March 4, 2025 • 40 mins
Surviving a school shooting and witnessing the tragic loss of her brother could have defined her path, but instead, these challenges fueled her passion for nursing and healing. Melissa Armstrong's story is nothing short of inspiring. She opens up about her chaotic childhood with addicted parents to finding peace and purpose as a nurse, health coach, wife, and mother.
Throughout the episode, we uncover the profound impact of stress and trauma on both mental and physical health. With insights from experts, we delve into the significance of the mind-body connection and explore alternative healing methods such as EMDR therapy. Melissa's narrative illustrates the importance of acknowledging past traumas while striving for holistic well-being, offering hope and strategies for listeners seeking their healing paths.
The conversation also emphasizes the transformative power of neuroplasticity and therapeutic practices. By sharing her experiences, Melissa illustrates how reclaiming her authentic self has allowed her to create a healthier environment for herself and her family.
This episode is a testament to the belief that healing is possible for everyone.
I encourage listeners to prioritize their health and explore the resources Melissa generously shares to aid their pursuit of clarity and emotional freedom.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to another episode of the Sober Living
Stories podcast.
Meet Melissa Armstrong.
She's a wife, health coach andmom of two.
Melissa faced significantchildhood and young adult trauma
, leading her to explore, laterin life, natural medicine and
somatic healing.
She now helps women heal frompersonal and intergenerational
trauma and she empowers them tolive their best life.
(00:22):
Join us as we sit down to hearMelissa's personal story.
Hey, melissa, welcome to theshow.
I'm so happy to have you here.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hi Jessica, I'm so happy to be here.
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
You have a really interesting story.
I'd love for you to go just asfar back as you're comfortable
going, sharing with listenersyour past that brought you to
the present of helping womenheal.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah, so my story starts as a very young child.
I grew up in a very chaotic,traumatic household.
My parents were both addicts.
My dad was very physicallyabusive toward my mom and
everything that went with that,so he would beat up my mom and
we were really poor and periodsof homelessness and random
(01:08):
people in and out of our housesall the time because of the
drugs, and that they divorcedwhen I was about six and then my
dad left and never really cameback in any significant way.
He's since passed away fromdrugs, but my my mom, as a
result of her own trauma andthings she had been through as a
kid and then again more with mydad, she was very verbally
(01:32):
abusive and emotionallyunavailable and that continued
for much of my all of mychildhood into young, you know,
into my teen years, when I was15, survived a school shooting
and then when I was 18, mybrother was killed in an
accident right in front of meand so my I already had this
(01:55):
huge burden of mental healthissues and anxiety.
And, like I remember beingreally, really young I have a
four-year-old myself right now Iremember being his age or even
younger and having anxiety.
I didn't know what that was,but I remember that feeling.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
And so from the period of time from you know,
the time that I was about 18,when my brother died, until well
into my twenties I was verydied until well into my twenties
I was very, very unwellphysically, mentally,
emotionally, spiritually, all ofit.
(02:36):
I had severe anxiety,depression, panic, insomnia.
The panic was the worst of allof it I had just I couldn't
function, I couldn't go to thestore, I had panic attacks daily
and I was just really unwell.
Like eventually that kind ofevolved into.
I started to manifest a lot ofphysical symptoms.
So I had a lot of GI issues, Ihad skin issues, I had migraines
.
I already said I had insomnia.
(02:57):
I didn't sleep.
I slept horribly in my earlytwenties, if I slept at all.
There was days where I didn'tsleep because the panic was so
bad.
And yeah, when my brother died,I also made the decision at that
time that I wanted to be anurse, because the nurses had
helped him and our family andyou know so much.
(03:18):
Ultimately he passed away, butthey were just angels on earth
and I wanted to help people andI kind of always knew that I
would be in medicine.
I think I was born to be ahealer with my story.
So I at that time declarednursing as my major started
going toward that, and I reallydon't know how I got through it
because I was so unwell, but Idid.
(03:41):
And then, when I was about 24,was the first time that I
actually that was really wheremy healing journey started my
now husband, then boyfriend,suggested that I try meditation.
He said to me one time, and atthe end of a panic attack you're
just so like up here all thetime, like if you could just
(04:05):
calm yourself down sometimes Ifeel like you would just be so
much better and so much happier.
Have you ever tried meditation?
And so I went oh wow, no, letme try that.
I don't know why I was able to,but I was.
And that's kind of like thebeginning of of the healing and
that really made me realize I, Iwas, I had just become a nurse,
(04:28):
I had.
And then all of a sudden Irealized like, oh wow, in
traditional medicine, you know,and from the time that I was 18
to 24, I was going to the doctorpretty frequently.
I was on antidepressants, I wason sleeping pills, I was on
steroids.
I would wake up covered head totoe and rash, go to the doctor
and they'd be like, yeah, wedon't know, here's a steroid,
and then it would happen againin two months, you know, and
(04:51):
they just give me anothersteroid.
They wouldn't actually.
I kept asking like, but why isthis happening?
What is this?
Nobody could tell me.
So I feel like I was, you know,kind of failed in that way.
And then come to you know 24, Istart meditating.
(05:11):
I realized all of a sudden Iwas like, oh boy, I can calm my
mind down, like this isincredible.
Why has nobody ever told meabout this?
And and then I startedconsuming a lot of that
information and just likeresearching, like what is
meditation?
Why does meditation work?
What is, you know, somaticrelease?
What is neuroplasticity?
How does the mind and how arethe mind and the body connected?
And, um, it just kind ofevolved from there, um, to where
(05:36):
I am now, 15 years later.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
Yeah.
So I think um listeners candefinitely relate um to perhaps
maybe growing up with alcoholicor addicted parents or being in
that themselves and havingtransitional people come in and
out of the home and what thatdoes to your security and where
you're experiencing that anxietyand the domestic abuse of
course.
And also you know schoolshootings have been such a
(06:02):
prevalent thing in the pastyears that it's a real fear of a
lot of people.
So when you were 15, when thathappened, what's the residual
impact of that being a survivorof a school shooting?
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Yeah, I think now I've done a ton of healing.
So I feel, you know, strangelylike okay with it, if that's the
right word.
But there was a long period oftime after that where I had like
complex post-traumatic stressdisorder and like to the point
(06:40):
where when I would hear a loudsound like I would drop to the
ground and curl up in a ball.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
Yeah, oftentimes you think of the victims that lost
their lives, right, but I mean,every single person in that
building is affected from that,obviously.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
It's taken me a long time to heal through that sort
of like jumpiness that I.
You know I was diagnosed withpost-traumatic stress right
after that happened and thenthat was like one of the hardest
parts for me to deal with.
Was that panic and that likethat, that stress response that
would come over my body, that Iwas not able to control.
(07:21):
If anything in my environmenteven remotely resembled danger,
particularly those loud noises,so like a car door slamming,
would literally put me into apanic attack because it was just
loud.
And if I wasn't, especially ifI was on it, you know, if it was
unexpected.
I think now, like the residualis is obviously like it hurts my
(07:48):
, my heart to like go back tothat place and remember those
details.
But I think I feel like that'slike the extent of it.
You know, I feel like that'spart of my journey.
I, I, it happened to me, but Idon't, I don't own it, it's not,
it's, it's not, it's a part ofme, but it's not my story, it's
not my whole story.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Yeah, you know, that's interesting that you say
that, because in healing youknow, when you can say something
out loud too, is is verypowerful, because that
essentially means that you havecome to a different place in it,
that you can actually speak it.
And then I really love what youjust said, because within my
own healing I have healedcertain things, but when I do
(08:33):
return to them in my mind, thereis that pull on my heart, but
it's not an ownership, like youjust said.
And so I think what you justsaid to me and to listeners is
that it's okay to have that pull.
It was something that did takeplace in your life, but it
doesn't own your identityanymore, you know, and that's
(08:54):
very powerful.
But and it gives permission tohave that heart pull and to be
like wait, am I not healed fromthat?
No, it's just in a differentplace.
And so, too, with your brother'saccident, that was probably
very I mean, unbelievably tragicfor you and your family, and so
you chose to be a nurse as anoutcome to that and a healer,
(09:18):
which changed the trajectory of,maybe, your career path.
