July 12, 2022 • 75 mins
If you were called out publicly (or worse, cancelled altogether), would your closest friends stick by your side and be there for you? In this episode, we examine the impact of being betrayed by close friends on social media for their own self-preservation. We also explore how the loss, grief, and trauma can permeate all future relationships and leave you with self-doubt anytime you decide to trust someone.
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ABOUT THE CBT DIVE PODCAST
The CBT Dive is a video podcast that brings therapy skills to the real world. Each episode welcomes a new guest who wants to explore a challenging situation using the most common cognitive behavioural therapy tool: the thought record.
ABOUT HOST
Rahim Thawer is a queer, racialized social worker and psychotherapist based in Toronto. He's created The CBT Dive podcast to support folks who want to learn how to use a thought record and to demystify what therapy can look like.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
UNKNOWN (00:00):
Thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Welcome to the CBT Dive, a vodcast that goes into
the lives of real people withreal struggles.
Each episode welcomes a newguest who wants to explore a
challenging situation using themost common cognitive behavioral
therapy tool, the ThoughtRecord.
Your host, Raheem Thawar, is asocial worker and
(00:21):
psychotherapist based in Torontoand well-known for his work in
LGBTQ communities.
He's created the CBT Dive todiminish What therapy can look
like and share interventionskills for wellness.
We hope that each episode helpsyou along on your own journey
for insight and self-compassion.
SPEAKER_02 (00:47):
Hello everyone and welcome to the CBT dive.
Today I have the pleasure ofworking with Andrea.
I met Andrea on my travels a fewyears ago when I was presenting
in a conference in Georgia.
Andrea is 50 years old.
She's a fabulous writer.
(01:08):
I know because I've read herbooks and recommended them to
other folks.
And she lives in LA where allthe famous people live.
And She has dogs.
She loves them.
And before we jumped on thissession today, we were thinking
about what the best way to spenda Friday is.
(01:29):
And it turns out we have similarideas about how to pass time on
a Friday afternoon or a Fridaymorning, as it were in L.A.
Andrea, how are you today?
SPEAKER_03 (01:41):
Hi, I'm pretty good.
I'm a little tired, but I'mgood.
SPEAKER_02 (01:45):
Okay.
Andrea, I want to start byasking you a little bit about
what you either know aboutcognitive behavioral therapy or
what your relationship tocounseling has been in the past.
You don't have to share toomuch, but like, have you gone?
Have you liked it?
Has it been helpful?
Do you hate it?
Are you scared of it?
That kind of thing.
SPEAKER_03 (02:03):
Yeah.
I'm a lifelong therapy attender.
So I have been in therapy for 25years, not continuously,
sometimes on and off.
I've done a whole bunch ofdifferent modalities, including
(02:25):
Freudian analysis back in NewYork City in the day and a bunch
of CBT and more recently in thepast, like eight years
dialectical behavior therapy,DBT.
So most of my experiences havebeen with cognitive behavior
(02:46):
therapy.
And I think therapy is like anecessary part of life.
I think everyone should be intherapy and more than once
therapy has literally saved mylife.
SPEAKER_02 (03:00):
Wow.
I'm so happy to hear that.
You know, sometimes I talk topeople and they think, oh,
you're, you're, Like I toldsomeone yesterday, I'm looking
for a schema therapist.
I want to try that.
And they were like, but what'sthe problem you're focusing on?
And I'm like, girl, just gettingthrough the day.
There's so much to process.
There's so much to process,right?
(03:22):
So I appreciate sharing thisvirtual space with you as
somebody who's keen on therapy.
My hope today is that some ofthe skills you already have are
brought in to this space becauseYou know, all of our skills need
sharpening, and this could be away that you begin to think
more, and that could be helpfulfor you.
(03:44):
Maybe you'll find it too easy.
That's another risk we'retaking.
And you'll be like, eh, I didn'treally learn anything.
But, you know, one thing I'vebeen telling my guests is that
even if you're really good atsomething or you have a lot of
exposure to it, having someonecoach you through a particular
process can be nice, right?
(04:04):
That's why we go back totherapists over and over.
All right.
I am going to go ahead and sharemy screen.
And when I do that, we're goingto look together at the thought
record that we're going to beworking on today.
SPEAKER_01 (04:18):
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (04:23):
All right.
Do you see that thought recordon your screen, Andrea?
Uh-huh.
Uh-huh.
Okay.
And when you've done CBT before,has it looked like this?
Have you used a thought recordor do you think you...
SPEAKER_03 (04:37):
I've never used a thought record.
SPEAKER_02 (04:39):
Okay, okay.
So with CBT, there's differententry points.
Some people do interventionsthat focus on the thoughts and
see how they can impact yourfeelings and behaviors.
And whereas other folks mightsay, we're going to focus on
behaviors.
So they'll say, let's dobehavioral strategies.
Let's do behavioral skills.
(05:00):
And I think when you talkedabout DBT, a lot of the entry
point for that is behavioralbecause you notice a feeling,
but you don't think about allthe thoughts so much.
You interrupt that line ofemotional intensity with the
behavior.
So The situation we're going toanalyze today is something you
(05:23):
had told me about prior to ourrecording.
My close friend Carly postedawful things about me online and
stopped talking to me after Iwas called out on social media
by someone else.
Now, this happened some timeago, right?
Was this approximately one yearago?
SPEAKER_03 (05:43):
Yeah, a year ago.
SPEAKER_02 (05:45):
Okay.
And are you friends with Carlyat all now?
SPEAKER_03 (05:50):
And,
SPEAKER_02 (05:55):
you know, because this is a big situation, I'm
looking for a bit more, just ahint of more specificity.
So I'm most curious about whenthe difficult feelings come up
for you now.
Is it when you look at picturesor is it just when you think
about what went down?
I'm thinking about what's themoment, you know,
SPEAKER_03 (06:17):
when
SPEAKER_02 (06:18):
this comes back for you.
SPEAKER_03 (06:20):
Right.
It comes back for me more than Iwant it to.
I'll say that.
Yeah.
In other words, it's unexpectedsometimes, right?
I don't have to, like, I don'tfollow her on social media
anymore, but she's in my circle,both personally and
(06:40):
professionally.
So inevitably she pops up in aconversation or online and, And
or the kind of site of the callout was on Facebook.
SPEAKER_02 (06:58):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (06:59):
And Facebook is sort of ubiquitous and everywhere.
So I feel like I go back to theevent itself, the call out, and
then how everyone around mereacted to it.
UNKNOWN (07:17):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (07:18):
Like several times a week.
Okay.
It just pops back up in my head.
SPEAKER_02 (07:24):
And is what activates it when her name or
her work shows up in some way?
SPEAKER_03 (07:31):
Yes.
And also sometimes it literallyjust pops into my head.
SPEAKER_02 (07:40):
Like when you're walking, for example.
Right.
You take your dog for a walk.
Like
SPEAKER_03 (07:44):
I'm getting ready to go to sleep and like it pops.
it sort of pops up in my headand I'm, I mean, in my case, I'm
like, I'm like drafting a letterto her or an email in my head.
Yeah.
Or I'm analyzing, I'mreanalyzing the situation.
SPEAKER_02 (08:05):
Okay.
You know what?
That's very helpful because whenwe refine it.
So the whole situation thatyou've named is important
because, but usually thesituation ends up being context
because this precise time thatwe pinpointed is like when
(08:27):
you're getting ready to go tobed.
And sometimes your reaction tothat is going to look different
or your thoughts are going to bedifferent than if we were
talking about, you know, a timewhen her name comes up
professionally, right?
Because when her name comes upprofessionally, you might be
thinking, you know, I wish shedidn't, for example, you know,
(08:49):
if it was my field, I wish thisperson didn't get referrals,
because I don't like them,something like that.
Whereas at a different time,you're thinking more about
interpersonally, like Like theloss or being misunderstood.
Like a different thing comes up.
SPEAKER_01 (09:05):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (09:05):
So I want you to think about the same situation
or the context of the situation,but more specifically when
you're getting ready to go tobed.
Andrea, what feelings come upfor you when the situation is
activated for you and you'reabout to go to bed?
SPEAKER_03 (09:27):
Grief.
SPEAKER_01 (09:29):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (09:31):
Betrayal, frustration, anger, sadness, a
feeling of being misunderstood.
Yeah.
Like a lingering feeling ofconfusion about why she did it.
(09:58):
I'm still just not...
Why she did it.
So there's still like confusionthere.
And.
And then a kind of like.
Judgment of myself for not fortrusting her.
(10:25):
For like thinking that.
Like I definitely, I sort ofrate and judge myself.
Like, how did you get in thesituation in the first place?
Like, how are you friends withsomeone who would do this to
you?
SPEAKER_02 (10:39):
Okay.
Yeah, that's an interesting one.
I don't know what that, I putdown judging self.
I don't know another way tolabel that as a feeling, even
though I know there probably isa word for it, but we'll come
back to that.
Are there any other feelingsthat come up for you?
(11:00):
You do have a good list, but.
SPEAKER_03 (11:04):
No, I think that's, I think that's
SPEAKER_02 (11:05):
good.
That's it?
SPEAKER_03 (11:07):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (11:07):
Okay.
Well, I'm going to add, I'mgoing to, I just like to name a
few more and then you can tellme if they fit or not.
Is there curiosity?
SPEAKER_03 (11:23):
No.
SPEAKER_02 (11:24):
Relief?
SPEAKER_03 (11:26):
No.
SPEAKER_02 (11:28):
Isolation.
SPEAKER_01 (11:34):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (11:41):
Okay.
Self-doubt.
Uh-huh.
You just said confusion.
It's like bewilderment almost.
Uh-huh.
Do you feel self-critical?
SPEAKER_03 (12:02):
Oh, that's like my default.
SPEAKER_02 (12:06):
Okay.
So that's
SPEAKER_03 (12:08):
my every day.
That's my baseline.
SPEAKER_02 (12:09):
So when we combine judging self and self-doubt and
self-critical, the word thatcomes up for me and tell me if
it fits is like shame orembarrassment.
SPEAKER_03 (12:27):
I think shame.
Sure.
Shame.
SPEAKER_02 (12:30):
Okay.
You said sadness and you saidgrief.
Often what goes with grief isalso loss.
Like I think they're closecousins.
Grief is often our response toloss, but sometimes people
experience them separately.
(12:51):
I don't know.
Is that true for you or are theyone in the same?
SPEAKER_03 (12:55):
Yeah.
They're kind of one in the samefor me, I think, grief and loss.
SPEAKER_02 (13:04):
Yeah, that's great.
You know what?
I'm going to just put themtogether then, if that's okay.
So we've got grief loss,betrayal, frustration, anger,
sadness, misunderstood,confusion, isolation,
self-doubt, self-critical,judging self, shame.
Okay, we've...
(13:26):
We've got a good list.
Now you're thinking about, thisis the moment when you're
getting ready to go to sleep andthis enters your mind.
I wonder if like the way youdescribed it, even like in your
mind, you're drafting a letter,there's a sense of overwhelm.
Like this thing takes over.
(13:46):
Like you, it's almost like youget possessed by it.
SPEAKER_03 (13:50):
Yeah.
I mean, I'm a ruminator ingeneral.
Yeah.
And so I have intrusive thoughtsthat I sometimes feel like I
can't control.
And
SPEAKER_02 (14:05):
of course,
SPEAKER_03 (14:08):
when I'm going to bed, I want to relax.
I want to unwind.
I actually don't want this shitpopping in my head right before
I go to bed.
UNKNOWN (14:19):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (14:20):
Yeah.
So there's a few words coming upfor me.
Rumination, overwhelmed, andloss of control.
Because you wish you could putthis away, but you can't really.
You're overcome with it.
Okay, now we maybe have too manyfeelings, but that's okay.
That's how complex humans are.
(14:41):
All right.
So in this situation, you'regetting ready to go to bed.
You're thinking about theclosest friend who posted awful
things about you online.
I want you to rate each of thesefeelings for me on a scale of
one to 10, 10 being the mostintense and one, not at all.
So how would you rate your senseof grief and loss?
(15:07):
Betrayal.
SPEAKER_03 (15:08):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (15:11):
frustration.
SPEAKER_03 (15:11):
Five.
SPEAKER_02 (15:15):
Anger.
SPEAKER_03 (15:17):
Seven.
SPEAKER_02 (15:21):
Sadness.
SPEAKER_01 (15:29):
Five.
SPEAKER_02 (15:32):
Misunderstood.
SPEAKER_03 (15:33):
10.
SPEAKER_02 (15:41):
Confusion.
SPEAKER_03 (15:45):
Five.
SPEAKER_02 (15:48):
Isolation.
SPEAKER_03 (15:51):
Sorry, that's my dog.
SPEAKER_02 (15:54):
No, that's great.
SPEAKER_03 (15:56):
They're doing construction next door.
SPEAKER_02 (15:58):
Oh, I thought you wanted to rate the feeling.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (16:02):
Isolation.
Like a
SPEAKER_01 (16:07):
six.
UNKNOWN (16:08):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_02 (16:10):
Self-doubt.
SPEAKER_01 (16:14):
Eight.
