June 24, 2025 • 37 mins
Laura and Mishayla explore how childhood experiences create lasting templates in our nervous system that trigger automatic responses in similar situations throughout our lives.
• Our nervous system takes "snapshots" during emotionally charged moments that can be triggered later in similar circumstances
• When we feel helpless or threatened, our body goes into fight, flight, or freeze responses that can become habitual patterns
• Children often interpret negative experiences as meaning something about themselves ("I'm not good enough")
• Adults can help children process difficult experiences by acknowledging their feelings rather than dismissing them
• Grounding techniques help bring our prefrontal cortex back online when we're triggered
• Different grounding methods work for different people - find what works specifically for you
• Accepting anxiety rather than fighting it can reduce its power over us
• Changing our narrative about past experiences helps rewrite our nervous system templates
• We can learn to recognize when we're triggered and create plans to respond differently
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This show is sponsored by:
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www.benavieri.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Laura (00:00):
Hello and welcome to.
Why Am I Like this?
The podcast for those whodidn't get enough hugs as a
child?
I'm Laura Wood and I'm a traumatherapist.
Michaela (00:10):
And I'm Michaela Beaver.
I'm a psychiatric nursepractitioner.
Laura (00:15):
So, Michaela, why are we doing this podcast?
Michaela (00:18):
I'm so glad you asked.
We want to help you understandyourself a bit better how the
things you learned aboutyourself and the world in
childhood are still affectingyou today.
We want to figure out why arewe like this those random things
about ourselves that we mightwonder about, like why am I so
jumpy?
Why am I so anxious?
Why do I take everythingpersonally?
(00:38):
Why are my thoughts so negative?
Why do I feel like I have tofix everything?
Laura (00:42):
all the time.
Ugh, yes, and today we'retalking about hard things and
how they shaped us.
We're going to try to answerthe following questions how did
the past experiences affect usthen, how could they be still
affecting us today and what canwe do about it?
So let's get started.
(01:03):
What do you think about pastexperiences and how they kind of
have a big impact on us?
Michaela (01:09):
Yeah, as I was thinking about like this podcast
and thinking about like whatwould I want to talk about, what
would I think about for this?
And I was thinking about likeone thing I was thinking about
was you know how, um, what welearn about experiences.
So I was thinking about mythird grade experience and I
(01:32):
don't think we've talked I don'tthink I've talked about this
one on the podcast.
So I had this teacher and, um,she called all the students by
like princess one, princess two,princess three, whatever.
So we got numbers and I was kindof like a shy, quiet kid or
(01:54):
whatever.
And her favorite favoritestudent, um, was this guy who
was very like animated and loudand like very talkative and like
just like the exact opposite ofme, and so I was thinking about
like what that taught me thenwas that like, like I wasn't
(02:16):
good enough, like like there wassomething wrong with me.
That like I, I think I was likeprincess 32 or something like
that, like and so like that Ithink further, like made me go
into myself more than it did,like help me be more like
animated and like want to belike the other kid yeah, but it
(02:40):
didn't really like nurture anykind of learning or growth.
Laura (02:45):
It really just shaped like you kind of shut down a
little bit maybe didn't want tochange or didn't want to do
anything differently, becausemaybe you were afraid.
Michaela (02:55):
Yeah, I think I was.
I think that, like you know, asa kid we look at like who we're
like, what we're like Right,and we think about like I'm not
like the kid that she liked, I'mdifferent than that, so there
must be something wrong with me.
And I think that, like when Ithink about the nervous system
response that that probablycaused was a lot of freeze right
(03:19):
, like um fight or flight freezeresponse, and so I think that,
like that just taught my nervoussystem what to do when I just
didn't feel like I wascomfortable.
Laura (03:33):
Yeah, anytime we have those hard experiences, our
nervous system it creates like amark on our nervous system.
Like our survival response is tooptimize, like our capacity to
survive in that moment and we'regoing to do what we feel like
we need to do in order to getthrough it with as minimal
(03:54):
injury.
Right, and so if it's too muchof a risk to make a change or
like to put yourself out therelike to feel vulnerable, that's
not going to work.