So if you could talk a littlebit about when you began your
nurse nursing, a lot of peoplego into Western medicine and
they find answers and a lot ofpeople don't you know, and yours
resulting in physical symptomslike they came out in your body,
like that happens all the time,like with stress, it results in
(09:40):
a physical response and peopleare treating the physical
responses without treating thestress.
Can you talk to that?
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Yeah, yeah, that's, that's a huge part of my work.
Is that mind body connection,they say.
Like research is more and moreresearch is coming out that
showing the connection betweenstress and the physical symptoms
that were just plagued with inthis, in this country and in the
industrialized world, 95%, theyestimate, of conditions are
(10:09):
either caused by or worsened bystress.
So it's like why do we not talkabout that?
I think that emotional toll andthat our mind is so powerful
and you can, it's all about.
You know, with trauma, they say, dr Gabor Mate talks about it
all the time Like the trauma isnot the event, it's your
(10:29):
response to the event.
So that just speaks to the powerof the mind.
If you perceive something, asyou know, stressful or traumatic
or anything like that, like ityou know.
If your mind gets ahold of thatand you continue to replay that
or you are focused on that, itis.
It's not a matter of if, it's amatter of when it's going to
(10:52):
create some sort of physicalailment in your body, because
those thoughts, that those yourmind, can actually create toxic
toxicity.
Toxic thoughts are just as badas toxic water, toxic food,
toxic chemicals In my experienceand opinion.
I think that the mind is superpowerful.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
What do you think are the top three physical symptoms
that result?
We talk about stomach issues or, I think, neck pain.
What are the top three thatyou've seen in your work?
Speaker 2 (11:23):
or, I think, neck pain like what are the top three
that you've seen in your work?
Get definitely gastrointestinalissues.
So like diarrhea, constipation,bloating, abdominal pain,
abdominal discomfort, I see alot of joint pain and I see a
lot of gosh three.
I do see a lot of like fatigue.
I don't know if you could callthat a physical symptom, but I
(11:44):
think it is Sure.
But yeah, like I think sleepdisturbances and disturbances.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
And it's not always.
Sometimes people come andthey're sleeping.
They're sleeping great, likethey're sleeping eight hours,
but they're just exhausted allthe time and it's just speaks to
that like um, the effect thatyour mind and your thoughts and
the stress can have on yourphysical body, like it just
(12:12):
creates this massiveinflammation throughout your
body, oxidative stress,mitochondrial dysfunction and,
um, you know, you wind up justfeeling fatigued, no matter how
much you sleep.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
That's really interesting.
Another point do you find a lotof women who come to you and I
see this sometimes you knowthey're functioning in the world
, whether they're successful,they're a great mom, they're
running, you know they're familymembers, they're helping, you
know, but their thought ofthemselves does not match their
(12:48):
life, and so that to me issometimes an indication of maybe
something that they're hangingon to that's back there.
It's just not meeting up withtheir adult self that if they
healed that or had the courageto look at it and just uproot it
and heal from it, it would allmake sense and come together and
(13:09):
their interior matches theirexterior.
Do you see that often?
Speaker 2 (13:14):
All the time, like in probably all of my clients, I
think that there's, there is.
We will only achieve the levelof success that we believe
believe that we are worthy of,and I think that everybody,
everybody I've worked with Ican't think of a single person
(13:35):
that I've worked with thathasn't had some element of
feeling like they didn't deserveit, they weren't worthy.
It all boils down to what youthink you're worthy of.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Achieve what you just said.
We will only achieve the levelof success that we feel we are
worthy of.
That.
I can look around and, as youwere raised, I was raised like
you can do anything.
You will be and become anythingyou want to be.
And when I was just speaking tosomeone and she said to me you
(14:08):
know, I was raised in a homewhere my mother said that's not
possible for you, you're notable to do that.
It was just a complete negativeverbal, you know degradation
consistently throughout herchildhood.
And she said that she was aboutlike 60 years old and she said
said I still believe that today.
So I don't become the businessowner, I don't become the CEO, I
(14:31):
work for those people andbecause that's where I decided
to land.
And so I thought, wow, that wasreally interesting to me.
What she was listening to andhearing as a child just became
her reality as an adult and Ithought I wonder if people can
change that for themselves.
And I believe they can.
And that's a large part of thework that you do, which is so
(14:52):
important, because we alldeserve to be exactly whoever we
want to be and we can unattachourselves from the systems in
which we learned a message thatwasn't our truth, but maybe
somebody else's A hundredpercent.
Speaker 2 (15:04):
Learned a message that wasn't our truth, but maybe
somebody else's 100%.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
So what kind of healing in your own journey,
like when you went from Westernto natural.
You did the meditation, butwhat were some other pivotal
alternative solutions that youcame to that really helped you
heal?
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Yeah, well, one of the big things that I did early
on in my healing journey too,was I was always in therapy.
Like traditional talk therapywasn't super helpful to me
because I was just kind ofreplaying all of it was almost
re-traumatizing me every time Iwould talk about things, but I
did.
Eventually, when I startedmeditation, I discovered EMDR
(15:41):
therapy, which is eye movement,desensitization and reprocessing
or reprogramming, depending onwho you're talking to.
I did that for a couple ofyears early on in that journey
and that helped me.
Dr Mary Catherine McDonald hasthis really great analogy about
trauma.
She has a new book out Gosh,the name escapes me right now,
but Dr Mary Catherine McDonald,look her up, she's got a great
(16:01):
book she talks about you know,your brain is like a filing
cabinet and you have all ofthese files that you know are
are different memories, and youhave these little guys working
in your in your file room andanytime something happens, these
little guys take the file andthey put the little you know
label on it.
That labels like oh, this isfunny or this you know, putting
(16:22):
little indicators so your braincan pull those files out when
you need to recall thosememories and and something about
trauma.
For some reason, all of asudden, all of those guys go
take a break and then, with thistrauma, all of these files get
just like dumped into your fileroom and then, after you know a
period of time passes, theseguys come back to the file room.
They're like what is all thismess?
(16:42):
Like?
Look at all these files, wheredid all these come from?
Like we don't know where the sothey just start stuffing them
places.
There's no labels, there's noorganization.
It's just kind of like putrandom places Right.
So it's kind of likedisorganized.
And so that's kind of like thepremise behind like trauma and
like why?
Like sometimes the memories aresometimes hard to recall.
(17:03):
You might remember certainpieces of it but you can't
remember other pieces of it, ormaybe you remember it completely
incorrectly or your perceptionof it is different from somebody
else who was there, orsomething like that.
But with EMDR the idea is likeyou use two different the way it
worked for me and there'sdifferent ways to do it.
But I had two handheld devicesthat would pulsate to stimulate
(17:26):
both sides of the brain while Iwas talking about the event, so
I could kind of like reorganizethose thoughts.
So EMDR was super pivotal atthe beginning.
From there I really usedmeditation, tapping or emotional
freedom technique, breath work,and then I really just started
to try to understand like thatconnection from, you know,
(17:48):
between my mind and my body, andlike when things would happen
that would trigger me.
I don't love that word, but forlack of a better word that I
would notice I started to beable to notice how that was
showing up in my body.
Okay, somebody said this, orthis experience just happened.
Like how does that make me feelinside of my body?
(18:10):
Where is that?
Where is the sensation?
Excuse me, where is thatsensation inside of my body?
What is?
What is the quality?
Is it dull, is it sharp, is ithot, is it?
You know?
Just noticing that.
And then, once I notice it,then I can change it.
That's, that's the first step,is the awareness.
(18:33):
So it's like, okay, well, Inoticed that that person said X,
y, z, and then suddenly I feltthis like deep aching, empty
feeling inside of my stomach.
Like why do I feel that deepaching emptiness inside of my
stomach?
Okay, because I remember thatmy mom used to say the same
thing when I was a kid.
(18:54):
Okay, so it's not actually thisperson that said anything wrong
.
Necessarily it's this feelingthat I have about something that
is from my childhood.
So let me go back and love onmy little girl self, who was
told she wasn't worth it or madeto feel like she was a burden
(19:14):
or all those things, and reallyjust like kind of going back and
loving on myself as a child andthrough all of the different
stages and processing thatenergy out of my body.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
It's incredible to me because each guest that comes
on this podcast like speaks to acertain selfishly, speaks to a
part of my life where I'mexactly at, and it's just
incredible to me.