SPEAKER_02 (16:18):
Self-critical.
SPEAKER_03 (16:19):
Ten.
SPEAKER_02 (16:24):
And judging self for trusting this person.
SPEAKER_03 (16:30):
Ten.
SPEAKER_02 (16:38):
Okay, shame.
SPEAKER_01 (16:42):
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (16:45):
Rumination.
SPEAKER_01 (16:46):
Eight.
SPEAKER_02 (16:52):
Overwhelmed.
SPEAKER_01 (16:56):
Four.
And
SPEAKER_02 (16:59):
loss of control.
SPEAKER_01 (17:04):
Eight.
SPEAKER_02 (17:06):
Eight.
Andrea, is there a hint of envyat all?
SPEAKER_03 (17:13):
No,
SPEAKER_02 (17:14):
no.
Okay.
I just thought I'd ask becauseit seems like the way I'm, I'm
one of the ways I'm imaginingthe scenario and you'll tell me
more about it in a bit is thatmaybe there was a kind of
competition or that somebody,somebody put you down so that
they could get ahead.
I mean,
SPEAKER_03 (17:34):
that's like been suggested to me, right?
Like, like, Like a few peoplehave kind of explained it to me
as, Oh, she was trying to saveher own ass.
SPEAKER_01 (17:50):
She was
SPEAKER_03 (17:50):
trying to sort of distance herself from you so
that she didn't get sort ofcaught up in the drama.
Right.
So she was sort of trying tosignal like, oh, you think I'm
really close to that person.
And so you may have somethoughts about me, but like,
actually, no, I'm going to gofor the jugular right away so
that you know that I'm not withher or like her.
SPEAKER_02 (18:16):
Okay.
So in the automatic thoughtscolumn, one of the things I'm
putting down is one of thethoughts that comes up is, Carly
acted this way out ofself-preservation because that's
the idea.
I mean, maybe it didn'toriginate from you, but it's
been implemented.
It didn't
SPEAKER_03 (18:33):
originate from me for sure.
It was not automatic, but yes.
SPEAKER_02 (18:36):
No.
But it
SPEAKER_03 (18:37):
crosses my mind now because several people have said
they think that's what's goingon.
SPEAKER_02 (18:41):
Okay.
Okay.
So- I'm just going to go back astep to the behavior column
because it's particular whenyou're getting ready to go to
sleep.
What are some of the things youdo?
So in your mind, you draft aletter, you reanalyze the
situation.
Is there anything else like youcount to 10, take a sleeping
pill, do some meditation, sendangry, you write out an angry
(19:05):
email and then delete it.
You watch TV.
SPEAKER_03 (19:09):
Right, right, right, right, right.
UNKNOWN (19:11):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (19:17):
I always draft the emails in my head.
I don't always write them.
In this case, I haven't writtenone for this situation.
But sometimes I do write themand delete them.
I mean, I'm really trying tosort of like empty my brain of
(19:39):
thoughts.
Like there's so much residualnoise at the end of my day.
And I sort of want to put itlike on a shelf and say, okay,
like we're, you're going to dealwith this tomorrow because right
now, like you need to rest.
SPEAKER_02 (20:00):
Yes.
So you try to do self-talkessentially.
SPEAKER_01 (20:05):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (20:06):
I need to rest and put this on a shelf for now.
And I like that.
That's really interesting.
That's really great.
I'm guessing the self-talk is abit, it's a bit of a battle.
It sounds like you have to pushthrough it right.
Until you, I guess, until youlike tire out.
SPEAKER_03 (20:25):
Right.
Yeah.
Okay.
All right.
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (20:30):
So I I'm just trying to identify, I just want to make
sure we're on the same page herethat you haven't engaged in
behaviors that arecounterproductive or causing you
more distress or harm.
No.
Okay.
Great.
So the automatic thoughts columnis really about what comes into
your mind when you're gettingready to go to sleep and you
(20:53):
think about the situation withCarly.
And the first thought that I putdown there wasn't even one of
yours.
So tell me what one of yoursmight be.
So, for example, when you thinkmaybe I'll make that a bit more
specific.
When you feel when you say youfeel.
(21:15):
betrayed.
I feel betrayed because...
I
SPEAKER_03 (21:25):
really had this idea of our friendship as being
intimate and of her reallyseeing me and caring for me.
So...
(21:47):
it seems like a total about fit.
It doesn't make sense in thecontext of what I thought our
relationship is and what, who Ithought she was.
And
SPEAKER_02 (22:00):
another thing,
SPEAKER_03 (22:01):
confusion,
SPEAKER_02 (22:03):
but that's okay.
They can, they can, they canoverlap.
Right.
So, cause you alluded to thisearlier when you said judging
self, you said, I judged myselffor, um, You know, it's kind of
like, exactly.
SPEAKER_03 (22:18):
Yeah.
So I, I judged myself fortrusting her and also, you know,
opening up to her.
We had just probably like ninemonths before that gone on
vacation together and had somelike really intense talks.
(22:39):
And I had been really vulnerablewith her.
more so than ever before in ourrelationship.
Like we both joked at the end ofit, that like our relationship
had like leveled up as a resultof some of the things that
(23:01):
happened.
And then we had to process andshe was there for me, like in a
really intense, loving way.
And so I, So I felt like wemoved into this like new phase
where she really had my back.
(23:22):
She sort of unequivocally had myback.
And that was like a central kindof feature to the relationship
for me at that time.
SPEAKER_02 (23:35):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (23:36):
So this seemed like literally the opposite of it.
SPEAKER_02 (23:40):
Okay.
SPEAKER_03 (23:41):
So how did I...
have this experience where Ithought like this person, 100%
has my back and loves me andcares about me.
How is it possible that shecould do this?
SPEAKER_02 (23:55):
Right.
SPEAKER_03 (23:56):
Like I've got to, I've got to have misread
something or, or read thesituation incorrectly.
SPEAKER_02 (24:06):
Okay.
So now we're saying that as aresult of this person's
duplicitousness, is that a word,or duplicity?
You're thinking, I might havemisread this person, right?
(24:33):
And that's essentially whensomebody's this duplicitous
person What does it say aboutyou for having bought into one
of their sides?
One is that I might have misreadthis person.
I imagine there's some pride youhave around being able to assess
(24:53):
who is trustworthy and not, andthis might have thwarted that a
bit.
SPEAKER_03 (24:57):
Yeah, I feel like I'm pretty guarded sometimes.
I feel like I have this sort oftight inner circle and that
tight inner circle really getsto see every side of me, me at
my absolute worst and me at likemy most open or needy or right.
(25:23):
And so like, that's not like athing I just like drop on
anyone.
SPEAKER_02 (25:28):
No.
So what does it mean if, you letsomeone into that inner circle
and they're a bad fit or likethey weren't intended to be
there.
What does that say about theinner circle even existing or
you being able to be vulnerablemoving forward?
SPEAKER_03 (25:49):
Well, it just doesn't feel safe.
So yeah.
So I feel, I feel moredistrusting.
I feel, and I feel less safe.
SPEAKER_02 (26:02):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so as you meet new people oreven current people in your
inner circle, this distrust getsactivated.
Is that right?
SPEAKER_01 (26:16):
Okay.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (26:18):
So would it be fair to say you've had to become
distant from people in your lifecurrently as a protective
mechanism?
SPEAKER_03 (26:34):
Yeah, I feel like it's almost like the circle
tightens, right?
Like then I begin to sort ofassess in that like
hypervigilant way, like who canI really, really trust?
SPEAKER_02 (26:53):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (26:54):
And who's really like my ride or die?
SPEAKER_02 (26:57):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (26:59):
And who might just sort of like jump ship at any
moment.
SPEAKER_02 (27:12):
So I have to tighten my circle further before being
vulnerable.
I'm also thinking here, ifthat's true, if you have to
tighten your circle and it'shard to trust people, what does
that mean for your life, yourrelationships, your day-to-day?
SPEAKER_03 (27:33):
Just that I feel more isolated and alone.
And this definitely happenedduring the pandemic.
So it's like kind of a badcombination.
SPEAKER_02 (27:44):
Yeah.
No, I bet.
I bet.
And when you think about, so yousay I feel more isolated and
alone.
I'm wondering if the thoughtthere, it's actually shifting
over from like a thought in thissituation to maybe an underlying
belief.
Maybe that I'll always have tobe protective or people will
(28:07):
always try to take advantage ofme.
I don't think I can ever fullytrust anyone.
Are there any beliefs like thatthat are kind of simmering?
SPEAKER_03 (28:29):
I have a belief that people can turn on me.
SPEAKER_02 (28:39):
And is it fair to say people or anyone?
SPEAKER_03 (28:45):
Well, it's like, so when the whole context of this
with the Facebook group was likea lot of people turning on me,
but, and that felt horrible, butyeah, I didn't necessarily have
close relationships witheveryone in the Facebook group.
Right.
So it's like, I could say aboutseveral of the people, like, you
(29:09):
don't know me.
Like you're, you know what Imean?
Like you're seeing this inreally black and white
circumstances and you're justlike jumping on the bandwagon of
like, let's hate on me.
Yeah.
UNKNOWN (29:25):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (29:26):
So it felt like there was like a clear divide
there of like people who justdon't know me.
And so it's like, and I sort of,I'm not invested in them.
You know what I mean?
So I'm like, like, they're
SPEAKER_01 (29:41):
sort of
SPEAKER_03 (29:42):
like, fuck you.
But then there are people whoknow me and how could you sort
of like turn on a dime?
SPEAKER_02 (29:51):
Yeah.
If people could turn on a dime,I'm curious to know, what does
it say about the world for you?
I
SPEAKER_03 (30:07):
mean that it's unsafe.
SPEAKER_02 (30:09):
Yeah.
And If I'm going to the thoughtall the way at the top where
(30:30):
Carly acted this way out ofself-preservation, that's one of
the thoughts.
If that's true, what's the...
What does that mean for yourrelationships in general?
So not just that they're unsafe,but that...
I don't know.
I'm wondering if there'ssomething else.
SPEAKER_03 (30:51):
Well, it's like that...
There's a limit to people'sloyalty,
SPEAKER_02 (31:01):
right?
SPEAKER_03 (31:03):
That like people can be loyal, but then to a point,
and then it's like, oh, I gottaget the fuck out of here.
And the only way to do that isfor me to actually like throw me
under the bus.
SPEAKER_02 (31:17):
Yeah, yeah.
When you think about the griefand loss piece, is it loss of
the entire, is it about loss ofthis person?
(31:40):
Is it loss of a larger communityor is it more loss of the
community because of thisperson?
SPEAKER_03 (31:56):
It's loss of this person for sure.
Like it's, I thought I couldcount on her.
You know, like I counted her inthis sort of like charm circle.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (32:16):
So that takes me to your self-doubt and your
self-criticism.
So if you think you can count onsomeone and it turns out You
can't.
What does that say about you,Andrea?
SPEAKER_03 (32:29):
That I have bad judgment.
That I've like misread thesituation.
SPEAKER_01 (32:35):
That
SPEAKER_03 (32:37):
I've misread the person in front of me.
Because it's like, if you quizme, if you gave me a quiz like a
year before and said, how likelyare these people to betray you?
Right?
SPEAKER_01 (32:51):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (32:51):
And you just like made me fill it out.
And it was about like 20 people.
SPEAKER_01 (32:55):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (32:57):
feel like I would have rated Carly low, really
low, actually.
You know, there's other peoplewho I'd been like, I don't know,
I haven't known them well enoughor long enough, or maybe we're
like, you know what I mean?
But
SPEAKER_02 (33:13):
yeah,
SPEAKER_03 (33:15):
I, I felt pretty, I would feel pretty confident
before this, that she would notdo this to me.
SPEAKER_02 (33:23):
Right.
Now, One other thing I'd like toask you in relation to this is,
I think it might be context.
From what I'm understanding, youwere called out on social media.
(33:44):
So you posted something someoneelse didn't like.
I know you a little bit.
And from what I know, you likelytried to be accountable in all
the right ways.
And you're talking about some ofthe toxic things that do end up
happening on social media.
And here, it seems like peoplewho you thought would engage in
(34:04):
a more rational accountabilityprocess with you did it.
They completely abandoned youand you, and you called you out
and said awful things about youand you lost a lot of community.
Is that about sum it up?
SPEAKER_01 (34:16):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So
SPEAKER_02 (34:19):
there's this kind of shunning that you experienced.
Yeah.
And, So even though the loss isabout this person, the other
thing I'm wondering is, is therea thought there about having
lost notoriety, careeropportunities, things like that?
(34:44):
Like, is there a loss of...
That
SPEAKER_03 (34:47):
definitely happened.
I mean, it's not a thought.
It actually happened.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (34:53):
Okay.
And...
As a result of that, does thatchange how you think about
yourself?
Like I'm no longer this, or Ican no longer do that.
I
SPEAKER_03 (35:14):
mean, honestly, because I feel like I've had a
lot of time to process this.
UNKNOWN (35:21):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (35:28):
I mean, if I'm being honest, I feel like it really
spurred me to assess thecommunity to begin with and how
people were treating each other.
And I call it like, get out ofthe sandbox.
