn’t really have as much itching on my hands, but that’s one of the symptoms.

I had more so the itching on my feet, I would have to run them under cold water at night in order to be able to just relax enough to sleep. And one of the things that got me through that was a story of hope on one of our very early podcasts, where one of my friends had shared a condition that she had during pregnancy that caused her a lot of problems.

And, that continued even after she gave birth. So when my levels were elevated, I just had to deal with the symptom. Then it crossed the threshold and then there was new information and there were other things that happened. There were more conversations to be had. Then my blood pressure spike. I couldn’t really deal with how my birth was going to go way back, you know, several weeks before and really had to make a lot of shifts and a lot of changes to be able to get myself ready, business-wise even, and so forth to deliver three weeks early yet, everything was already in place that I needed to have in place. My clients had referrals. I had things ready to go, you know, by that point so that we were ready at that time. If there’s anything that I could leave you with it’s to know that if you follow some of these steps, it’s really going to help you have a more relaxed birth process.

It’s not going to be a hundred percent relaxed. It’s not going to be pain-free, but it’s going to be a process that you feel some more greater comfort level that you’re going to be able to get through and work through something about giving birth. And that’s a hard thing, but once you get through it and you’re like, wow, well, I got through that hard thing.

I can get through other hard things too. Thank you for tuning into my episode on what younger version of me and I, when I say younger version, I mean like a year ago, wish that she knew about giving birth and I hope that it helps somebody else. Maybe that’s in. Station of their life to hear something positive.

And even if you get nothing else out of this, just know that you can have a good birth experience. You can reduce some of your anxiety about having a baby. God is in control. He loves you and it’s all going to be okay, whatever happens. It’s going to become a part of your story. Thank you so much for listening today.

I know, even before I became pregnant, I was trying to get people on to talk about postpartum anxiety and depression, because it’s a big thing that happens in society that unfortunately people don’t always talk about. I haven’t had much luck on getting a guest for that. So if you know somebody that does that kind of work, feel free to have them contact me through the website. The best way to know about what is going on with the podcast is to follow us on Facebook, Instagram, or sign up for our email newsletter. You can find us anytime at hopeforanxietyandocd.com. Thanks for tuning in and you’ll hear from me in a couple days. 

Hope for Anxiety and OCD is a production of By the Well  Counseling.

Our show is hosted by me, Carrie Bock, licensed professional counselor in Tennessee. Opinions given by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of myself or By the Well Counseling.

 Our original music is by Brandon Mangrum. Until next time be comforted by God’s great love for you.