But EMDR I had heard about, Ihad a couple of friends that had
gone through that process andwhen you speak about like
burying a memory, like I'veheard about that process, and
(19:47):
when you speak about likeburying a memory, like I've
heard about that, like a memorywill be suppressed and then in
your far future something willhappen and it will come out Well
, I recently had that experienceabout a month ago and something
that happened when I was 16, Iwas in like a domestically
violent relationship for 2.5years exactly, which didn't fit
into my life but was my reality.
(20:07):
It was a boyfriend that I hadthat was physically and verbally
abusive.
That I've never spoken aboutout loud because I took care of
it and I never re-entered arelationship like that.
So I thought I had handled thatin the two ways that I did.
I volunteered at a coalitionfor rape and abuse and then I
made a t-shirt for the I thinkit's the Washington clothesline
(20:28):
project when I was in collegeand I got away from it.
So I thought, okay, I'm tyingthat up in a bow and I'm putting
that here and I'm moving onwith my life.
And I did so fast forward.
Um, a couple of weeks ago or amonth ago, I was in a meeting in
my home and somebody said oneline and said she made a list.
She's talking about beingorganized, and I had made a list
(20:49):
back then of things not to doto upset him so that I wouldn't
suffer the consequences of whatwas happening.
And I tell you, within thatmoment, something happened in my
brain and it's like all thememories just flooded back and
were bouncing around and I justhad a complete.
I felt like the need to shareit, but I didn't want to
interrupt the meeting and it wasoff topic.
(21:12):
But I took a chance and I didand what happened was a complete
visceral response.
I cried from my feet and shortlythereafter, about a week later,
I had entered into EMDR and I'monly in my third meeting.
So I'm just learning thatprocess.
What I was doing and whatpeople I think do, is they?
(21:32):
I'm trying to think the bestway to say that, if you take my
husband, for example, it's likesomething he's saying.
I'm attaching it to somethingthat was said to me when I was
16.
So I'm like, unintentionally,or I'm giving him an unwarranted
, I'm taking what he's sayingand he's not meaning.
(21:56):
The meaning is incorrect.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
Assigning the meaning to it.
That's not actually what he'sintending, right.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
I'm misassigning his intention of what he's saying to
something that happened so longago.
So I'm thinking it's him andwhat I'm learning is that no,
I'm not assigning the correctresponse to that.
It is mind blowing and it waslike a true gift given to me
that day, even though, of course, it's difficult to go through.
(22:24):
In a sense it's a gift becausethe freedom that comes from that
, the increase in love that'sgoing to be in my marriage, like
we're just so excited, it'slike wow, that it no longer is
going to be a part of my.
You know, I'm not going to ownthat anymore.
I'm going to be able to feelthat heart tug, but I'm not
going to own it and it's notgoing to hijack my current
(22:44):
relationship.
I would have never in a thousandyears thought that that was
still an issue within my bodyand it absolutely was.
So I had that experience.
So I'm glad that you brought upEMDR.
It's certainly a different typeof therapy that really realigns
your brain.
Talked about brainneuroplasticity.
Could you speak to that alittle bit?
What kind of healing did you doin realigning that as far like
(23:07):
after EMDR?
Speaker 2 (23:08):
So neuroplasticity Dr Caroline Leaf does, her her
life's work is based inneuroplasticity and that that
idea is just that your, yourbrain is actually like there's
been so much in the past.
You know, in the past medicine,really looked at like your
brain is, is static, like theneurons are there, they can't be
(23:31):
reformed, reshaped, reconnected, and and her research has
really proven otherwise thatyour, your brain is actually
very, very of rewiring and itjust takes some intentional
focus to get those neuronsrewired.
(23:51):
To attribute something thatyour husband said to what he
actually means, rather thansomething from 20 years ago.
So that's the whole philosophyor all the research behind
neuroplasticity is just showingor talking about the possibility
and the capability of the brainto rewire itself.
(24:12):
There wasn't things that Ispecifically did outside of what
I've already talked about, butall of those things that I've
done have helped me be able torewire my brain and reconnect
those memories, heal from thattrauma, let that emotion when
that traumatic event happens toyou and you have a response to
it, that you have an emotionalresponse to it.
(24:35):
And emotion is just energy inmotion.
So you think like we're allenergy, everything is energy
right, all of our cells,everything's moving and energy
in our environment, around usand when you have that emotional
response, you have that energyinside of you.
You need to be able to processthat energy, that emotion, out
(24:59):
of you and yeah, that's reallylike part of the process and
getting your brain to rewirelike part of the process and
getting your brain to rewire.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
You know, a lot of times people have negative
self-talk.
You know, I have children thatare 8, 11 and 18.
And so that self-talk that theystart their day with, you know
Dr Amen, do you know who he is?
He does a lot of brain, brainwork as well, and I he talks
about hitting the ground andsaying I'm going to have a great
(25:27):
day today.
Every morning I'm going to havea great day today, and it's
like, before you go to sleep, mykids say, god, I'm ready to go
to sleep now.
And sure enough, they all go tosleep.
It's just like telling yourselfsomething and then that's the
cutoff, and then that's what itis.
And throughout the day, you know, we can have negative self-talk
, or we can start to reframe andretrain what we think about
(25:52):
ourselves just by what we'resaying to ourselves.
And it's attainable by our ownmeans, like it's not something
we have to go get a prescriptionfor or we have to go see a
doctor every week, for it'ssomething, these little
practices that we can do on adaily basis to help ourselves
get to our best selves, that wedeserve to be at.
(26:13):
And so let's talk a little bitabout women getting to the best
version of who they are.
I think it'd be hard to find afemale that hasn't gone through
something you know, or a male,that it's hard to find anyone
that hasn't gone throughsomething.
Whether you know.
(26:35):
When you talk about gettingthrough a chaotic childhood
filled with addiction, survivinga school shooting and you know,
observing the breath, the andgetting you know having the
tragedy of your brother passaway at 18, you have the life
experience to have come out theother side of that.
(26:58):
Who truly would you, wouldanyone else want to have them
heal is somebody who's gonethrough it themselves.
I know with listeners that havegone through sobriety or
addiction, but the person that'sgoing to or addiction, the
person that's going to help them, is the person that lived that.
They're going to understandexactly the feelings and the
emotions, the behaviors, thenecessary things that they're
(27:21):
going to need to walk back intotheir new life.
So I think that your work, thatyou're doing I mean who better
to help people heal than you?
So what are you doing now andwho are you helping?
Can you talk a little bit aboutyour coaching and how it's
helping people get to the bestversion of who they are?
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Yeah.
So I help women overcome traumaand heal their whole mind, body
and spirit.
So I believe that that traumais something that holds us back.
So I believe that that traumais something that holds us back
and it's even little.
You know like they talk abouttrauma big T, little T trauma.
Lots of people have heard thatbig T trauma is like war zone,
(27:59):
you know, natural disasters,that kind of stuff.
Even little T traumas are justas bad.
The response to it can be justas impactful in somebody's life.
So even a car accident or beingfired from a job or breaking up
with a, you know, a spouse or aboyfriend or things like that,
(28:19):
having a friendship and like allof those things are traumatic.
So sometimes people come to meand they say, well, I don't have
any trauma and I'm like, no, no, you do, you just don't know it
, you're just not admitting it.
But really helping people.
Because once you have thattrauma that really impacts, like
you said, our self-talk, ourbelief about our own worth, our
(28:44):
trauma responses, and when youhave that negative self-talk, so
much of what we, we live ourlives, most people in our
subconscious, and that negativeself-talk is just playing
speaking about earlier, is whenyou have that toxicity, have
(29:11):
inflammation in your body as aresult, and when you have
inflammation and you have thattoxicity, you feel worse.
So you don't exercise and thenyou don't eat good and then
you're not doing things that areactually going to make your
body, just to serve your body.
You're doing things to get adopamine hit because sitting
(29:33):
scrolling on Instagram orsomething like that is going to
give you more dopamine thangoing for a walk.
You know acutely.
But once that dopamine wearsoff you're going to feel even
crappier in the long run.
So like really helping peopleshift out of that heal, that
trauma, recognize and becomeaware of their thoughts, their
self-worth and really heal theirwhole mind, body and spirit.