(35:49):
There was some like real juniorhigh mean girl bullshit behavior
that I felt like, when all was,when the smoke sort of cleared,
I was like, do I want to beat,like, do I want to invest my
time and energy into this groupof people who will like turn on
(36:15):
a dime and go after sort ofanyone they want?
And they, and all of them kindof join, you know, it's like,
it's like everyone was just sortof on this like group think
situation,
SPEAKER_01 (36:25):
right?
SPEAKER_03 (36:26):
Where it's like, That's part of the other reason
that the Carly situation hurtwas because she actually had a
choice to not say anything.
SPEAKER_02 (36:39):
Yes.
SPEAKER_03 (36:40):
So no one said, hey, Carly, you know this person.
What do you think?
SPEAKER_02 (36:46):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (36:47):
No one said that.
Carly could have silentlyobserved the situation.
Some people silently observedthe situation and then called
me, right, offline.
SPEAKER_02 (36:56):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (36:57):
Talked to me, supported me.
Some people just went in for thejugular.
And I felt like she went in forthe jugular when she could have
literally just sat back and notsaid anything.
SPEAKER_02 (37:10):
And not said anything.
Okay.
I'm just making a note hereabout something.
Okay.
So...
one more question that i havefor you is about this statement
(37:31):
you made about i have badjudgment um is that is that
specific to this situationbecause you were blindsided or
is that is there a larger tropethere where you've felt perhaps
I'm just throwing this outthere, perhaps in the past that
you've had bad judgment or notgood boundaries and you thought
(37:54):
you'd overcome that or, or gainskills in that area.
And now this feels like asetback of sorts.
SPEAKER_03 (38:00):
Right.
So I don't think of myself ashaving a lot of self doubt.
SPEAKER_02 (38:04):
Okay.
SPEAKER_03 (38:05):
In general that I, I feel like I have very strong
intuition and, And I listen tomy gut.
I listen to my inner voice.
And it has mostly served mereally well in the world.
(38:26):
I feel like I can read peoplereally well.
And I'm emotionally intelligent,
SPEAKER_01 (38:33):
socially
SPEAKER_03 (38:34):
intelligent.
And so it's not really arecurring theme for me.
SPEAKER_02 (38:43):
Okay.
SPEAKER_03 (38:44):
It's not.
It feels, that's why it feels alittle like, yes, like I was
blindsided.
SPEAKER_02 (38:49):
Yeah.
So what I wrote down was it'shard to rely on what I thought
was strong intuition.
So here's what I'm going to do,Andrea.
I'm going to read out this listof thoughts.
Some of the thoughts that Well,most of the, okay.
So the thoughts that don't havearrows beside them are kind of
(39:10):
the things that are top of mind.
They come up really quickly forus.
And then the ones with thearrows are the ones that we've
distilled a bit.
And the kinds of things we'vedone to distill it is we've
taken what might sound more likean objective fact and tried to
(39:33):
say, well, what does this meanif it's true?
What does it say about me ifthis is true?
Or if this is the case, what isthe consequence for my life, my
relationships?
Or what does it say about mypast, present, and future?
So we've got this situation.
You're getting ready to go tosleep.
(39:54):
You're thinking about this thingthat happened with Carly.
You feel grief.
Betrayal, frustration, anger,sadness, misunderstood,
confusion, isolation,self-doubt, self-critical,
judging, self-shame, rumination,overwhelmed, loss of control.
Here are the thoughts that gowith those.
Carly acted this way out ofself-preservation.
(40:16):
There's a limit to people'sloyalty.
I can't believe I trusted thisperson.
I opened up to her and was veryvulnerable with her.
We leveled up.
I thought I could count on her.
And so the consequence of thisor what this means is or for you
is maybe I have bad judgment.
It's hard to rely on what Ithought was strong intuition.
(40:38):
I thought our friendship wasintimate and that she really saw
me and cared for me.
She had my back.
So what does this say about you,the future?
Or what's the consequence of anyof this is true, which of course
is true, but I might havemisread this person.
It doesn't feel safe to bevulnerable, even in my inner
circle.
I have to tighten my circlefurther before being vulnerable.
(41:00):
It's always possible that peoplecan turn on me.
And now that includes closefriends.
Does this capture a lot of thethings that go on in your mind?
SPEAKER_01 (41:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (41:18):
Yeah.
Is there one that stands out toyou?
Preferably one that's got alittle arrow beside it.
I
SPEAKER_03 (41:35):
guess it's the last one.
It's always possible that peoplecan turn on me now.
And now that includes closefriends.
SPEAKER_02 (41:42):
Okay.
So what I'm going to do is I'mhighlighting that one and we're
going to call that one.
your hot thought.
So a hot thought is the thoughtthat's the most salient or the
most prominent.
It's the one that drives a lotof the difficult feelings in
this particular situation.
And so you've picked, it'salways possible that people can
(42:06):
turn on me.
And now that includes closefriends.
Before we go further, I justwonder, this idea of people
turning on you, like, Is it thekind of work you do or the kind
of, is it an LA thing?
Is it something, I'm just tryingto figure out, like, there's
(42:26):
kind of a slightly cynical slashhostile sentiment under it.
And I just wonder, is theresomething I'm missing or I need
to know about this?
SPEAKER_03 (42:46):
I mean, this experience was really profound
and really painful and reallytraumatic for me.
And so it's like Carly's like apiece of it.
But there are a lot of peoplewho I've known for decades who I
haven't spoken to since thishappened.
SPEAKER_02 (43:07):
Okay.
Okay.
I hear that.
Totally.
SPEAKER_03 (43:10):
It's like...
Yeah, I think it's just had aprofound effect on me because
SPEAKER_02 (43:17):
it
SPEAKER_03 (43:17):
was such a shit show.
And I understand the largercontext because like this is
happening kind of in circleseverywhere and online, but like
it really was like a bloodbath.
And certain people'sparticipation in it hurt more
(43:43):
because of my relationship withthem.
But like the whole thing as awhole was, was really traumatic.
SPEAKER_02 (43:51):
Okay.
Fair, fair.
Now, Andrea, what we're going todo is we're going to analyze
this hot thought.
It's always possible that peoplecould turn on me.
And now that includes closefriends.
We want some evidence to supportthis hot thought, which won't be
hard because you told me aboutCarly and all these people from
decades that you've known.
So let's start there.
I'm just going to say evidencethat supports.
(44:17):
I'll say Carly in particular.
And the other evidence is peopleyou've known for decades.
These are friends or colleaguesor community folks?
Yeah, so they're
SPEAKER_03 (44:28):
friends and colleagues.
people I've collaborated with onprojects, people I have personal
relationships with, who Isocialize with outside of the
group, people who've known mefor a really long time.
SPEAKER_02 (44:51):
Okay.
And before this event or afterthis particular event, have you
always...
Not always.
Have you had any otherexperiences that people could
turn on you?
Specifically people who are inyour close circle?
SPEAKER_01 (45:11):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (45:12):
Yeah.
Can you take me back to a timewhen that happened?
And you could just share asbrief, like,
SPEAKER_01 (45:19):
I just need
SPEAKER_02 (45:20):
something that kind of.
SPEAKER_03 (45:21):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So two of my closest friendswere a couple.
UNKNOWN (45:29):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (45:29):
And, um, I know them both forever.
I consider them chosen familyand they had an incredibly
difficult, contentious, likehorrible divorce.
And I ended up being the mainsupport system for one of them
and was there like for thedaily, like bursting into tears,
(45:55):
horrible crying trauma, just shewas going through it.
And I was really there for her.
I validated her.
It was just an awful kind ofsituation.
Right.
Of course.
And I knew like more of theinner workings than anyone else.
(46:16):
Right.
And so, and there was just a lotof really bad behavior on the
part of her partner, you know,that, and so, A year after they
divorced, I found out that theybegan seeing each other again.
SPEAKER_02 (46:37):
Okay.
SPEAKER_03 (46:40):
And so I questioned my friend and was like, wow.
Didn't see this coming.
And essentially, she began tosort of pull back from me.
And I feel like it was becauseshe knows I know where all the
(47:01):
bodies are buried, right?
SPEAKER_02 (47:04):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (47:04):
So it's like in order for her to be able to make
sense of being with this personwho mistreated her so intensely
that I was witness to, she sortof had to be like, let me back
up because I don't know, I mighthave something to say about it.
And so essentially I feel likeWe could no longer be friends
(47:28):
because she was like, thisrelationship with her ex-partner
is really important to me.
And that and my relationshipwith me can't exist.
SPEAKER_02 (47:41):
I see.
You know, both of thatsituation, and I think I'm
guessing the social media one,if there was a similarity, it
might be that you're under theassumption that if you are being
helpful and being accountableand doing the right thing,
(48:03):
that'll lead to a good outcome.
And that belief might have beenreally undermined for you.
SPEAKER_03 (48:10):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (48:12):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (48:13):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (48:16):
We'll leave that on the back burner for now.
But this evidence is good,right?
It makes sense that you wouldthink I really got to be distant
from people.
Now, is there evidence that doesnot support this idea that you
have to be super, super careful,even in your close circle of
friends?
Like you did say before that,like, you've had a good
(48:41):
intuition for the most part inyour life.
Right.
So I'll put that in.
Oh, I put goose.
I've had a goose sense.
I've had a good sense.
of people in my life prior tothis?
(49:03):
I
SPEAKER_03 (49:06):
guess my other evidence is just that there are
people that I've been friendswith for a really long time who
I've gone through shitty thingswith who haven't abandoned me
over them.
SPEAKER_02 (49:27):
Okay, so I've had friends who have lasted through
difficult times and they haven'tabandoned me.
SPEAKER_03 (49:35):
And then I also guess like, I feel like there
are people in my life who don'tjust sort of like dismiss me or
cut me off.
(49:56):
You know what I mean?
That are willing to stay andfigure it out.
SPEAKER_01 (50:06):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (50:19):
All right.
You're feeling...
You're having some feelings atthe moment.
Are those feelings almost inpart like gratitude for some of
these folks who've stayed?
It just seems like the emotionsamped up a bit when you were
talking about the good folks inyour life.
SPEAKER_03 (50:43):
Yeah, I do.
I feel grateful that I do havepeople in my life who...
I can a hundred percent bemyself with and who see me and
who are not sort of quick tolike turn on a dime kind of.
SPEAKER_02 (51:10):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, I'm not in thebusiness of diagnosing, as in
I'm not allowed
SPEAKER_03 (51:27):
to.
Oh, really?
You're a therapist.
SPEAKER_02 (51:29):
I know it's different in America versus
Canada.
I'm allowed to help someoneunderstand their diagnosis, but
not provide the label.
But I'm going to tell you rightnow that your friend sounds like
(51:51):
someone who has overdeveloped astrategy to both attach and then
attack.
And that might come from her owncomplex trauma.
I don't know.
That sometimes shows up inpeople who struggle with certain
(52:13):
personality disorders.
But people don't talk aboutthose when they're struggling
with them because they're quitestigmatized.
Right.
So I'm just putting that outthere.
I don't know.
You might know that person well,and they might've disclosed
something like that to you.
I don't know, but it's justsomething I'm seeing if that
helps give some, a way tocontextualize this really
(52:40):
bizarre behavior on her part of,of, of turning on a dime, as you
said.
SPEAKER_01 (52:45):
Great.
SPEAKER_02 (52:46):
Andrea says, We are in the second last column.
And this column is about comingup with an alternative thought
or a balanced thought, somethingthat will help you get to sleep
at night, will help you makesense of the situation.
Something that is different fromthe only way out is for me to be
(53:08):
more cautious about who I letnear me or that I can't trust my
own judgment, right?
So what would that alternativethought be, do you think?
And we can come up with severalof them.
SPEAKER_03 (53:30):
I mean, it's really simple and very black and white,
but sometimes it's not about me.
SPEAKER_02 (53:38):
Yeah.
No, I love that.
SPEAKER_03 (53:41):
Okay.
In other words, I often, inconflict with people...
sort of jumped to like all theway, all the things like I did
wrong and all the ways that Isort of fell down or
miscommunicated and have thisidea that like if I would have
done these 10 thingsdifferently, the outcome would
(54:03):
be totally different.
But I've learned in my 50 yearsof life that actually sometimes
you could do all, you could doall the things over differently
and then you can have the sameoutcome.
SPEAKER_01 (54:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (54:15):
Because the other person is like going through
their shit and it triggered ortouched on something that's
theirs.
And it had so much more to dowith them than it has to do with
you.
SPEAKER_01 (54:30):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (54:34):
Just typing some of this out over here.
Yeah.
So sometimes it's not about me.
Instead of telling myself Icould have done things
differently, I might have toaccept that the outcome is
heavily dependent on the otherperson.
SPEAKER_01 (54:56):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (54:58):
Yeah.
I wonder if there's a thoughthere about just the communities
you run in and something aboutdisplaced anger or scapegoating.
or canceling, is there a thoughtthere that, is there something
(55:20):
there that we just need toacknowledge or address?
SPEAKER_03 (55:25):
Yeah, which is that like people are just traumatized
people, like traumatize otherpeople, hurt people, hurt other
people.