So we shift to the other wayand then our parasympathetic
nervous system kind of takesover and like slows us way down
and and puts us into like ashutdown, or you know, our
(04:16):
sympathetic nervous system couldactivate and put us into a
freeze, which is where we'rejust like frozen in fear or
frozen in like, um, frozen infeeling like nothing that we do
is going to work or nothing thatwe do is going to be good
enough, Like we don't have, likewe're feeling helpless, Um, and
then I tried my best, and mybest wasn't good enough, and so,
(04:40):
therefore, I have to conserveenergy Like I have to.
Michaela (04:44):
I have to just survive .
Laura (04:48):
Yeah, and what's interesting is these marks on
our nervous system like theystay with us forever, like they
create almost like a template ofa response that then gets
inserted into other scenariosthat are similar.
Yeah, so our body will keepusing that same response over
(05:09):
and over and over.
Like I don't remember a lot ofmy childhood experiences, but
like when I do, they're likethose visceral memories, right
when they're really powerful,like vivid memories, and it's
like it teaches you somethingright, like what you said you
were learning in that moment.
Like I'm not good enough,there's something wrong with me.
A lot of the time, these hardexperiences create a negative
(05:33):
narrative about ourselves in ourhead where we think, like I
can't do it or I'm not goodenough.
I'm broken, or I'm bad or I'mdifferent.
Michaela (05:48):
Well, and I think that , like too, I think that, like
in this experience, I'm like,okay, I could totally see like
people pleasing being a responseto you know, like trying to
overcome not feeling like we'regood enough, right, like just
always trying to make everybodyelse happy so that you know we
don't rock the boat, or like,you know just, or like hiding,
(06:09):
right.
So I think of, like you know,imposter syndrome in this
scenario, right.
So like when I and I stillthink I know that this is a
thing that I feel, but I knowthat, especially like when I was
not quite in NP yet and I wasstill learning and I was working
in the emergency room, I thinkI felt a lot of that, and so,
(06:29):
like you know, the doctors wereso kind and they were so helpful
and they were trying to likehelp me learn and help me grow.
But I think that, like that,that's a moment where I felt
that that freeze came back,where I was like, oh, my gosh,
I'm not good enough, likethey're going to judge me and
I'm going to fail, and so itwould create a similar response.
(06:51):
And so, you know, I felt like,even though I knew a lot of
answers or whatever I was likeoh, I'm going to, I'm going to
do something wrong.
I'm not going to give the rightanswer Like I'm.
I'm a fraud, right.
Laura (07:03):
Yeah, and when we have that feeling it really hijacks
us and like takes away ourperspective from the bigger
picture.
Like it makes it so, like wezoom in so much to the fear that
we really can't zoom out andsee that like we're just one
person out of 30 students orwhatever, and you know it's not
(07:27):
that big of a deal, like it'snot the end of the world If
somebody, if we make a mistakeor if somebody like judges us
even, or you know, but we can'tzoom out and we can't see that
big picture of like the wholething and the the you know more
(07:48):
important things about it.
Like I'm going through thisexperience and I'm learning and
I'm growing and I'm um, I don'thave to have all the answers,
that's right, that's right.
That's like with a growthmindset we don't already know
everything we have.
When we have a growth mindset,we realize that we're in the
(08:09):
process, we're realized thatwe're not experts yet and we're
um, we're open to learning fromour experiences and when we have
an experience that teaches us,um, something, we take the
teaching versus the failing.
Like, we focus on the learningversus focusing on the mistake,
(08:29):
and that's with a growth mindset.
But sometimes, in those momentswhen we feel small or when we
feel like our nervous system iskind of hijacking us, it's so
hard to see that growth mindset.
In that moment, everything justfeels too big and everything
just feels like, like we're thethis, like spotlight is on us
(08:54):
and everybody's going to noticeevery single flaw that we
possibly have.
Michaela (08:59):
Well, and I think you know, I think back to like the
third grade experience, like inthe home setting, you look like
you're completely normal becauseyou're in a comfortable place.
That's safe, right, and it'snot that I didn't like tell my
parents what was going on, it'sthat they didn't know how much
it was affecting me.