(29:57):
I use functional medicine.
I use a functional medicineapproach, so I'm always looking
at a root cause, meaning I uselabs to assess where the
imbalances are in the body so wecan really target those
imbalances and help restore thatbalance.
So the body returns tohomeostasis.
While working on all of thelifestyle, you know the mind
(30:21):
stuff, you know somatic release,processing through that emotion
.
That's deep, deep work, butit's incredible and the freedom
that comes from it is justinsane.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Freedom is amazing.
It's well worth it becauseyou're able to really live out
your authentic self with othersthat you love, and so let's help
listeners right now identify.
I think this would be greatbecause I think we have a
tremendous capacity to minimize,deny and just undermine things
that have happened to us.
You talked about big T andlittle t, so I call them
(30:56):
taglines.
I just started, you know like Ihad a tagline for my 16 year
old self.
You know, the reason why Ididn't revisit that and I tied
it up in a little bow is becauseI said well, he never broke a
bone, so it's not worth talkingabout.
Saying that out loud isslightly horrific, right?
If anyone said that to me, I'dbe like excuse me, that's worth
(31:17):
talking about.
I went through the 2.5 years ofabuse, but because he never
broke my bone, it's not worthtalking about.
That's a huge, hugeminimization of what took place
for me, and I never allowedmyself permission.
Now I'm 51, I was 16 and itcame back because I felt like my
(31:38):
belief and my faith is God andI thought he's gifting me with
this because he wants me to beclear this for the next chapter.
So I am allowing myself now toknow that that tagline is worth
looking at.
So, like for listeners, theycan think what are their
taglines?
What have they been tellingthemselves that's insignificant,
(31:59):
what are they minimizing?
Or what is their line that theysay to themselves about a
situation that happened to them?
That they're pushing down andjust saying like doesn't really
matter, when it really does?
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
Yeah, that is so powerful.
Speaker 1 (32:15):
You know, like just to identify that, because then
they could start to be a littlebit more aware that maybe it
does count, you know, cause wethink, we think it doesn't Right
and um, it does everybody.
You know, not that I think workis hard, like looking back is
hard for some people, or I don'twant to do all that, or you
know, but sometimes it justcomes, and it comes because it's
(32:36):
given to you as like a gift, tolike, hey, you don't have to
carry this for another decade.
You know, let's clear you out.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Yeah, I think that the you're right.
It is so hard to look back andthe problem is is that we lead
these like busy lives.
People are like I don't havetime.
That was, that wasinsignificant, I need to just
get over it, I don't have timeto deal with it.
It's really not that big of adeal, like you said, minimizing
it, but our nervous systems arestill holding onto that and,
(33:08):
like our nervous system, peoplehave to understand that your
nervous system is literallydesigned to save your life, like
that's what it's for is to saveyour life from danger, right?
So, like a tiger, is there?
What do you do?
Fight, flight, freeze, you know.
So you, your, your nervoussystem equates safety with the
(33:32):
familiar.
Things that are unfamiliar aredangerous.
So I once heard this and I useit a lot in my practice is the
familiar hell versus theunfamiliar heaven?
Because if you, your safetyequals familiar.
So your nervous system isalways going to try to keep you
(33:55):
safe by putting you in thefamiliar hell, even if you know
consciously a lot of peopledon't know consciously or
they're not putting it,connecting the dots, but like,
even if you, you know that thatfamiliar hell is actually
disruptive to you or or notserving you.
I should say you're still goingto go there versus the
(34:17):
unfamiliar heaven, because theunfamiliar heaven is unfamiliar,
thus equals, you know, not safe.
So, like your nervous system isis trying to save your life,
but right.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
Exactly.
Push through that.
And how many people are walkingaround using survival
mechanisms that once kept themsafe as a child or a young adult
and they're bringing it intotheir adult life where they
don't need them anymore.
But they're coming up.
When you're unloading thedishwasher or you're making
dinner, you're using survival.
We're not surviving anymore.
(34:50):
Everything's safe, it's securebringing the.
We haven't shed those survivalskills.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
And your body, your body and your mind are still
thinking like okay, therethere's, the danger is still
there.
Okay, there's still a tiger.
But it's really, it's not atiger, it's just the dishes or
something you know it's not, nota tiger, so my response doesn't
have to be the same, butawareness is the first step.
Speaker 1 (35:14):
That's just a gift to the rest of your life.
You know, to reframe it not ashard work, but just as a
complete gift and absolutefreedom so that you can live the
life you were meant to live sowell.
This has been a reallyinformational, educational talk.
I'm so grateful that you cameon and shared your personal
story too, so that people canrelate.
(35:35):
Can you let people know wherethey can find you and what
services you offer?
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Yeah, so my website is holistichealthbymelissacom.
I'm also on social mediaInstagram and Facebook.
At holistic health by Melissa,my, I offer one-on-one coaching.
I offer group coaching.
I should be launching my coursehere soon.
There's some freebies on mywebsite.
I have a top 10 tips toregulate your nervous system
guide and workbook.
(36:01):
It's 22 pages of like a seriouslike, in-depth, like tips and
assessing, like how those tipsare working for you and really
like trying to pull out some ofthat suppressed emotion about
you know, whatever you've gotgoing on in your life or have
experienced in your past.
And then I also have a nervoussystem assessment so you can see
(36:21):
, get a good idea of if yournervous system is regulated or
dysregulated.
And then, obviously, like anyquestions, feel free to message
me.
I handle all my own emails andInstagram messages and all of
that.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
So I just downloaded your quiz and also your workbook
and I'm going to put those tworesources in the show notes
along with all your contactinformation.
So, as we tie up the interview,I'd like to just ask you.
I know that you live analcohol-free life, so for
listeners that are going towardthat lifestyle, oftentimes this
(36:54):
kind of work is the next step.
Oftentimes, when people getsober, they are in like new
territory, and so they'll maybeseek out therapy, to kind of now
that they're clear, theirawareness is at a higher level
and they can start to make theconnections of, maybe, why they
chose to do what they did.
And once they shed that badhabit.
That's where they can come totherapy.
(37:16):
That's where they can come tosomeone like you and what would
be the top benefits of that andhow they can get started.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
Yeah, so I totally agree.
Like when you're, when you'redrinking alcohol or using you
know things to suppress youremotion, that's really what it
is.
It's a depressant.
People tend to use that kind ofas a crutch because they they
want to numb out, they don'twant to feel if they're not
drinking.
They feel these feelings thatare like okay, that's not
(37:46):
comfortable, I don't want tofeel that.
Let me just have a drink,because then it kind of goes
away, but then you know it comesback and actually alcohol just
perpetuates that feeling.
It's a depressant.
So like, as soon as you comedown off of alcohol, you're
going to feel more depressedlater and you got to keep
drinking to feel the same wayand then and then you get into,
you know, very slipperyterritory there.
(38:07):
But yeah, that's I.
I promote an alcohol free life,I live an alcohol free life.
For me it was a choice.
Actually listened to a podcastlast year where Dan Martell was
talking about his relationshipwith alcohol.
He was an alcoholic for 10years and said that he or maybe
he I don't remember how long hewas an alcohol, or maybe he
(38:28):
wasn't even an alcoholic but hechose an alcohol-free life
because he realized, wow, I usealcohol for everything.
If I have a good day, I havealcohol.
If I have a bad day, I havealcohol.
If I have a.
If I'm bored, I have alcohol.
If I'm celebrating, I havealcohol.
If I'm upset, I have alcohol.
And I went, oh my gosh, that isso true.
(38:50):
I was not an alcoholic, but Ifelt like I was kind of using it
for everything and I didn'tlike that and I was like I just
want to be completely sober andso that's what I'm doing.
And I think anybody who gets tothat place and wants to be
sober and wants to address theirpast traumas and live a
fulfilling, happy, you know,emotionally free life Like
(39:10):
that's the benefit, is emotionalfreedom, is clarity, is, um,
living your authentic self,really delving into those things
, while it may be hard in themoment, really is only going to
serve you in the long run andit's going to serve your whole
family.
It's going to serve yourchildren I speak a lot to moms
(39:32):
who your children are going tobenefit from you healing
yourself.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
That's the best thing you could do for your kids is
heal yourself.