The context for this very muchfelt like people kind of
reliving their own traumas.
(55:49):
It felt so personal because theywere saying my name, right?
Because they were saying like,because it was focused around
me.
But then in hindsight, it'slike, wow, people were fucking
like working out their fuckingshit all over the place.
(56:10):
And I was like a convenient, youknow, lightning rod or I almost
became sort of metaphorical
SPEAKER_02 (56:22):
like
SPEAKER_03 (56:23):
it's not about me right like it almost became it
got to a point where it's soextreme that it was like wait
wait wait wait like let's goback to the facts of what
actually happened I did not goon a shooting spree and kill
people and murder people I didnot wake up in the morning and
(56:45):
intend to harm people in mycommunity.
Right.
So this escalated to a placethat really went sort of beyond
the actual facts and events.
SPEAKER_02 (57:04):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_03 (57:05):
You know?
SPEAKER_02 (57:06):
Yeah.
UNKNOWN (57:08):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (57:08):
So I'm making up my own alternative thought based on
what you're saying and we'll seeif it fits.
So I'm an individual in a systemand can't be equated with the
harmful system.
I deserve an opportunity foraccountability and healing.
Does
SPEAKER_03 (57:27):
that fit?
Yeah, and just that theprinciples on which this
community is built around thingslike transformative justice, no
one actually enacted any ofthose values.
Yeah.
And this is one of the thingsthat bugs me about Carly is like
(57:49):
in passing, sometimes I'll seesome like philosophical thought
of hers that's like deep andabout like empathy and healing
and being kind to people.
And I'll be like, uh, hold on.
You know, like what I want to dois just like, you know, reply to
(58:12):
their Instagram and be like,hold on.
Like this, it sounds cute.
And this makes for like a greatpersonal philosophy, but just so
you know, like you completelyabandoned these principles when
you were dealing with me.
SPEAKER_02 (58:26):
Yes.
And you know, it's interesting.
You say that like right now I'mwearing the shirt that says
abolish the police.
SPEAKER_01 (58:32):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (58:33):
And I know people who are abolitionists, um, and
have been for many, many yearswho have in certain situations
certainly called the police.
And I don't want to eliminatethe nuance of whatever they were
going through.
But why I'm bringing that up isI think you need to have the
(58:57):
kind of like insight, reflexivepractice and backbone to like
say that I'm also not perfect orI'm figuring this out or maybe
I'm realizing I don't have theanswer in this moment.
And it seems like you werearound folks who you, like I
said, Maya, you let this personinto your inner inner circle,
(59:19):
and they let you down.
Um, I wonder if you know, whenyou said sometimes it's not
about me, based on what you knowabout Carly.
And I had, I had suggested thisearlier, not knowing her at all.
But Is she unwell?
Does she struggle with somesignificant patterns of
(59:41):
attaching and attacking?
SPEAKER_03 (59:42):
I mean, I feel like she suffers from depression and
anxiety, which every fuckingperson I know does.
Yeah.
That's like everyone's baseline.
UNKNOWN (01:00:00):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (01:00:05):
there was like a triad relationship that she was
in where she like super freakedout on one of the people.
Okay.
And it got like real messy, likereal fast.
I only had her side of thestory, but, um, in hindsight,
it, it seemed a little, itseemed a little like black and
(01:00:30):
white and, um, no room for likethe benefit of the doubt
SPEAKER_02 (01:00:37):
okay so i can still trust myself i may have
overlooked um a mild red flag Idon't know, because you were,
(01:01:00):
you were swooned by her.
It seems like, I don't know ifyou, it doesn't sound like you
had a romantic relationship, butyou were like, you were swept up
in the magic of her.
SPEAKER_01 (01:01:10):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:01:16):
So what I've written here is I can still trust
myself.
I may have overlooked a mild redflag because of all the good.
Another thought that I thinkabout is, you know, Like if you
felt like you, actually I'mgoing to scratch that.
(01:01:42):
I'm thinking about your hotthought being about fear that
people close to you could betrayyou.
Is there something that reallyspeaks to that?
So you should be able to trustyourself more and You've already
said overall, I have goodjudgment.
I don't know if there'ssomething else you want to put
(01:02:02):
in there.
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:02:13):
don't know.
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (01:02:16):
I'm going to read these alternative thoughts.
Okay.
And then you tell me which oneyou like the most slash believe
the most.
slash feel, you know, thatresonates with you.
So you're getting ready to go tosleep.
You've got all these thoughts.
You want to write that letter.
(01:02:36):
What brings you the mostresolve?
Sometimes it's not about me.
I can still trust myself.
I may have overlooked a red flagbecause of all the good.
Instead of telling myself Icould have done things
differently, I might have toaccept that the outcome is
heavily dependent on the otherperson.
Hurt people.
(01:02:57):
hurt other people, and I wascaught in the crossfire of
someone else's trauma.
I am an individual in a system,and I can't be equated with the
harmful system.
I deserve an opportunity foraccountability and healing.
That was mostly my thought.
I extrapolated from what yousaid.
And people in my communityweren't ready to engage in
(01:03:18):
actual transformative justice.
Which one of those really standsout to you, brings you comfort,
you believe that.
SPEAKER_03 (01:03:35):
I mean, my instinct says hurt people, hurt other
people.
SPEAKER_02 (01:03:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (01:03:42):
I just feel like it's a way to access like a
little bit of empathy also.
SPEAKER_02 (01:03:46):
Yes.
SPEAKER_03 (01:03:47):
Absolutely.
UNKNOWN (01:03:50):
That
SPEAKER_03 (01:03:57):
Like she, that she did like really hurt me, but it
didn't come from a place oflike, I wanna be a horrible
person.
It came from a place for ownunresolved stuff.
SPEAKER_02 (01:04:14):
Okay.
So, okay.
So in a way you're kind ofsaying like the targeting came
from a place ofself-preservation.
Or maybe not evenself-preservation, but just her
own traumas in a way.
SPEAKER_03 (01:04:35):
Yeah.
Like her reaction is informed byher history, her, you know what
I mean?
Like
SPEAKER_02 (01:04:41):
her
SPEAKER_03 (01:04:44):
history, her experiences, her trauma, her
triggers, like her patterns.
And, um, and so there's a wholepiece of the puzzle.
That's again, not about me.
SPEAKER_02 (01:04:58):
Okay.
Okay, so this idea that it's notabout you, you said that it's
like brought up a new feeling,which is empathy.
On a scale of one to 10, howmuch empathy do you feel?
When you think about the newthought that hurt people, hurt
other people, and it's not aboutme.
SPEAKER_03 (01:05:18):
Then 10.
SPEAKER_02 (01:05:22):
Like you're flooded with empathy?
SPEAKER_03 (01:05:25):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:05:26):
Wow.
I can
SPEAKER_03 (01:05:26):
instantly access.
I can just instantly access herpain.
And I know some of it, right?
Because I know her, right?
So I know some of where the paincomes from.
I don't know all of it, but Ican instantly see that she's in
(01:05:54):
pain.
SPEAKER_02 (01:05:55):
Okay.
How would you rate the grief andloss on a scale of one to 10?
As you think about this newthought in the context of this
conflict and when you're gettingready to go to bed.
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:06:12):
mean, I still feel like it's, I feel like it's like
a five or a six.
SPEAKER_02 (01:06:17):
Oh yeah.
Look, it's okay if it's higher.
There's no, there's no way thatthese feelings have to go.
SPEAKER_01 (01:06:23):
Right.
So
SPEAKER_02 (01:06:24):
grief and loss is still high.
Betrayal.
SPEAKER_03 (01:06:32):
Now that's lower, probably like a six.
SPEAKER_02 (01:06:37):
And frustration.
SPEAKER_03 (01:06:45):
Like a three.
SPEAKER_01 (01:06:50):
Anger.
SPEAKER_03 (01:07:01):
Like a three.
SPEAKER_02 (01:07:04):
sadness that might go up.
SPEAKER_03 (01:07:12):
Yeah.
I mean, what was my sadnessbefore?
Yeah.
Maybe like a seven.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:07:21):
That makes sense.
Feeling misunderstood.
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:07:23):
still feel misunderstood.
You
SPEAKER_02 (01:07:28):
know, So I'm happy to leave it at a 10.
SPEAKER_03 (01:07:32):
Yeah, I mean a nine.
Like I still feel misunderstood.
SPEAKER_02 (01:07:34):
One thing I'll say about misunderstood is that if
we agree that you were hurtsomewhat deliberately, but
because someone felt like theywere next or they had to save
themselves, right?
then you weren't necessarilymisunderstood.
(01:07:56):
You were, you were targeted oryou were scapegoated.
Right.
But I can appreciate the feelingis still there where you're
like, I feel like people justaren't getting me.
They're not hearing me.
So I'll leave it there.
Did you say nine or 10?
Nine.
Nine.
Okay.
Confusion.
SPEAKER_03 (01:08:15):
I mean, way, way less confusion, probably like a
two.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:20):
Great.
In isolation.
SPEAKER_03 (01:08:27):
Like a three.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:29):
Self-doubt.
SPEAKER_01 (01:08:35):
One.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:35):
Self-critical.
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:08:42):
mean, that is my baseline.
Five.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:47):
And judging self for trusting this person.
SPEAKER_03 (01:08:52):
Two.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:52):
Shame.
Two.
Almost at the end here.
Rumination.
SPEAKER_01 (01:09:02):
Three.
SPEAKER_02 (01:09:08):
Overwhelm.
SPEAKER_01 (01:09:13):
Zero.
SPEAKER_02 (01:09:15):
And loss of control.
SPEAKER_03 (01:09:21):
Zero.
SPEAKER_02 (01:09:22):
Zero.
Are there new feelings that comeup?
Like feeling tired?
Or exhausted?
Depleted?
Yeah,
SPEAKER_03 (01:09:34):
I feel tired for sure.
How tired do I feel?
No, it's okay.
SPEAKER_02 (01:09:46):
Okay.
Some new feelings that have comeup.
SPEAKER_03 (01:09:48):
Right.
Feels a little like Clarity?
Clarity of feeling?
SPEAKER_02 (01:10:03):
Not really.
I sometimes like to say, no, youknow what?
Clarity is fine.
Sometimes I use the wordresolve, but that's a different
feeling.
SPEAKER_03 (01:10:16):
Right.
The edge is off.
That's also not a feeling,but...
It feels less charged.
It feels softened.
SPEAKER_02 (01:10:35):
Yeah.
You know, when you say lesscharged, I think, can I say
extinguished?
Like the fire extinguished?
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:10:44):
wouldn't say extinguished.
Okay,
SPEAKER_02 (01:10:49):
okay, okay.
Okay, okay.
SPEAKER_03 (01:10:50):
But I would say like dampened or something.
SPEAKER_02 (01:10:53):
Dampened.
Okay, look.
We've got a lot of feelings.
This is very good.
Andrea, my question to you ishow, like reflect on this
process with me.
Do you think it's helped youwork through it?
(01:11:18):
This challenge, I know this is asmall piece of a larger pie that
you had experienced, but it wasone of the relationships that
you singled out because it hurtthe most.
Yeah.
So what has your experience beenworking through this thought
record?
SPEAKER_03 (01:11:37):
I mean, I feel like I have like, again, I feel like
I want to use the word softened.
I feel the whole thing feelsless, charged to me um that also
could be a function of time um Iguess it helped me articulate
(01:12:01):
some things that I feel like Iknew but I hadn't really said
out loud about the situation um
SPEAKER_02 (01:12:18):
It seems to me like the main thing that has happened
or one of the main things isthat you've regained a sense of
trust in your own self and inyour friendship network and
group.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12:30):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:12:30):
Right.
Um, and you've been able to kindof balance out, like you've got
tons of folks who have stayedwith you and figured things out.
And then there was tons of folkswho left and all that tells us
is that, um, there's some levelof unpredictability that's
(01:12:51):
normal when people have traumaor competing things going on.
SPEAKER_03 (01:12:57):
Right, right, right.
That makes sense, yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:13:01):
Yeah.
The other thing, you know, likeI think when anger goes down, in
particular anger, it might besomething else, But when anger
and betrayal go down, I thinkthat's one of the key things
that allows for empathy to show.
It allows space for empathy toshow up.
(01:13:25):
But because you experiencedbetrayal and it felt unfair to
you, you might be committed tothe anger because you're
committed to ideas of fairness.
And then when you talk aboutthis person responding from a
different place in their mind,body, history, you destabilize
the idea of fairness.
(01:13:46):
Like the rules of the gamechange in a way.
SPEAKER_03 (01:13:48):
That makes a lot of sense.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:13:53):
Yeah.
And it's also tiring, not justbecause you've been exhausted
through this process or becauseyou're tired from grieving, but
tired because like it makes itso that figuring out people is
like, it's like a lifelongendeavor for a lot of us.
SPEAKER_01 (01:14:08):
And
SPEAKER_02 (01:14:08):
then we think, oh my gosh, I still, when will I get
it right?
Or when will I figure it allout?
SPEAKER_03 (01:14:14):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (01:14:15):
And that's hard.
SPEAKER_03 (01:14:16):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:14:17):
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right.
I'm going to leave it there.