Absolutely, I agree, 100%.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
I'm going to encouragelisteners to download your
resources and once again, it'sall going to be in the show
notes.
Reach out to Melissa Armstrong.
She is definitely someone whohas lived the life and has
experienced the healing solution, so, and I know that you
(40:00):
believe that every single personcan heal.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
Yeah, yeah.
That's what that's kind of mytagline.
I say you know, no matter whatthe experience, the situation, I
don't care what the doctorshave told you, healing is always
possible, Always.
Thank you for being here.
Speaker 1 (40:19):
Thanks for having me.
Welcome to another episode of the Sober Living
Stories podcast.
Meet Melissa Armstrong.
She's a wife, health coach andmom of two.
Melissa faced significantchildhood and young adult trauma
, leading her to explore, laterin life, natural medicine and
somatic healing.
She now helps women heal frompersonal and intergenerational
trauma and she empowers them tolive their best life.
(00:22):
Join us as we sit down to hearMelissa's personal story.
Hey, melissa, welcome to theshow.
I'm so happy to have you here.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hi Jessica, I'm so happy to be here.
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
You have a really interesting story.
I'd love for you to go just asfar back as you're comfortable
going, sharing with listenersyour past that brought you to
the present of helping womenheal.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah, so my story starts as a very young child.
I grew up in a very chaotic,traumatic household.
My parents were both addicts.
My dad was very physicallyabusive toward my mom and
everything that went with that,so he would beat up my mom and
we were really poor and periodsof homelessness and random
(01:08):
people in and out of our housesall the time because of the
drugs, and that they divorcedwhen I was about six and then my
dad left and never really cameback in any significant way.
He's since passed away fromdrugs, but my my mom, as a
result of her own trauma andthings she had been through as a
kid and then again more with mydad, she was very verbally
(01:32):
abusive and emotionallyunavailable and that continued
for much of my all of mychildhood into young, you know,
into my teen years, when I was15, survived a school shooting
and then when I was 18, mybrother was killed in an
accident right in front of meand so my I already had this
(01:55):
huge burden of mental healthissues and anxiety.
And, like I remember beingreally, really young I have a
four-year-old myself right now Iremember being his age or even
younger and having anxiety.
I didn't know what that was,but I remember that feeling.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
And so from the period of time from you know,
the time that I was about 18,when my brother died, until well
into my twenties I was verydied until well into my twenties
I was very, very unwellphysically, mentally,
emotionally, spiritually, all ofit.
(02:36):
I had severe anxiety,depression, panic, insomnia.
The panic was the worst of allof it I had just I couldn't
function, I couldn't go to thestore, I had panic attacks daily
and I was just really unwell.
Like eventually that kind ofevolved into.
I started to manifest a lot ofphysical symptoms.
So I had a lot of GI issues, Ihad skin issues, I had migraines
.
I already said I had insomnia.
(02:57):
I didn't sleep.
I slept horribly in my earlytwenties, if I slept at all.
There was days where I didn'tsleep because the panic was so
bad.
And yeah, when my brother died,I also made the decision at that
time that I wanted to be anurse, because the nurses had
helped him and our family andyou know so much.
(03:18):
Ultimately he passed away, butthey were just angels on earth
and I wanted to help people andI kind of always knew that I
would be in medicine.
I think I was born to be ahealer with my story.
So I at that time declarednursing as my major started
going toward that, and I reallydon't know how I got through it
because I was so unwell, but Idid.
(03:41):
And then, when I was about 24,was the first time that I
actually that was really wheremy healing journey started my
now husband, then boyfriend,suggested that I try meditation.
He said to me one time, and atthe end of a panic attack you're
just so like up here all thetime, like if you could just
(04:05):
calm yourself down sometimes Ifeel like you would just be so
much better and so much happier.
Have you ever tried meditation?
And so I went oh wow, no, letme try that.
I don't know why I was able to,but I was.
And that's kind of like thebeginning of of the healing and
that really made me realize I, Iwas, I had just become a nurse,
(04:28):
I had.
And then all of a sudden Irealized like, oh wow, in
traditional medicine, you know,and from the time that I was 18
to 24, I was going to the doctorpretty frequently.
I was on antidepressants, I wason sleeping pills, I was on
steroids.
I would wake up covered head totoe and rash, go to the doctor
and they'd be like, yeah, wedon't know, here's a steroid,
and then it would happen againin two months, you know, and
(04:51):
they just give me anothersteroid.
They wouldn't actually.
I kept asking like, but why isthis happening?
What is this?
Nobody could tell me.
So I feel like I was, you know,kind of failed in that way.
And then come to you know 24, Istart meditating.
(05:11):
I realized all of a sudden Iwas like, oh boy, I can calm my
mind down, like this isincredible.
Why has nobody ever told meabout this?
And and then I startedconsuming a lot of that
information and just likeresearching, like what is
meditation?
Why does meditation work?
What is, you know, somaticrelease?
What is neuroplasticity?
How does the mind and how arethe mind and the body connected?
And, um, it just kind ofevolved from there, um, to where
(05:36):
I am now, 15 years later.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
Yeah.
So I think um listeners candefinitely relate um to perhaps
maybe growing up with alcoholicor addicted parents or being in
that themselves and havingtransitional people come in and
out of the home and what thatdoes to your security and where
you're experiencing that anxietyand the domestic abuse of
course.
And also you know schoolshootings have been such a
(06:02):
prevalent thing in the pastyears that it's a real fear of a
lot of people.
So when you were 15, when thathappened, what's the residual
impact of that being a survivorof a school shooting?
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Yeah, I think now I've done a ton of healing.
So I feel, you know, strangelylike okay with it, if that's the
right word.
But there was a long period oftime after that where I had like
complex post-traumatic stressdisorder and like to the point
(06:40):
where when I would hear a loudsound like I would drop to the
ground and curl up in a ball.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
Yeah, oftentimes you think of the victims that lost
their lives, right, but I mean,every single person in that
building is affected from that,obviously.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
It's taken me a long time to heal through that sort
of like jumpiness that I.
You know I was diagnosed withpost-traumatic stress right
after that happened and thenthat was like one of the hardest
parts for me to deal with.
Was that panic and that likethat, that stress response that
would come over my body, that Iwas not able to control.
(07:21):
If anything in my environmenteven remotely resembled danger,
particularly those loud noises,so like a car door slamming,
would literally put me into apanic attack because it was just
loud.
And if I wasn't, especially ifI was on it, you know, if it was
unexpected.
I think now, like the residualis is obviously like it hurts my
(07:48):
, my heart to like go back tothat place and remember those
details.
But I think I feel like that'slike the extent of it.
You know, I feel like that'spart of my journey.
I, I, it happened to me, but Idon't, I don't own it, it's not,
it's, it's not, it's a part ofme, but it's not my story, it's
not my whole story.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Yeah, you know, that's interesting that you say
that, because in healing youknow, when you can say something
out loud too, is is verypowerful, because that
essentially means that you havecome to a different place in it,
that you can actually speak it.
And then I really love what youjust said, because within my
own healing I have healedcertain things, but when I do
(08:33):
return to them in my mind, thereis that pull on my heart, but
it's not an ownership, like youjust said.
And so I think what you justsaid to me and to listeners is
that it's okay to have that pull.
It was something that did takeplace in your life, but it
doesn't own your identityanymore, you know, and that's
(08:54):
very powerful.
But and it gives permission tohave that heart pull and to be
like wait, am I not healed fromthat?
No, it's just in a differentplace.
And so, too, with your brother'saccident, that was probably
very I mean, unbelievably tragicfor you and your family, and so
you chose to be a nurse as anoutcome to that and a healer,
(09:18):
which changed the trajectory of,maybe, your career path.
So if you could talk a littlebit about when you began your
nurse nursing, a lot of peoplego into Western medicine and
they find answers and a lot ofpeople don't you know, and yours
resulting in physical symptomslike they came out in your body,
like that happens all the time,like with stress, it results in
(09:40):
a physical response and peopleare treating the physical
responses without treating thestress.
Can you talk to that?
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Yeah, yeah, that's, that's a huge part of my work.
Is that mind body connection,they say.
Like research is more and moreresearch is coming out that
showing the connection betweenstress and the physical symptoms
that were just plagued with inthis, in this country and in the
industrialized world, 95%, theyestimate, of conditions are
(10:09):
either caused by or worsened bystress.