Is there anything else you wantto ask or share before we end
today?
SPEAKER_01 (01:14:27):
No.
SPEAKER_02 (01:14:28):
No.
All right, Andrea, thank you somuch for participating in a
moment.
I'm going to stop the recording.
We can debrief, but thank you somuch for being here.
And yeah, I hope
SPEAKER_00 (01:14:44):
this was helpful.
Take care.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Welcome to the CBT Dive, a vodcast that goes into
the lives of real people withreal struggles.
Each episode welcomes a newguest who wants to explore a
challenging situation using themost common cognitive behavioral
therapy tool, the ThoughtRecord.
Your host, Raheem Thawar, is asocial worker and
(00:21):
psychotherapist based in Torontoand well-known for his work in
LGBTQ communities.
He's created the CBT Dive todiminish What therapy can look
like and share interventionskills for wellness.
We hope that each episode helpsyou along on your own journey
for insight and self-compassion.
SPEAKER_02 (00:47):
Hello everyone and welcome to the CBT dive.
Today I have the pleasure ofworking with Andrea.
I met Andrea on my travels a fewyears ago when I was presenting
in a conference in Georgia.
Andrea is 50 years old.
She's a fabulous writer.
(01:08):
I know because I've read herbooks and recommended them to
other folks.
And she lives in LA where allthe famous people live.
And She has dogs.
She loves them.
And before we jumped on thissession today, we were thinking
about what the best way to spenda Friday is.
(01:29):
And it turns out we have similarideas about how to pass time on
a Friday afternoon or a Fridaymorning, as it were in L.A.
Andrea, how are you today?
SPEAKER_03 (01:41):
Hi, I'm pretty good.
I'm a little tired, but I'mgood.
SPEAKER_02 (01:45):
Okay.
Andrea, I want to start byasking you a little bit about
what you either know aboutcognitive behavioral therapy or
what your relationship tocounseling has been in the past.
You don't have to share toomuch, but like, have you gone?
Have you liked it?
Has it been helpful?
Do you hate it?
Are you scared of it?
That kind of thing.
SPEAKER_03 (02:03):
Yeah.
I'm a lifelong therapy attender.
So I have been in therapy for 25years, not continuously,
sometimes on and off.
I've done a whole bunch ofdifferent modalities, including
(02:25):
Freudian analysis back in NewYork City in the day and a bunch
of CBT and more recently in thepast, like eight years
dialectical behavior therapy,DBT.
So most of my experiences havebeen with cognitive behavior
(02:46):
therapy.
And I think therapy is like anecessary part of life.
I think everyone should be intherapy and more than once
therapy has literally saved mylife.
SPEAKER_02 (03:00):
Wow.
I'm so happy to hear that.
You know, sometimes I talk topeople and they think, oh,
you're, you're, Like I toldsomeone yesterday, I'm looking
for a schema therapist.
I want to try that.
And they were like, but what'sthe problem you're focusing on?
And I'm like, girl, just gettingthrough the day.
There's so much to process.
There's so much to process,right?
(03:22):
So I appreciate sharing thisvirtual space with you as
somebody who's keen on therapy.
My hope today is that some ofthe skills you already have are
brought in to this space becauseYou know, all of our skills need
sharpening, and this could be away that you begin to think
more, and that could be helpfulfor you.
(03:44):
Maybe you'll find it too easy.
That's another risk we'retaking.
And you'll be like, eh, I didn'treally learn anything.
But, you know, one thing I'vebeen telling my guests is that
even if you're really good atsomething or you have a lot of
exposure to it, having someonecoach you through a particular
process can be nice, right?
(04:04):
That's why we go back totherapists over and over.
All right.
I am going to go ahead and sharemy screen.
And when I do that, we're goingto look together at the thought
record that we're going to beworking on today.
SPEAKER_01 (04:18):
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (04:23):
All right.
Do you see that thought recordon your screen, Andrea?
Uh-huh.
Uh-huh.
Okay.
And when you've done CBT before,has it looked like this?
Have you used a thought recordor do you think you...
SPEAKER_03 (04:37):
I've never used a thought record.
SPEAKER_02 (04:39):
Okay, okay.
So with CBT, there's differententry points.
Some people do interventionsthat focus on the thoughts and
see how they can impact yourfeelings and behaviors.
And whereas other folks mightsay, we're going to focus on
behaviors.
So they'll say, let's dobehavioral strategies.
Let's do behavioral skills.
(05:00):
And I think when you talkedabout DBT, a lot of the entry
point for that is behavioralbecause you notice a feeling,
but you don't think about allthe thoughts so much.
You interrupt that line ofemotional intensity with the
behavior.
So The situation we're going toanalyze today is something you
(05:23):
had told me about prior to ourrecording.
My close friend Carly postedawful things about me online and
stopped talking to me after Iwas called out on social media
by someone else.
Now, this happened some timeago, right?
Was this approximately one yearago?
SPEAKER_03 (05:43):
Yeah, a year ago.
SPEAKER_02 (05:45):
Okay.
And are you friends with Carlyat all now?
SPEAKER_03 (05:50):
And,
SPEAKER_02 (05:55):
you know, because this is a big situation, I'm
looking for a bit more, just ahint of more specificity.
So I'm most curious about whenthe difficult feelings come up
for you now.
Is it when you look at picturesor is it just when you think
about what went down?
I'm thinking about what's themoment, you know,
SPEAKER_03 (06:17):
when
SPEAKER_02 (06:18):
this comes back for you.
SPEAKER_03 (06:20):
Right.
It comes back for me more than Iwant it to.
I'll say that.
Yeah.
In other words, it's unexpectedsometimes, right?
I don't have to, like, I don'tfollow her on social media
anymore, but she's in my circle,both personally and
(06:40):
professionally.
So inevitably she pops up in aconversation or online and, And
or the kind of site of the callout was on Facebook.
SPEAKER_02 (06:58):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (06:59):
And Facebook is sort of ubiquitous and everywhere.
So I feel like I go back to theevent itself, the call out, and
then how everyone around mereacted to it.
UNKNOWN (07:17):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (07:18):
Like several times a week.
Okay.
It just pops back up in my head.
SPEAKER_02 (07:24):
And is what activates it when her name or
her work shows up in some way?
SPEAKER_03 (07:31):
Yes.
And also sometimes it literallyjust pops into my head.
SPEAKER_02 (07:40):
Like when you're walking, for example.
Right.
You take your dog for a walk.
Like
SPEAKER_03 (07:44):
I'm getting ready to go to sleep and like it pops.
it sort of pops up in my headand I'm, I mean, in my case, I'm
like, I'm like drafting a letterto her or an email in my head.
Yeah.
Or I'm analyzing, I'mreanalyzing the situation.
SPEAKER_02 (08:05):
Okay.
You know what?
That's very helpful because whenwe refine it.
So the whole situation thatyou've named is important
because, but usually thesituation ends up being context
because this precise time thatwe pinpointed is like when
(08:27):
you're getting ready to go tobed.
And sometimes your reaction tothat is going to look different
or your thoughts are going to bedifferent than if we were
talking about, you know, a timewhen her name comes up
professionally, right?
Because when her name comes upprofessionally, you might be
thinking, you know, I wish shedidn't, for example, you know,
(08:49):
if it was my field, I wish thisperson didn't get referrals,
because I don't like them,something like that.
Whereas at a different time,you're thinking more about
interpersonally, like Like theloss or being misunderstood.
Like a different thing comes up.
SPEAKER_01 (09:05):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (09:05):
So I want you to think about the same situation
or the context of the situation,but more specifically when
you're getting ready to go tobed.
Andrea, what feelings come upfor you when the situation is
activated for you and you'reabout to go to bed?
SPEAKER_03 (09:27):
Grief.
SPEAKER_01 (09:29):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (09:31):
Betrayal, frustration, anger, sadness, a
feeling of being misunderstood.
Yeah.
Like a lingering feeling ofconfusion about why she did it.
(09:58):
I'm still just not...
Why she did it.
So there's still like confusionthere.
And.
And then a kind of like.
Judgment of myself for not fortrusting her.
(10:25):
For like thinking that.
Like I definitely, I sort ofrate and judge myself.
Like, how did you get in thesituation in the first place?
Like, how are you friends withsomeone who would do this to
you?
SPEAKER_02 (10:39):
Okay.
Yeah, that's an interesting one.
I don't know what that, I putdown judging self.
I don't know another way tolabel that as a feeling, even
though I know there probably isa word for it, but we'll come
back to that.
Are there any other feelingsthat come up for you?
(11:00):
You do have a good list, but.
SPEAKER_03 (11:04):
No, I think that's, I think that's
SPEAKER_02 (11:05):
good.
That's it?
SPEAKER_03 (11:07):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (11:07):
Okay.
Well, I'm going to add, I'mgoing to, I just like to name a
few more and then you can tellme if they fit or not.
Is there curiosity?
SPEAKER_03 (11:23):
No.
SPEAKER_02 (11:24):
Relief?
SPEAKER_03 (11:26):
No.
SPEAKER_02 (11:28):
Isolation.
SPEAKER_01 (11:34):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (11:41):
Okay.
Self-doubt.
Uh-huh.
You just said confusion.
It's like bewilderment almost.
Uh-huh.
Do you feel self-critical?
SPEAKER_03 (12:02):
Oh, that's like my default.
SPEAKER_02 (12:06):
Okay.
So that's
SPEAKER_03 (12:08):
my every day.
That's my baseline.
SPEAKER_02 (12:09):
So when we combine judging self and self-doubt and
self-critical, the word thatcomes up for me and tell me if
it fits is like shame orembarrassment.
SPEAKER_03 (12:27):
I think shame.
Sure.
Shame.
SPEAKER_02 (12:30):
Okay.
You said sadness and you saidgrief.
Often what goes with grief isalso loss.
Like I think they're closecousins.
Grief is often our response toloss, but sometimes people
experience them separately.
(12:51):
I don't know.
Is that true for you or are theyone in the same?
SPEAKER_03 (12:55):
Yeah.
They're kind of one in the samefor me, I think, grief and loss.
SPEAKER_02 (13:04):
Yeah, that's great.
You know what?
I'm going to just put themtogether then, if that's okay.
So we've got grief loss,betrayal, frustration, anger,
sadness, misunderstood,confusion, isolation,
self-doubt, self-critical,judging self, shame.
Okay, we've...
(13:26):
We've got a good list.
Now you're thinking about, thisis the moment when you're
getting ready to go to sleep andthis enters your mind.
I wonder if like the way youdescribed it, even like in your
mind, you're drafting a letter,there's a sense of overwhelm.
Like this thing takes over.
(13:46):
Like you, it's almost like youget possessed by it.
SPEAKER_03 (13:50):
Yeah.
I mean, I'm a ruminator ingeneral.
Yeah.
And so I have intrusive thoughtsthat I sometimes feel like I
can't control.
And
SPEAKER_02 (14:05):
of course,
SPEAKER_03 (14:08):
when I'm going to bed, I want to relax.
I want to unwind.
I actually don't want this shitpopping in my head right before
I go to bed.
UNKNOWN (14:19):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (14:20):
Yeah.
So there's a few words coming upfor me.
Rumination, overwhelmed, andloss of control.
Because you wish you could putthis away, but you can't really.
You're overcome with it.
Okay, now we maybe have too manyfeelings, but that's okay.
That's how complex humans are.
(14:41):
All right.
So in this situation, you'regetting ready to go to bed.
You're thinking about theclosest friend who posted awful
things about you online.
I want you to rate each of thesefeelings for me on a scale of
one to 10, 10 being the mostintense and one, not at all.
So how would you rate your senseof grief and loss?
(15:07):
Betrayal.
SPEAKER_03 (15:08):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (15:11):
frustration.
SPEAKER_03 (15:11):
Five.
SPEAKER_02 (15:15):
Anger.
SPEAKER_03 (15:17):
Seven.
SPEAKER_02 (15:21):
Sadness.
SPEAKER_01 (15:29):
Five.
SPEAKER_02 (15:32):
Misunderstood.
SPEAKER_03 (15:33):
10.
SPEAKER_02 (15:41):
Confusion.
SPEAKER_03 (15:45):
Five.
SPEAKER_02 (15:48):
Isolation.
SPEAKER_03 (15:51):
Sorry, that's my dog.
SPEAKER_02 (15:54):
No, that's great.
SPEAKER_03 (15:56):
They're doing construction next door.
SPEAKER_02 (15:58):
Oh, I thought you wanted to rate the feeling.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (16:02):
Isolation.
Like a
SPEAKER_01 (16:07):
six.
UNKNOWN (16:08):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_02 (16:10):
Self-doubt.
SPEAKER_01 (16:14):
Eight.
SPEAKER_02 (16:18):
Self-critical.
SPEAKER_03 (16:19):
Ten.
SPEAKER_02 (16:24):
And judging self for trusting this person.
SPEAKER_03 (16:30):
Ten.
SPEAKER_02 (16:38):
Okay, shame.
SPEAKER_01 (16:42):
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (16:45):
Rumination.
SPEAKER_01 (16:46):
Eight.
SPEAKER_02 (16:52):
Overwhelmed.