So it's like why do we not talkabout that?
I think that emotional toll andthat our mind is so powerful
and you can, it's all about.
You know, with trauma, they say, dr Gabor Mate talks about it
all the time Like the trauma isnot the event, it's your
(10:29):
response to the event.
So that just speaks to the powerof the mind.
If you perceive something, asyou know, stressful or traumatic
or anything like that, like ityou know.
If your mind gets ahold of thatand you continue to replay that
or you are focused on that, itis.
It's not a matter of if, it's amatter of when it's going to
(10:52):
create some sort of physicalailment in your body, because
those thoughts, that those yourmind, can actually create toxic
toxicity.
Toxic thoughts are just as badas toxic water, toxic food,
toxic chemicals In my experienceand opinion.
I think that the mind is superpowerful.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
What do you think are the top three physical symptoms
that result?
We talk about stomach issues or, I think, neck pain.
What are the top three thatyou've seen in your work?
Speaker 2 (11:23):
or, I think, neck pain like what are the top three
that you've seen in your work?
Get definitely gastrointestinalissues.
So like diarrhea, constipation,bloating, abdominal pain,
abdominal discomfort, I see alot of joint pain and I see a
lot of gosh three.
I do see a lot of like fatigue.
I don't know if you could callthat a physical symptom, but I
(11:44):
think it is Sure.
But yeah, like I think sleepdisturbances and disturbances.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
And it's not always.
Sometimes people come andthey're sleeping.
They're sleeping great, likethey're sleeping eight hours,
but they're just exhausted allthe time and it's just speaks to
that like um, the effect thatyour mind and your thoughts and
the stress can have on yourphysical body, like it just
(12:12):
creates this massiveinflammation throughout your
body, oxidative stress,mitochondrial dysfunction and,
um, you know, you wind up justfeeling fatigued, no matter how
much you sleep.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
That's really interesting.
Another point do you find a lotof women who come to you and I
see this sometimes you knowthey're functioning in the world
, whether they're successful,they're a great mom, they're
running, you know they're familymembers, they're helping, you
know, but their thought ofthemselves does not match their
(12:48):
life, and so that to me issometimes an indication of maybe
something that they're hangingon to that's back there.
It's just not meeting up withtheir adult self that if they
healed that or had the courageto look at it and just uproot it
and heal from it, it would allmake sense and come together and
(13:09):
their interior matches theirexterior.
Do you see that often?
Speaker 2 (13:14):
All the time, like in probably all of my clients, I
think that there's, there is.
We will only achieve the levelof success that we believe
believe that we are worthy of,and I think that everybody,
everybody I've worked with Ican't think of a single person
(13:35):
that I've worked with thathasn't had some element of
feeling like they didn't deserveit, they weren't worthy.
It all boils down to what youthink you're worthy of.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Achieve what you just said.
We will only achieve the levelof success that we feel we are
worthy of.
That.
I can look around and, as youwere raised, I was raised like
you can do anything.
You will be and become anythingyou want to be.
And when I was just speaking tosomeone and she said to me you
(14:08):
know, I was raised in a homewhere my mother said that's not
possible for you, you're notable to do that.
It was just a complete negativeverbal, you know degradation
consistently throughout herchildhood.
And she said that she was aboutlike 60 years old and she said
said I still believe that today.
So I don't become the businessowner, I don't become the CEO, I
(14:31):
work for those people andbecause that's where I decided
to land.
And so I thought, wow, that wasreally interesting to me.
What she was listening to andhearing as a child just became
her reality as an adult and Ithought I wonder if people can
change that for themselves.
And I believe they can.
And that's a large part of thework that you do, which is so
(14:52):
important, because we alldeserve to be exactly whoever we
want to be and we can unattachourselves from the systems in
which we learned a message thatwasn't our truth, but maybe
somebody else's A hundredpercent.
Speaker 2 (15:04):
Learned a message that wasn't our truth, but maybe
somebody else's 100%.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
So what kind of healing in your own journey,
like when you went from Westernto natural.
You did the meditation, butwhat were some other pivotal
alternative solutions that youcame to that really helped you
heal?
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Yeah, well, one of the big things that I did early
on in my healing journey too,was I was always in therapy.
Like traditional talk therapywasn't super helpful to me
because I was just kind ofreplaying all of it was almost
re-traumatizing me every time Iwould talk about things, but I
did.
Eventually, when I startedmeditation, I discovered EMDR
(15:41):
therapy, which is eye movement,desensitization and reprocessing
or reprogramming, depending onwho you're talking to.
I did that for a couple ofyears early on in that journey
and that helped me.
Dr Mary Catherine McDonald hasthis really great analogy about
trauma.
She has a new book out Gosh,the name escapes me right now,
but Dr Mary Catherine McDonald,look her up, she's got a great
(16:01):
book she talks about you know,your brain is like a filing
cabinet and you have all ofthese files that you know are
are different memories, and youhave these little guys working
in your in your file room andanytime something happens, these
little guys take the file andthey put the little you know
label on it.
That labels like oh, this isfunny or this you know, putting
(16:22):
little indicators so your braincan pull those files out when
you need to recall thosememories and and something about
trauma.
For some reason, all of asudden, all of those guys go
take a break and then, with thistrauma, all of these files get
just like dumped into your fileroom and then, after you know a
period of time passes, theseguys come back to the file room.
They're like what is all thismess?
(16:42):
Like?
Look at all these files, wheredid all these come from?
Like we don't know where the sothey just start stuffing them
places.
There's no labels, there's noorganization.
It's just kind of like putrandom places Right.
So it's kind of likedisorganized.
And so that's kind of like thepremise behind like trauma and
like why?
Like sometimes the memories aresometimes hard to recall.
(17:03):
You might remember certainpieces of it but you can't
remember other pieces of it, ormaybe you remember it completely
incorrectly or your perceptionof it is different from somebody
else who was there, orsomething like that.
But with EMDR the idea is likeyou use two different the way it
worked for me and there'sdifferent ways to do it.
But I had two handheld devicesthat would pulsate to stimulate
(17:26):
both sides of the brain while Iwas talking about the event, so
I could kind of like reorganizethose thoughts.
So EMDR was super pivotal atthe beginning.
From there I really usedmeditation, tapping or emotional
freedom technique, breath work,and then I really just started
to try to understand like thatconnection from, you know,
(17:48):
between my mind and my body, andlike when things would happen
that would trigger me.
I don't love that word, but forlack of a better word that I
would notice I started to beable to notice how that was
showing up in my body.
Okay, somebody said this, orthis experience just happened.
Like how does that make me feelinside of my body?
(18:10):
Where is that?
Where is the sensation?
Excuse me, where is thatsensation inside of my body?
What is?
What is the quality?
Is it dull, is it sharp, is ithot, is it?
You know?
Just noticing that.
And then, once I notice it,then I can change it.
That's, that's the first step,is the awareness.
(18:33):
So it's like, okay, well, Inoticed that that person said X,
y, z, and then suddenly I feltthis like deep aching, empty
feeling inside of my stomach.
Like why do I feel that deepaching emptiness inside of my
stomach?
Okay, because I remember thatmy mom used to say the same
thing when I was a kid.
(18:54):
Okay, so it's not actually thisperson that said anything wrong
.
Necessarily it's this feelingthat I have about something that
is from my childhood.
So let me go back and love onmy little girl self, who was
told she wasn't worth it or madeto feel like she was a burden
(19:14):
or all those things, and reallyjust like kind of going back and
loving on myself as a child andthrough all of the different
stages and processing thatenergy out of my body.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
It's incredible to me because each guest that comes
on this podcast like speaks to acertain selfishly, speaks to a
part of my life where I'mexactly at, and it's just
incredible to me.
But EMDR I had heard about, Ihad a couple of friends that had
gone through that process andwhen you speak about like
burying a memory, like I'veheard about that process, and
(19:47):
when you speak about likeburying a memory, like I've
heard about that, like a memorywill be suppressed and then in
your far future something willhappen and it will come out Well
, I recently had that experienceabout a month ago and something
that happened when I was 16, Iwas in like a domestically
violent relationship for 2.5years exactly, which didn't fit
into my life but was my reality.