SPEAKER_01 (16:56):
Four.
And
SPEAKER_02 (16:59):
loss of control.
SPEAKER_01 (17:04):
Eight.
SPEAKER_02 (17:06):
Eight.
Andrea, is there a hint of envyat all?
SPEAKER_03 (17:13):
No,
SPEAKER_02 (17:14):
no.
Okay.
I just thought I'd ask becauseit seems like the way I'm, I'm
one of the ways I'm imaginingthe scenario and you'll tell me
more about it in a bit is thatmaybe there was a kind of
competition or that somebody,somebody put you down so that
they could get ahead.
I mean,
SPEAKER_03 (17:34):
that's like been suggested to me, right?
Like, like, Like a few peoplehave kind of explained it to me
as, Oh, she was trying to saveher own ass.
SPEAKER_01 (17:50):
She was
SPEAKER_03 (17:50):
trying to sort of distance herself from you so
that she didn't get sort ofcaught up in the drama.
Right.
So she was sort of trying tosignal like, oh, you think I'm
really close to that person.
And so you may have somethoughts about me, but like,
actually, no, I'm going to gofor the jugular right away so
that you know that I'm not withher or like her.
SPEAKER_02 (18:16):
Okay.
So in the automatic thoughtscolumn, one of the things I'm
putting down is one of thethoughts that comes up is, Carly
acted this way out ofself-preservation because that's
the idea.
I mean, maybe it didn'toriginate from you, but it's
been implemented.
It didn't
SPEAKER_03 (18:33):
originate from me for sure.
It was not automatic, but yes.
SPEAKER_02 (18:36):
No.
But it
SPEAKER_03 (18:37):
crosses my mind now because several people have said
they think that's what's goingon.
SPEAKER_02 (18:41):
Okay.
Okay.
So- I'm just going to go back astep to the behavior column
because it's particular whenyou're getting ready to go to
sleep.
What are some of the things youdo?
So in your mind, you draft aletter, you reanalyze the
situation.
Is there anything else like youcount to 10, take a sleeping
pill, do some meditation, sendangry, you write out an angry
(19:05):
email and then delete it.
You watch TV.
SPEAKER_03 (19:09):
Right, right, right, right, right.
UNKNOWN (19:11):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (19:17):
I always draft the emails in my head.
I don't always write them.
In this case, I haven't writtenone for this situation.
But sometimes I do write themand delete them.
I mean, I'm really trying tosort of like empty my brain of
(19:39):
thoughts.
Like there's so much residualnoise at the end of my day.
And I sort of want to put itlike on a shelf and say, okay,
like we're, you're going to dealwith this tomorrow because right
now, like you need to rest.
SPEAKER_02 (20:00):
Yes.
So you try to do self-talkessentially.
SPEAKER_01 (20:05):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (20:06):
I need to rest and put this on a shelf for now.
And I like that.
That's really interesting.
That's really great.
I'm guessing the self-talk is abit, it's a bit of a battle.
It sounds like you have to pushthrough it right.
Until you, I guess, until youlike tire out.
SPEAKER_03 (20:25):
Right.
Yeah.
Okay.
All right.
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (20:30):
So I I'm just trying to identify, I just want to make
sure we're on the same page herethat you haven't engaged in
behaviors that arecounterproductive or causing you
more distress or harm.
No.
Okay.
Great.
So the automatic thoughts columnis really about what comes into
your mind when you're gettingready to go to sleep and you
(20:53):
think about the situation withCarly.
And the first thought that I putdown there wasn't even one of
yours.
So tell me what one of yoursmight be.
So, for example, when you thinkmaybe I'll make that a bit more
specific.
When you feel when you say youfeel.
(21:15):
betrayed.
I feel betrayed because...
I
SPEAKER_03 (21:25):
really had this idea of our friendship as being
intimate and of her reallyseeing me and caring for me.
So...
(21:47):
it seems like a total about fit.
It doesn't make sense in thecontext of what I thought our
relationship is and what, who Ithought she was.
And
SPEAKER_02 (22:00):
another thing,
SPEAKER_03 (22:01):
confusion,
SPEAKER_02 (22:03):
but that's okay.
They can, they can, they canoverlap.
Right.
So, cause you alluded to thisearlier when you said judging
self, you said, I judged myselffor, um, You know, it's kind of
like, exactly.
SPEAKER_03 (22:18):
Yeah.
So I, I judged myself fortrusting her and also, you know,
opening up to her.
We had just probably like ninemonths before that gone on
vacation together and had somelike really intense talks.
(22:39):
And I had been really vulnerablewith her.
more so than ever before in ourrelationship.
Like we both joked at the end ofit, that like our relationship
had like leveled up as a resultof some of the things that
(23:01):
happened.
And then we had to process andshe was there for me, like in a
really intense, loving way.
And so I, So I felt like wemoved into this like new phase
where she really had my back.
(23:22):
She sort of unequivocally had myback.
And that was like a central kindof feature to the relationship
for me at that time.
SPEAKER_02 (23:35):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (23:36):
So this seemed like literally the opposite of it.
SPEAKER_02 (23:40):
Okay.
SPEAKER_03 (23:41):
So how did I...
have this experience where Ithought like this person, 100%
has my back and loves me andcares about me.
How is it possible that shecould do this?
SPEAKER_02 (23:55):
Right.
SPEAKER_03 (23:56):
Like I've got to, I've got to have misread
something or, or read thesituation incorrectly.
SPEAKER_02 (24:06):
Okay.
So now we're saying that as aresult of this person's
duplicitousness, is that a word,or duplicity?
You're thinking, I might havemisread this person, right?
(24:33):
And that's essentially whensomebody's this duplicitous
person What does it say aboutyou for having bought into one
of their sides?
One is that I might have misreadthis person.
I imagine there's some pride youhave around being able to assess
(24:53):
who is trustworthy and not, andthis might have thwarted that a
bit.
SPEAKER_03 (24:57):
Yeah, I feel like I'm pretty guarded sometimes.
I feel like I have this sort oftight inner circle and that
tight inner circle really getsto see every side of me, me at
my absolute worst and me at likemy most open or needy or right.
(25:23):
And so like, that's not like athing I just like drop on
anyone.
SPEAKER_02 (25:28):
No.
So what does it mean if, you letsomeone into that inner circle
and they're a bad fit or likethey weren't intended to be
there.
What does that say about theinner circle even existing or
you being able to be vulnerablemoving forward?
SPEAKER_03 (25:49):
Well, it just doesn't feel safe.
So yeah.
So I feel, I feel moredistrusting.
I feel, and I feel less safe.
SPEAKER_02 (26:02):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so as you meet new people oreven current people in your
inner circle, this distrust getsactivated.
Is that right?
SPEAKER_01 (26:16):
Okay.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (26:18):
So would it be fair to say you've had to become
distant from people in your lifecurrently as a protective
mechanism?
SPEAKER_03 (26:34):
Yeah, I feel like it's almost like the circle
tightens, right?
Like then I begin to sort ofassess in that like
hypervigilant way, like who canI really, really trust?
SPEAKER_02 (26:53):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (26:54):
And who's really like my ride or die?
SPEAKER_02 (26:57):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (26:59):
And who might just sort of like jump ship at any
moment.
SPEAKER_02 (27:12):
So I have to tighten my circle further before being
vulnerable.
I'm also thinking here, ifthat's true, if you have to
tighten your circle and it'shard to trust people, what does
that mean for your life, yourrelationships, your day-to-day?
SPEAKER_03 (27:33):
Just that I feel more isolated and alone.
And this definitely happenedduring the pandemic.
So it's like kind of a badcombination.
SPEAKER_02 (27:44):
Yeah.
No, I bet.
I bet.
And when you think about, so yousay I feel more isolated and
alone.
I'm wondering if the thoughtthere, it's actually shifting
over from like a thought in thissituation to maybe an underlying
belief.
Maybe that I'll always have tobe protective or people will
(28:07):
always try to take advantage ofme.
I don't think I can ever fullytrust anyone.
Are there any beliefs like thatthat are kind of simmering?
SPEAKER_03 (28:29):
I have a belief that people can turn on me.
SPEAKER_02 (28:39):
And is it fair to say people or anyone?
SPEAKER_03 (28:45):
Well, it's like, so when the whole context of this
with the Facebook group was likea lot of people turning on me,
but, and that felt horrible, butyeah, I didn't necessarily have
close relationships witheveryone in the Facebook group.
Right.
So it's like, I could say aboutseveral of the people, like, you
(29:09):
don't know me.
Like you're, you know what Imean?
Like you're seeing this inreally black and white
circumstances and you're justlike jumping on the bandwagon of
like, let's hate on me.
Yeah.
UNKNOWN (29:25):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (29:26):
So it felt like there was like a clear divide
there of like people who justdon't know me.
And so it's like, and I sort of,I'm not invested in them.
You know what I mean?
So I'm like, like, they're
SPEAKER_01 (29:41):
sort of
SPEAKER_03 (29:42):
like, fuck you.
But then there are people whoknow me and how could you sort
of like turn on a dime?
SPEAKER_02 (29:51):
Yeah.
If people could turn on a dime,I'm curious to know, what does
it say about the world for you?
I
SPEAKER_03 (30:07):
mean that it's unsafe.
SPEAKER_02 (30:09):
Yeah.
And If I'm going to the thoughtall the way at the top where
(30:30):
Carly acted this way out ofself-preservation, that's one of
the thoughts.
If that's true, what's the...
What does that mean for yourrelationships in general?
So not just that they're unsafe,but that...
I don't know.
I'm wondering if there'ssomething else.
SPEAKER_03 (30:51):
Well, it's like that...
There's a limit to people'sloyalty,
SPEAKER_02 (31:01):
right?
SPEAKER_03 (31:03):
That like people can be loyal, but then to a point,
and then it's like, oh, I gottaget the fuck out of here.
And the only way to do that isfor me to actually like throw me
under the bus.
SPEAKER_02 (31:17):
Yeah, yeah.
When you think about the griefand loss piece, is it loss of
the entire, is it about loss ofthis person?
(31:40):
Is it loss of a larger communityor is it more loss of the
community because of thisperson?
SPEAKER_03 (31:56):
It's loss of this person for sure.
Like it's, I thought I couldcount on her.
You know, like I counted her inthis sort of like charm circle.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (32:16):
So that takes me to your self-doubt and your
self-criticism.
So if you think you can count onsomeone and it turns out You
can't.
What does that say about you,Andrea?
SPEAKER_03 (32:29):
That I have bad judgment.
That I've like misread thesituation.
SPEAKER_01 (32:35):
That
SPEAKER_03 (32:37):
I've misread the person in front of me.
Because it's like, if you quizme, if you gave me a quiz like a
year before and said, how likelyare these people to betray you?
Right?
SPEAKER_01 (32:51):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (32:51):
And you just like made me fill it out.
And it was about like 20 people.
SPEAKER_01 (32:55):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (32:57):
feel like I would have rated Carly low, really
low, actually.
You know, there's other peoplewho I'd been like, I don't know,
I haven't known them well enoughor long enough, or maybe we're
like, you know what I mean?
But
SPEAKER_02 (33:13):
yeah,
SPEAKER_03 (33:15):
I, I felt pretty, I would feel pretty confident
before this, that she would notdo this to me.
SPEAKER_02 (33:23):
Right.
Now, One other thing I'd like toask you in relation to this is,
I think it might be context.
From what I'm understanding, youwere called out on social media.
(33:44):
So you posted something someoneelse didn't like.
I know you a little bit.
And from what I know, you likelytried to be accountable in all
the right ways.
And you're talking about some ofthe toxic things that do end up
happening on social media.
And here, it seems like peoplewho you thought would engage in
(34:04):
a more rational accountabilityprocess with you did it.
They completely abandoned youand you, and you called you out
and said awful things about youand you lost a lot of community.
Is that about sum it up?
SPEAKER_01 (34:16):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So
SPEAKER_02 (34:19):
there's this kind of shunning that you experienced.
Yeah.
And, So even though the loss isabout this person, the other
thing I'm wondering is, is therea thought there about having
lost notoriety, careeropportunities, things like that?
(34:44):
Like, is there a loss of...
That
SPEAKER_03 (34:47):
definitely happened.
I mean, it's not a thought.
It actually happened.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (34:53):
Okay.
And...
As a result of that, does thatchange how you think about
yourself?
Like I'm no longer this, or Ican no longer do that.
I
SPEAKER_03 (35:14):
mean, honestly, because I feel like I've had a
lot of time to process this.
UNKNOWN (35:21):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (35:28):
I mean, if I'm being honest, I feel like it really
spurred me to assess thecommunity to begin with and how
people were treating each other.
And I call it like, get out ofthe sandbox.
(35:49):
There was some like real juniorhigh mean girl bullshit behavior
that I felt like, when all was,when the smoke sort of cleared,
I was like, do I want to beat,like, do I want to invest my
time and energy into this groupof people who will like turn on
(36:15):
a dime and go after sort ofanyone they want?
And they, and all of them kindof join, you know, it's like,
it's like everyone was just sortof on this like group think
situation,
SPEAKER_01 (36:25):
right?