(20:07):
It was a boyfriend that I hadthat was physically and verbally
abusive.
That I've never spoken aboutout loud because I took care of
it and I never re-entered arelationship like that.
So I thought I had handled thatin the two ways that I did.
I volunteered at a coalitionfor rape and abuse and then I
made a t-shirt for the I thinkit's the Washington clothesline
(20:28):
project when I was in collegeand I got away from it.
So I thought, okay, I'm tyingthat up in a bow and I'm putting
that here and I'm moving onwith my life.
And I did so fast forward.
Um, a couple of weeks ago or amonth ago, I was in a meeting in
my home and somebody said oneline and said she made a list.
She's talking about beingorganized, and I had made a list
(20:49):
back then of things not to doto upset him so that I wouldn't
suffer the consequences of whatwas happening.
And I tell you, within thatmoment, something happened in my
brain and it's like all thememories just flooded back and
were bouncing around and I justhad a complete.
I felt like the need to shareit, but I didn't want to
interrupt the meeting and it wasoff topic.
(21:12):
But I took a chance and I didand what happened was a complete
visceral response.
I cried from my feet and shortlythereafter, about a week later,
I had entered into EMDR and I'monly in my third meeting.
So I'm just learning thatprocess.
What I was doing and whatpeople I think do, is they?
(21:32):
I'm trying to think the bestway to say that, if you take my
husband, for example, it's likesomething he's saying.
I'm attaching it to somethingthat was said to me when I was
16.
So I'm like, unintentionally,or I'm giving him an unwarranted
, I'm taking what he's sayingand he's not meaning.
(21:56):
The meaning is incorrect.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
Assigning the meaning to it.
That's not actually what he'sintending, right.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
I'm misassigning his intention of what he's saying to
something that happened so longago.
So I'm thinking it's him andwhat I'm learning is that no,
I'm not assigning the correctresponse to that.
It is mind blowing and it waslike a true gift given to me
that day, even though, of course, it's difficult to go through.
(22:24):
In a sense it's a gift becausethe freedom that comes from that
, the increase in love that'sgoing to be in my marriage, like
we're just so excited, it'slike wow, that it no longer is
going to be a part of my.
You know, I'm not going to ownthat anymore.
I'm going to be able to feelthat heart tug, but I'm not
going to own it and it's notgoing to hijack my current
(22:44):
relationship.
I would have never in a thousandyears thought that that was
still an issue within my bodyand it absolutely was.
So I had that experience.
So I'm glad that you brought upEMDR.
It's certainly a different typeof therapy that really realigns
your brain.
Talked about brainneuroplasticity.
Could you speak to that alittle bit?
What kind of healing did you doin realigning that as far like
(23:07):
after EMDR?
Speaker 2 (23:08):
So neuroplasticity Dr Caroline Leaf does, her her
life's work is based inneuroplasticity and that that
idea is just that your, yourbrain is actually like there's
been so much in the past.
You know, in the past medicine,really looked at like your
brain is, is static, like theneurons are there, they can't be
(23:31):
reformed, reshaped, reconnected, and and her research has
really proven otherwise thatyour, your brain is actually
very, very of rewiring and itjust takes some intentional
focus to get those neuronsrewired.
(23:51):
To attribute something thatyour husband said to what he
actually means, rather thansomething from 20 years ago.
So that's the whole philosophyor all the research behind
neuroplasticity is just showingor talking about the possibility
and the capability of the brainto rewire itself.
(24:12):
There wasn't things that Ispecifically did outside of what
I've already talked about, butall of those things that I've
done have helped me be able torewire my brain and reconnect
those memories, heal from thattrauma, let that emotion when
that traumatic event happens toyou and you have a response to
it, that you have an emotionalresponse to it.
(24:35):
And emotion is just energy inmotion.
So you think like we're allenergy, everything is energy
right, all of our cells,everything's moving and energy
in our environment, around usand when you have that emotional
response, you have that energyinside of you.
You need to be able to processthat energy, that emotion, out
(24:59):
of you and yeah, that's reallylike part of the process and
getting your brain to rewirelike part of the process and
getting your brain to rewire.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
You know, a lot of times people have negative
self-talk.
You know, I have children thatare 8, 11 and 18.
And so that self-talk that theystart their day with, you know
Dr Amen, do you know who he is?
He does a lot of brain, brainwork as well, and I he talks
about hitting the ground andsaying I'm going to have a great
(25:27):
day today.
Every morning I'm going to havea great day today, and it's
like, before you go to sleep, mykids say, god, I'm ready to go
to sleep now.
And sure enough, they all go tosleep.
It's just like telling yourselfsomething and then that's the
cutoff, and then that's what itis.
And throughout the day, you know, we can have negative self-talk
, or we can start to reframe andretrain what we think about
(25:52):
ourselves just by what we'resaying to ourselves.
And it's attainable by our ownmeans, like it's not something
we have to go get a prescriptionfor or we have to go see a
doctor every week, for it'ssomething, these little
practices that we can do on adaily basis to help ourselves
get to our best selves, that wedeserve to be at.
(26:13):
And so let's talk a little bitabout women getting to the best
version of who they are.
I think it'd be hard to find afemale that hasn't gone through
something you know, or a male,that it's hard to find anyone
that hasn't gone throughsomething.
Whether you know.
(26:35):
When you talk about gettingthrough a chaotic childhood
filled with addiction, survivinga school shooting and you know,
observing the breath, the andgetting you know having the
tragedy of your brother passaway at 18, you have the life
experience to have come out theother side of that.
(26:58):
Who truly would you, wouldanyone else want to have them
heal is somebody who's gonethrough it themselves.
I know with listeners that havegone through sobriety or
addiction, but the person that'sgoing to or addiction, the
person that's going to help them, is the person that lived that.
They're going to understandexactly the feelings and the
emotions, the behaviors, thenecessary things that they're
(27:21):
going to need to walk back intotheir new life.
So I think that your work, thatyou're doing I mean who better
to help people heal than you?
So what are you doing now andwho are you helping?
Can you talk a little bit aboutyour coaching and how it's
helping people get to the bestversion of who they are?
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Yeah.
So I help women overcome traumaand heal their whole mind, body
and spirit.
So I believe that that traumais something that holds us back.
So I believe that that traumais something that holds us back
and it's even little.
You know like they talk abouttrauma big T, little T trauma.
Lots of people have heard thatbig T trauma is like war zone,
(27:59):
you know, natural disasters,that kind of stuff.
Even little T traumas are justas bad.
The response to it can be justas impactful in somebody's life.
So even a car accident or beingfired from a job or breaking up
with a, you know, a spouse or aboyfriend or things like that,
(28:19):
having a friendship and like allof those things are traumatic.
So sometimes people come to meand they say, well, I don't have
any trauma and I'm like, no, no, you do, you just don't know it
, you're just not admitting it.
But really helping people.
Because once you have thattrauma that really impacts, like
you said, our self-talk, ourbelief about our own worth, our
(28:44):
trauma responses, and when youhave that negative self-talk, so
much of what we, we live ourlives, most people in our
subconscious, and that negativeself-talk is just playing
speaking about earlier, is whenyou have that toxicity, have
(29:11):
inflammation in your body as aresult, and when you have
inflammation and you have thattoxicity, you feel worse.
So you don't exercise and thenyou don't eat good and then
you're not doing things that areactually going to make your
body, just to serve your body.
You're doing things to get adopamine hit because sitting
(29:33):
scrolling on Instagram orsomething like that is going to
give you more dopamine thangoing for a walk.
You know acutely.
But once that dopamine wearsoff you're going to feel even
crappier in the long run.
So like really helping peopleshift out of that heal, that
trauma, recognize and becomeaware of their thoughts, their
self-worth and really heal theirwhole mind, body and spirit.
(29:57):
I use functional medicine.
I use a functional medicineapproach, so I'm always looking
at a root cause, meaning I uselabs to assess where the
imbalances are in the body so wecan really target those
imbalances and help restore thatbalance.
So the body returns tohomeostasis.
While working on all of thelifestyle, you know the mind
(30:21):
stuff, you know somatic release,processing through that emotion
.
That's deep, deep work, butit's incredible and the freedom
that comes from it is justinsane.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Freedom is amazing.