SPEAKER_03 (36:26):
Where it's like, That's part of the other reason
that the Carly situation hurtwas because she actually had a
choice to not say anything.
SPEAKER_02 (36:39):
Yes.
SPEAKER_03 (36:40):
So no one said, hey, Carly, you know this person.
What do you think?
SPEAKER_02 (36:46):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (36:47):
No one said that.
Carly could have silentlyobserved the situation.
Some people silently observedthe situation and then called
me, right, offline.
SPEAKER_02 (36:56):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (36:57):
Talked to me, supported me.
Some people just went in for thejugular.
And I felt like she went in forthe jugular when she could have
literally just sat back and notsaid anything.
SPEAKER_02 (37:10):
And not said anything.
Okay.
I'm just making a note hereabout something.
Okay.
So...
one more question that i havefor you is about this statement
(37:31):
you made about i have badjudgment um is that is that
specific to this situationbecause you were blindsided or
is that is there a larger tropethere where you've felt perhaps
I'm just throwing this outthere, perhaps in the past that
you've had bad judgment or notgood boundaries and you thought
(37:54):
you'd overcome that or, or gainskills in that area.
And now this feels like asetback of sorts.
SPEAKER_03 (38:00):
Right.
So I don't think of myself ashaving a lot of self doubt.
SPEAKER_02 (38:04):
Okay.
SPEAKER_03 (38:05):
In general that I, I feel like I have very strong
intuition and, And I listen tomy gut.
I listen to my inner voice.
And it has mostly served mereally well in the world.
(38:26):
I feel like I can read peoplereally well.
And I'm emotionally intelligent,
SPEAKER_01 (38:33):
socially
SPEAKER_03 (38:34):
intelligent.
And so it's not really arecurring theme for me.
SPEAKER_02 (38:43):
Okay.
SPEAKER_03 (38:44):
It's not.
It feels, that's why it feels alittle like, yes, like I was
blindsided.
SPEAKER_02 (38:49):
Yeah.
So what I wrote down was it'shard to rely on what I thought
was strong intuition.
So here's what I'm going to do,Andrea.
I'm going to read out this listof thoughts.
Some of the thoughts that Well,most of the, okay.
So the thoughts that don't havearrows beside them are kind of
(39:10):
the things that are top of mind.
They come up really quickly forus.
And then the ones with thearrows are the ones that we've
distilled a bit.
And the kinds of things we'vedone to distill it is we've
taken what might sound more likean objective fact and tried to
(39:33):
say, well, what does this meanif it's true?
What does it say about me ifthis is true?
Or if this is the case, what isthe consequence for my life, my
relationships?
Or what does it say about mypast, present, and future?
So we've got this situation.
You're getting ready to go tosleep.
(39:54):
You're thinking about this thingthat happened with Carly.
You feel grief.
Betrayal, frustration, anger,sadness, misunderstood,
confusion, isolation,self-doubt, self-critical,
judging, self-shame, rumination,overwhelmed, loss of control.
Here are the thoughts that gowith those.
Carly acted this way out ofself-preservation.
(40:16):
There's a limit to people'sloyalty.
I can't believe I trusted thisperson.
I opened up to her and was veryvulnerable with her.
We leveled up.
I thought I could count on her.
And so the consequence of thisor what this means is or for you
is maybe I have bad judgment.
It's hard to rely on what Ithought was strong intuition.
(40:38):
I thought our friendship wasintimate and that she really saw
me and cared for me.
She had my back.
So what does this say about you,the future?
Or what's the consequence of anyof this is true, which of course
is true, but I might havemisread this person.
It doesn't feel safe to bevulnerable, even in my inner
circle.
I have to tighten my circlefurther before being vulnerable.
(41:00):
It's always possible that peoplecan turn on me.
And now that includes closefriends.
Does this capture a lot of thethings that go on in your mind?
SPEAKER_01 (41:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (41:18):
Yeah.
Is there one that stands out toyou?
Preferably one that's got alittle arrow beside it.
I
SPEAKER_03 (41:35):
guess it's the last one.
It's always possible that peoplecan turn on me now.
And now that includes closefriends.
SPEAKER_02 (41:42):
Okay.
So what I'm going to do is I'mhighlighting that one and we're
going to call that one.
your hot thought.
So a hot thought is the thoughtthat's the most salient or the
most prominent.
It's the one that drives a lotof the difficult feelings in
this particular situation.
And so you've picked, it'salways possible that people can
(42:06):
turn on me.
And now that includes closefriends.
Before we go further, I justwonder, this idea of people
turning on you, like, Is it thekind of work you do or the kind
of, is it an LA thing?
Is it something, I'm just tryingto figure out, like, there's
(42:26):
kind of a slightly cynical slashhostile sentiment under it.
And I just wonder, is theresomething I'm missing or I need
to know about this?
SPEAKER_03 (42:46):
I mean, this experience was really profound
and really painful and reallytraumatic for me.
And so it's like Carly's like apiece of it.
But there are a lot of peoplewho I've known for decades who I
haven't spoken to since thishappened.
SPEAKER_02 (43:07):
Okay.
Okay.
I hear that.
Totally.
SPEAKER_03 (43:10):
It's like...
Yeah, I think it's just had aprofound effect on me because
SPEAKER_02 (43:17):
it
SPEAKER_03 (43:17):
was such a shit show.
And I understand the largercontext because like this is
happening kind of in circleseverywhere and online, but like
it really was like a bloodbath.
And certain people'sparticipation in it hurt more
(43:43):
because of my relationship withthem.
But like the whole thing as awhole was, was really traumatic.
SPEAKER_02 (43:51):
Okay.
Fair, fair.
Now, Andrea, what we're going todo is we're going to analyze
this hot thought.
It's always possible that peoplecould turn on me.
And now that includes closefriends.
We want some evidence to supportthis hot thought, which won't be
hard because you told me aboutCarly and all these people from
decades that you've known.
So let's start there.
I'm just going to say evidencethat supports.
(44:17):
I'll say Carly in particular.
And the other evidence is peopleyou've known for decades.
These are friends or colleaguesor community folks?
Yeah, so they're
SPEAKER_03 (44:28):
friends and colleagues.
people I've collaborated with onprojects, people I have personal
relationships with, who Isocialize with outside of the
group, people who've known mefor a really long time.
SPEAKER_02 (44:51):
Okay.
And before this event or afterthis particular event, have you
always...
Not always.
Have you had any otherexperiences that people could
turn on you?
Specifically people who are inyour close circle?
SPEAKER_01 (45:11):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (45:12):
Yeah.
Can you take me back to a timewhen that happened?
And you could just share asbrief, like,
SPEAKER_01 (45:19):
I just need
SPEAKER_02 (45:20):
something that kind of.
SPEAKER_03 (45:21):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So two of my closest friendswere a couple.
UNKNOWN (45:29):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (45:29):
And, um, I know them both forever.
I consider them chosen familyand they had an incredibly
difficult, contentious, likehorrible divorce.
And I ended up being the mainsupport system for one of them
and was there like for thedaily, like bursting into tears,
(45:55):
horrible crying trauma, just shewas going through it.
And I was really there for her.
I validated her.
It was just an awful kind ofsituation.
Right.
Of course.
And I knew like more of theinner workings than anyone else.
(46:16):
Right.
And so, and there was just a lotof really bad behavior on the
part of her partner, you know,that, and so, A year after they
divorced, I found out that theybegan seeing each other again.
SPEAKER_02 (46:37):
Okay.
SPEAKER_03 (46:40):
And so I questioned my friend and was like, wow.
Didn't see this coming.
And essentially, she began tosort of pull back from me.
And I feel like it was becauseshe knows I know where all the
(47:01):
bodies are buried, right?
SPEAKER_02 (47:04):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (47:04):
So it's like in order for her to be able to make
sense of being with this personwho mistreated her so intensely
that I was witness to, she sortof had to be like, let me back
up because I don't know, I mighthave something to say about it.
And so essentially I feel likeWe could no longer be friends
(47:28):
because she was like, thisrelationship with her ex-partner
is really important to me.
And that and my relationshipwith me can't exist.
SPEAKER_02 (47:41):
I see.
You know, both of thatsituation, and I think I'm
guessing the social media one,if there was a similarity, it
might be that you're under theassumption that if you are being
helpful and being accountableand doing the right thing,
(48:03):
that'll lead to a good outcome.
And that belief might have beenreally undermined for you.
SPEAKER_03 (48:10):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (48:12):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (48:13):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (48:16):
We'll leave that on the back burner for now.
But this evidence is good,right?
It makes sense that you wouldthink I really got to be distant
from people.
Now, is there evidence that doesnot support this idea that you
have to be super, super careful,even in your close circle of
friends?
Like you did say before that,like, you've had a good
(48:41):
intuition for the most part inyour life.
Right.
So I'll put that in.
Oh, I put goose.
I've had a goose sense.
I've had a good sense.
of people in my life prior tothis?
(49:03):
I
SPEAKER_03 (49:06):
guess my other evidence is just that there are
people that I've been friendswith for a really long time who
I've gone through shitty thingswith who haven't abandoned me
over them.
SPEAKER_02 (49:27):
Okay, so I've had friends who have lasted through
difficult times and they haven'tabandoned me.
SPEAKER_03 (49:35):
And then I also guess like, I feel like there
are people in my life who don'tjust sort of like dismiss me or
cut me off.
(49:56):
You know what I mean?
That are willing to stay andfigure it out.
SPEAKER_01 (50:06):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (50:19):
All right.
You're feeling...
You're having some feelings atthe moment.
Are those feelings almost inpart like gratitude for some of
these folks who've stayed?
It just seems like the emotionsamped up a bit when you were
talking about the good folks inyour life.
SPEAKER_03 (50:43):
Yeah, I do.
I feel grateful that I do havepeople in my life who...
I can a hundred percent bemyself with and who see me and
who are not sort of quick tolike turn on a dime kind of.
SPEAKER_02 (51:10):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, I'm not in thebusiness of diagnosing, as in
I'm not allowed
SPEAKER_03 (51:27):
to.
Oh, really?
You're a therapist.
SPEAKER_02 (51:29):
I know it's different in America versus
Canada.
I'm allowed to help someoneunderstand their diagnosis, but
not provide the label.
But I'm going to tell you rightnow that your friend sounds like
(51:51):
someone who has overdeveloped astrategy to both attach and then
attack.
And that might come from her owncomplex trauma.
I don't know.
That sometimes shows up inpeople who struggle with certain
(52:13):
personality disorders.
But people don't talk aboutthose when they're struggling
with them because they're quitestigmatized.
Right.
So I'm just putting that outthere.
I don't know.
You might know that person well,and they might've disclosed
something like that to you.
I don't know, but it's justsomething I'm seeing if that
helps give some, a way tocontextualize this really
(52:40):
bizarre behavior on her part of,of, of turning on a dime, as you
said.
SPEAKER_01 (52:45):
Great.
SPEAKER_02 (52:46):
Andrea says, We are in the second last column.
And this column is about comingup with an alternative thought
or a balanced thought, somethingthat will help you get to sleep
at night, will help you makesense of the situation.
Something that is different fromthe only way out is for me to be
(53:08):
more cautious about who I letnear me or that I can't trust my
own judgment, right?
So what would that alternativethought be, do you think?
And we can come up with severalof them.
SPEAKER_03 (53:30):
I mean, it's really simple and very black and white,
but sometimes it's not about me.
SPEAKER_02 (53:38):
Yeah.
No, I love that.
SPEAKER_03 (53:41):
Okay.
In other words, I often, inconflict with people...
sort of jumped to like all theway, all the things like I did
wrong and all the ways that Isort of fell down or
miscommunicated and have thisidea that like if I would have
done these 10 thingsdifferently, the outcome would
(54:03):
be totally different.
But I've learned in my 50 yearsof life that actually sometimes
you could do all, you could doall the things over differently
and then you can have the sameoutcome.
SPEAKER_01 (54:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (54:15):
Because the other person is like going through
their shit and it triggered ortouched on something that's
theirs.
And it had so much more to dowith them than it has to do with
you.
SPEAKER_01 (54:30):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (54:34):
Just typing some of this out over here.
Yeah.
So sometimes it's not about me.
Instead of telling myself Icould have done things
differently, I might have toaccept that the outcome is
heavily dependent on the otherperson.
SPEAKER_01 (54:56):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (54:58):
Yeah.
I wonder if there's a thoughthere about just the communities
you run in and something aboutdisplaced anger or scapegoating.
or canceling, is there a thoughtthere that, is there something
(55:20):
there that we just need toacknowledge or address?
SPEAKER_03 (55:25):
Yeah, which is that like people are just traumatized
people, like traumatize otherpeople, hurt people, hurt other
people.
The context for this very muchfelt like people kind of
reliving their own traumas.
(55:49):
It felt so personal because theywere saying my name, right?
Because they were saying like,because it was focused around
me.
But then in hindsight, it'slike, wow, people were fucking
like working out their fuckingshit all over the place.