It's well worth it becauseyou're able to really live out
your authentic self with othersthat you love, and so let's help
listeners right now identify.
I think this would be greatbecause I think we have a
tremendous capacity to minimize,deny and just undermine things
that have happened to us.
You talked about big T andlittle t, so I call them
(30:56):
taglines.
I just started, you know like Ihad a tagline for my 16 year
old self.
You know, the reason why Ididn't revisit that and I tied
it up in a little bow is becauseI said well, he never broke a
bone, so it's not worth talkingabout.
Saying that out loud isslightly horrific, right?
If anyone said that to me, I'dbe like excuse me, that's worth
(31:17):
talking about.
I went through the 2.5 years ofabuse, but because he never
broke my bone, it's not worthtalking about.
That's a huge, hugeminimization of what took place
for me, and I never allowedmyself permission.
Now I'm 51, I was 16 and itcame back because I felt like my
(31:38):
belief and my faith is God andI thought he's gifting me with
this because he wants me to beclear this for the next chapter.
So I am allowing myself now toknow that that tagline is worth
looking at.
So, like for listeners, theycan think what are their
taglines?
What have they been tellingthemselves that's insignificant,
(31:59):
what are they minimizing?
Or what is their line that theysay to themselves about a
situation that happened to them?
That they're pushing down andjust saying like doesn't really
matter, when it really does?
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
Yeah, that is so powerful.
Speaker 1 (32:15):
You know, like just to identify that, because then
they could start to be a littlebit more aware that maybe it
does count, you know, cause wethink, we think it doesn't Right
and um, it does everybody.
You know, not that I think workis hard, like looking back is
hard for some people, or I don'twant to do all that, or you
know, but sometimes it justcomes, and it comes because it's
(32:36):
given to you as like a gift, tolike, hey, you don't have to
carry this for another decade.
You know, let's clear you out.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Yeah, I think that the you're right.
It is so hard to look back andthe problem is is that we lead
these like busy lives.
People are like I don't havetime.
That was, that wasinsignificant, I need to just
get over it, I don't have timeto deal with it.
It's really not that big of adeal, like you said, minimizing
it, but our nervous systems arestill holding onto that and,
(33:08):
like our nervous system, peoplehave to understand that your
nervous system is literallydesigned to save your life, like
that's what it's for is to saveyour life from danger, right?
So, like a tiger, is there?
What do you do?
Fight, flight, freeze, you know.
So you, your, your nervoussystem equates safety with the
(33:32):
familiar.
Things that are unfamiliar aredangerous.
So I once heard this and I useit a lot in my practice is the
familiar hell versus theunfamiliar heaven?
Because if you, your safetyequals familiar.
So your nervous system isalways going to try to keep you
(33:55):
safe by putting you in thefamiliar hell, even if you know
consciously a lot of peopledon't know consciously or
they're not putting it,connecting the dots, but like,
even if you, you know that thatfamiliar hell is actually
disruptive to you or or notserving you.
I should say you're still goingto go there versus the
(34:17):
unfamiliar heaven, because theunfamiliar heaven is unfamiliar,
thus equals, you know, not safe.
So, like your nervous system isis trying to save your life,
but right.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
Exactly.
Push through that.
And how many people are walkingaround using survival
mechanisms that once kept themsafe as a child or a young adult
and they're bringing it intotheir adult life where they
don't need them anymore.
But they're coming up.
When you're unloading thedishwasher or you're making
dinner, you're using survival.
We're not surviving anymore.
(34:50):
Everything's safe, it's securebringing the.
We haven't shed those survivalskills.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
And your body, your body and your mind are still
thinking like okay, therethere's, the danger is still
there.
Okay, there's still a tiger.
But it's really, it's not atiger, it's just the dishes or
something you know it's not, nota tiger, so my response doesn't
have to be the same, butawareness is the first step.
Speaker 1 (35:14):
That's just a gift to the rest of your life.
You know, to reframe it not ashard work, but just as a
complete gift and absolutefreedom so that you can live the
life you were meant to live sowell.
This has been a reallyinformational, educational talk.
I'm so grateful that you cameon and shared your personal
story too, so that people canrelate.
(35:35):
Can you let people know wherethey can find you and what
services you offer?
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Yeah, so my website is holistichealthbymelissacom.
I'm also on social mediaInstagram and Facebook.
At holistic health by Melissa,my, I offer one-on-one coaching.
I offer group coaching.
I should be launching my coursehere soon.
There's some freebies on mywebsite.
I have a top 10 tips toregulate your nervous system
guide and workbook.
(36:01):
It's 22 pages of like a seriouslike, in-depth, like tips and
assessing, like how those tipsare working for you and really
like trying to pull out some ofthat suppressed emotion about
you know, whatever you've gotgoing on in your life or have
experienced in your past.
And then I also have a nervoussystem assessment so you can see
(36:21):
, get a good idea of if yournervous system is regulated or
dysregulated.
And then, obviously, like anyquestions, feel free to message
me.
I handle all my own emails andInstagram messages and all of
that.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
So I just downloaded your quiz and also your workbook
and I'm going to put those tworesources in the show notes
along with all your contactinformation.
So, as we tie up the interview,I'd like to just ask you.
I know that you live analcohol-free life, so for
listeners that are going towardthat lifestyle, oftentimes this
(36:54):
kind of work is the next step.
Oftentimes, when people getsober, they are in like new
territory, and so they'll maybeseek out therapy, to kind of now
that they're clear, theirawareness is at a higher level
and they can start to make theconnections of, maybe, why they
chose to do what they did.
And once they shed that badhabit.
That's where they can come totherapy.
(37:16):
That's where they can come tosomeone like you and what would
be the top benefits of that andhow they can get started.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
Yeah, so I totally agree.
Like when you're, when you'redrinking alcohol or using you
know things to suppress youremotion, that's really what it
is.
It's a depressant.
People tend to use that kind ofas a crutch because they they
want to numb out, they don'twant to feel if they're not
drinking.
They feel these feelings thatare like okay, that's not
(37:46):
comfortable, I don't want tofeel that.
Let me just have a drink,because then it kind of goes
away, but then you know it comesback and actually alcohol just
perpetuates that feeling.
It's a depressant.
So like, as soon as you comedown off of alcohol, you're
going to feel more depressedlater and you got to keep
drinking to feel the same wayand then and then you get into,
you know, very slipperyterritory there.
(38:07):
But yeah, that's I.
I promote an alcohol free life,I live an alcohol free life.
For me it was a choice.
Actually listened to a podcastlast year where Dan Martell was
talking about his relationshipwith alcohol.
He was an alcoholic for 10years and said that he or maybe
he I don't remember how long hewas an alcohol, or maybe he
(38:28):
wasn't even an alcoholic but hechose an alcohol-free life
because he realized, wow, I usealcohol for everything.
If I have a good day, I havealcohol.
If I have a bad day, I havealcohol.
If I have a.
If I'm bored, I have alcohol.
If I'm celebrating, I havealcohol.
If I'm upset, I have alcohol.
And I went, oh my gosh, that isso true.
(38:50):
I was not an alcoholic, but Ifelt like I was kind of using it
for everything and I didn'tlike that and I was like I just
want to be completely sober andso that's what I'm doing.
And I think anybody who gets tothat place and wants to be
sober and wants to address theirpast traumas and live a
fulfilling, happy, you know,emotionally free life Like
(39:10):
that's the benefit, is emotionalfreedom, is clarity, is, um,
living your authentic self,really delving into those things
, while it may be hard in themoment, really is only going to
serve you in the long run andit's going to serve your whole
family.
It's going to serve yourchildren I speak a lot to moms
(39:32):
who your children are going tobenefit from you healing
yourself.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
That's the best thing you could do for your kids is
heal yourself.
Absolutely, I agree, 100%.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
I'm going to encouragelisteners to download your
resources and once again, it'sall going to be in the show
notes.
Reach out to Melissa Armstrong.
She is definitely someone whohas lived the life and has
experienced the healing solution, so, and I know that you
(40:00):
believe that every single personcan heal.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
Yeah, yeah.
That's what that's kind of mytagline.
I say you know, no matter whatthe experience, the situation, I
don't care what the doctorshave told you, healing is always
possible, Always.
Thank you for being here.
Speaker 1 (40:19):
Thanks for having me.
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