(56:10):
And I was like a convenient, youknow, lightning rod or I almost
became sort of metaphorical
SPEAKER_02 (56:22):
like
SPEAKER_03 (56:23):
it's not about me right like it almost became it
got to a point where it's soextreme that it was like wait
wait wait wait like let's goback to the facts of what
actually happened I did not goon a shooting spree and kill
people and murder people I didnot wake up in the morning and
(56:45):
intend to harm people in mycommunity.
Right.
So this escalated to a placethat really went sort of beyond
the actual facts and events.
SPEAKER_02 (57:04):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_03 (57:05):
You know?
SPEAKER_02 (57:06):
Yeah.
UNKNOWN (57:08):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (57:08):
So I'm making up my own alternative thought based on
what you're saying and we'll seeif it fits.
So I'm an individual in a systemand can't be equated with the
harmful system.
I deserve an opportunity foraccountability and healing.
Does
SPEAKER_03 (57:27):
that fit?
Yeah, and just that theprinciples on which this
community is built around thingslike transformative justice, no
one actually enacted any ofthose values.
Yeah.
And this is one of the thingsthat bugs me about Carly is like
(57:49):
in passing, sometimes I'll seesome like philosophical thought
of hers that's like deep andabout like empathy and healing
and being kind to people.
And I'll be like, uh, hold on.
You know, like what I want to dois just like, you know, reply to
(58:12):
their Instagram and be like,hold on.
Like this, it sounds cute.
And this makes for like a greatpersonal philosophy, but just so
you know, like you completelyabandoned these principles when
you were dealing with me.
SPEAKER_02 (58:26):
Yes.
And you know, it's interesting.
You say that like right now I'mwearing the shirt that says
abolish the police.
SPEAKER_01 (58:32):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (58:33):
And I know people who are abolitionists, um, and
have been for many, many yearswho have in certain situations
certainly called the police.
And I don't want to eliminatethe nuance of whatever they were
going through.
But why I'm bringing that up isI think you need to have the
(58:57):
kind of like insight, reflexivepractice and backbone to like
say that I'm also not perfect orI'm figuring this out or maybe
I'm realizing I don't have theanswer in this moment.
And it seems like you werearound folks who you, like I
said, Maya, you let this personinto your inner inner circle,
(59:19):
and they let you down.
Um, I wonder if you know, whenyou said sometimes it's not
about me, based on what you knowabout Carly.
And I had, I had suggested thisearlier, not knowing her at all.
But Is she unwell?
Does she struggle with somesignificant patterns of
(59:41):
attaching and attacking?
SPEAKER_03 (59:42):
I mean, I feel like she suffers from depression and
anxiety, which every fuckingperson I know does.
Yeah.
That's like everyone's baseline.
UNKNOWN (01:00:00):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (01:00:05):
there was like a triad relationship that she was
in where she like super freakedout on one of the people.
Okay.
And it got like real messy, likereal fast.
I only had her side of thestory, but, um, in hindsight,
it, it seemed a little, itseemed a little like black and
(01:00:30):
white and, um, no room for likethe benefit of the doubt
SPEAKER_02 (01:00:37):
okay so i can still trust myself i may have
overlooked um a mild red flag Idon't know, because you were,
(01:01:00):
you were swooned by her.
It seems like, I don't know ifyou, it doesn't sound like you
had a romantic relationship, butyou were like, you were swept up
in the magic of her.
SPEAKER_01 (01:01:10):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:01:16):
So what I've written here is I can still trust
myself.
I may have overlooked a mild redflag because of all the good.
Another thought that I thinkabout is, you know, Like if you
felt like you, actually I'mgoing to scratch that.
(01:01:42):
I'm thinking about your hotthought being about fear that
people close to you could betrayyou.
Is there something that reallyspeaks to that?
So you should be able to trustyourself more and You've already
said overall, I have goodjudgment.
I don't know if there'ssomething else you want to put
(01:02:02):
in there.
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:02:13):
don't know.
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (01:02:16):
I'm going to read these alternative thoughts.
Okay.
And then you tell me which oneyou like the most slash believe
the most.
slash feel, you know, thatresonates with you.
So you're getting ready to go tosleep.
You've got all these thoughts.
You want to write that letter.
(01:02:36):
What brings you the mostresolve?
Sometimes it's not about me.
I can still trust myself.
I may have overlooked a red flagbecause of all the good.
Instead of telling myself Icould have done things
differently, I might have toaccept that the outcome is
heavily dependent on the otherperson.
Hurt people.
(01:02:57):
hurt other people, and I wascaught in the crossfire of
someone else's trauma.
I am an individual in a system,and I can't be equated with the
harmful system.
I deserve an opportunity foraccountability and healing.
That was mostly my thought.
I extrapolated from what yousaid.
And people in my communityweren't ready to engage in
(01:03:18):
actual transformative justice.
Which one of those really standsout to you, brings you comfort,
you believe that.
SPEAKER_03 (01:03:35):
I mean, my instinct says hurt people, hurt other
people.
SPEAKER_02 (01:03:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (01:03:42):
I just feel like it's a way to access like a
little bit of empathy also.
SPEAKER_02 (01:03:46):
Yes.
SPEAKER_03 (01:03:47):
Absolutely.
UNKNOWN (01:03:50):
That
SPEAKER_03 (01:03:57):
Like she, that she did like really hurt me, but it
didn't come from a place oflike, I wanna be a horrible
person.
It came from a place for ownunresolved stuff.
SPEAKER_02 (01:04:14):
Okay.
So, okay.
So in a way you're kind ofsaying like the targeting came
from a place ofself-preservation.
Or maybe not evenself-preservation, but just her
own traumas in a way.
SPEAKER_03 (01:04:35):
Yeah.
Like her reaction is informed byher history, her, you know what
I mean?
Like
SPEAKER_02 (01:04:41):
her
SPEAKER_03 (01:04:44):
history, her experiences, her trauma, her
triggers, like her patterns.
And, um, and so there's a wholepiece of the puzzle.
That's again, not about me.
SPEAKER_02 (01:04:58):
Okay.
Okay, so this idea that it's notabout you, you said that it's
like brought up a new feeling,which is empathy.
On a scale of one to 10, howmuch empathy do you feel?
When you think about the newthought that hurt people, hurt
other people, and it's not aboutme.
SPEAKER_03 (01:05:18):
Then 10.
SPEAKER_02 (01:05:22):
Like you're flooded with empathy?
SPEAKER_03 (01:05:25):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:05:26):
Wow.
I can
SPEAKER_03 (01:05:26):
instantly access.
I can just instantly access herpain.
And I know some of it, right?
Because I know her, right?
So I know some of where the paincomes from.
I don't know all of it, but Ican instantly see that she's in
(01:05:54):
pain.
SPEAKER_02 (01:05:55):
Okay.
How would you rate the grief andloss on a scale of one to 10?
As you think about this newthought in the context of this
conflict and when you're gettingready to go to bed.
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:06:12):
mean, I still feel like it's, I feel like it's like
a five or a six.
SPEAKER_02 (01:06:17):
Oh yeah.
Look, it's okay if it's higher.
There's no, there's no way thatthese feelings have to go.
SPEAKER_01 (01:06:23):
Right.
So
SPEAKER_02 (01:06:24):
grief and loss is still high.
Betrayal.
SPEAKER_03 (01:06:32):
Now that's lower, probably like a six.
SPEAKER_02 (01:06:37):
And frustration.
SPEAKER_03 (01:06:45):
Like a three.
SPEAKER_01 (01:06:50):
Anger.
SPEAKER_03 (01:07:01):
Like a three.
SPEAKER_02 (01:07:04):
sadness that might go up.
SPEAKER_03 (01:07:12):
Yeah.
I mean, what was my sadnessbefore?
Yeah.
Maybe like a seven.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:07:21):
That makes sense.
Feeling misunderstood.
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:07:23):
still feel misunderstood.
You
SPEAKER_02 (01:07:28):
know, So I'm happy to leave it at a 10.
SPEAKER_03 (01:07:32):
Yeah, I mean a nine.
Like I still feel misunderstood.
SPEAKER_02 (01:07:34):
One thing I'll say about misunderstood is that if
we agree that you were hurtsomewhat deliberately, but
because someone felt like theywere next or they had to save
themselves, right?
then you weren't necessarilymisunderstood.
(01:07:56):
You were, you were targeted oryou were scapegoated.
Right.
But I can appreciate the feelingis still there where you're
like, I feel like people justaren't getting me.
They're not hearing me.
So I'll leave it there.
Did you say nine or 10?
Nine.
Nine.
Okay.
Confusion.
SPEAKER_03 (01:08:15):
I mean, way, way less confusion, probably like a
two.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:20):
Great.
In isolation.
SPEAKER_03 (01:08:27):
Like a three.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:29):
Self-doubt.
SPEAKER_01 (01:08:35):
One.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:35):
Self-critical.
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:08:42):
mean, that is my baseline.
Five.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:47):
And judging self for trusting this person.
SPEAKER_03 (01:08:52):
Two.
SPEAKER_02 (01:08:52):
Shame.
Two.
Almost at the end here.
Rumination.
SPEAKER_01 (01:09:02):
Three.
SPEAKER_02 (01:09:08):
Overwhelm.
SPEAKER_01 (01:09:13):
Zero.
SPEAKER_02 (01:09:15):
And loss of control.
SPEAKER_03 (01:09:21):
Zero.
SPEAKER_02 (01:09:22):
Zero.
Are there new feelings that comeup?
Like feeling tired?
Or exhausted?
Depleted?
Yeah,
SPEAKER_03 (01:09:34):
I feel tired for sure.
How tired do I feel?
No, it's okay.
SPEAKER_02 (01:09:46):
Okay.
Some new feelings that have comeup.
SPEAKER_03 (01:09:48):
Right.
Feels a little like Clarity?
Clarity of feeling?
SPEAKER_02 (01:10:03):
Not really.
I sometimes like to say, no, youknow what?
Clarity is fine.
Sometimes I use the wordresolve, but that's a different
feeling.
SPEAKER_03 (01:10:16):
Right.
The edge is off.
That's also not a feeling,but...
It feels less charged.
It feels softened.
SPEAKER_02 (01:10:35):
Yeah.
You know, when you say lesscharged, I think, can I say
extinguished?
Like the fire extinguished?
I
SPEAKER_03 (01:10:44):
wouldn't say extinguished.
Okay,
SPEAKER_02 (01:10:49):
okay, okay.
Okay, okay.
SPEAKER_03 (01:10:50):
But I would say like dampened or something.
SPEAKER_02 (01:10:53):
Dampened.
Okay, look.
We've got a lot of feelings.
This is very good.
Andrea, my question to you ishow, like reflect on this
process with me.
Do you think it's helped youwork through it?
(01:11:18):
This challenge, I know this is asmall piece of a larger pie that
you had experienced, but it wasone of the relationships that
you singled out because it hurtthe most.
Yeah.
So what has your experience beenworking through this thought
record?
SPEAKER_03 (01:11:37):
I mean, I feel like I have like, again, I feel like
I want to use the word softened.
I feel the whole thing feelsless, charged to me um that also
could be a function of time um Iguess it helped me articulate
(01:12:01):
some things that I feel like Iknew but I hadn't really said
out loud about the situation um
SPEAKER_02 (01:12:18):
It seems to me like the main thing that has happened
or one of the main things isthat you've regained a sense of
trust in your own self and inyour friendship network and
group.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12:30):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:12:30):
Right.
Um, and you've been able to kindof balance out, like you've got
tons of folks who have stayedwith you and figured things out.
And then there was tons of folkswho left and all that tells us
is that, um, there's some levelof unpredictability that's
(01:12:51):
normal when people have traumaor competing things going on.
SPEAKER_03 (01:12:57):
Right, right, right.
That makes sense, yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:13:01):
Yeah.
The other thing, you know, likeI think when anger goes down, in
particular anger, it might besomething else, But when anger
and betrayal go down, I thinkthat's one of the key things
that allows for empathy to show.
It allows space for empathy toshow up.
(01:13:25):
But because you experiencedbetrayal and it felt unfair to
you, you might be committed tothe anger because you're
committed to ideas of fairness.
And then when you talk aboutthis person responding from a
different place in their mind,body, history, you destabilize
the idea of fairness.
(01:13:46):
Like the rules of the gamechange in a way.
SPEAKER_03 (01:13:48):
That makes a lot of sense.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:13:53):
Yeah.
And it's also tiring, not justbecause you've been exhausted
through this process or becauseyou're tired from grieving, but
tired because like it makes itso that figuring out people is
like, it's like a lifelongendeavor for a lot of us.
SPEAKER_01 (01:14:08):
And
SPEAKER_02 (01:14:08):
then we think, oh my gosh, I still, when will I get
it right?
Or when will I figure it allout?
SPEAKER_03 (01:14:14):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (01:14:15):
And that's hard.
SPEAKER_03 (01:14:16):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (01:14:17):
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right.
I'm going to leave it there.
Is there anything else you wantto ask or share before we end
today?
SPEAKER_01 (01:14:27):
No.
SPEAKER_02 (01:14:28):
No.
All right, Andrea, thank you somuch for participating in a
moment.
I'm going to stop the recording.
We can debrief, but thank you somuch for being here.
And yeah, I hope
SPEAKER_00 (01:14:44):
this was helpful.
Take care.
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