I didn't know it wasn't normal,right, like I didn't know that
(09:23):
this was a thing that was like,not what, how everybody else
felt, cause I'm, I was eight,right, and I was, I was.
I started school on the youngend.
So, like, I was the probablylike one of the youngest kids in
the class.
So there's all these kids thathave a lot more, you know, a
year, almost a year, ahead of meand their knowledge and their
(09:44):
growth.
So I was always probably tryingto play catch up with them
developmentally.
I didn't know that, though as akid right, as a kid, you don't
really think about those things,and so you know, I think that
that you know, I think about how, like I asked for help, I told
my parents what happened, butnothing changed.
How could that have affected mynervous system?
(10:06):
Right, like I'm alone, I can'tdo, I can't.
There's nothing I can do to fixthis?
Nobody's going to save me,right?
Nobody has any answers for me,right?
I'm on my own.
Laura (10:18):
Yeah, and that feeling of being on your own when you're a
kid is so big it'sinsurmountable.
Right, we can't make it on ourown.
We need support and help.
But we also don't necessarilyknow how to communicate what we
need or like really dig intolike what the problems are.
And then also sometimes, whenkids have problems like adults
(10:38):
in our lives, like just kind ofsay like okay, that's not that
big of a deal, like you'll befine or it's no big deal.
But when we're not getting thatattunement to like the concern
and nobody's really saying likeI really understand where you're
coming from and I really feellike this, this is big for you,
like I can tell that you'rereally upset.
You know kind of connectingwith that and attuning to that,
(11:00):
like any experience that youhave with the adult in your life
, when the adult is not, um, Idon't know connecting and
attuning, then we're in aposition where our nervous
system is going to respond tothat like that we're alone and
that we don't have the supportthat we need and we're going to
feel helpless.
Michaela (11:21):
Right, but also like my adult brain now, looking back
at that situation, I'm likethat was dumb, who cares Right?
Like why?
Why did that?
You know?
Like.
So I think that, like, look anadult looking into this and this
is one of the things that youcan take away from this is that,
like as an adult, when your kidcomes to you with a problem,
just because you don't thinkit's a big problem, doesn't mean
(11:43):
that it's not a big problem forthem.
Laura (11:47):
Yeah, we have to have empathy for our kids.
And it's hard to have empathyfor kids because everything is
so big.
Like kids can be dramatic,right, they can, kind of they
can make mountains out ofmolehills, and we don't want to
feed into that like overlydramatic response.
We don't want to like makeeverything a big deal.
(12:08):
But I think sometimes justsimply acknowledging and saying
like hey, I see you, this isreally hard for you, it's really
hard for you to make thischange, it's really hard for you
to go through this class, it'sreally hard for you, you know,
like kind of reflecting, justreflecting back on what they're
going through, like you're goingthrough a hard time and I get
(12:28):
that and you know I'm here foryou can go a long way.
Michaela (12:34):
Yeah, Well, and I think that you know, helping
them to understand like hey,right now you think that this
means something about you, andthen helping them come up with
like why it doesn't.
Laura (12:48):
Right.
Michaela (12:49):
Okay, it makes you feel like you're not good enough
, but maybe like, are there someways that you think that maybe
you are good enough, right, andlike highlighting the positive
things and helping them come upwith the answers on their own,
so that they can kind of realizeoh okay, maybe these thoughts
aren't true.
Laura (13:04):
So that they can kind of realize oh okay, maybe these
thoughts aren't true.
And in trauma therapy we workto change that negative
cognition to a positive one or aneutral one, and so sometimes
the answer isn't positive, theanswer is just neutral, like
maybe this doesn't mean anythingabout you, maybe this story
isn't about you at all.
It's about this teacher who is,you know, not necessarily
(13:28):
making the best decisions forhow she addresses her class and
um, and it's not, it's notreally taking a nurturing
posture.
I think sometimes we thinksomething.
This means this has to meansomething about us.
But the reality is it doesn'tmean anything about us, it means
everything about the otherperson.
Michaela (13:48):
Yeah, like maybe this lady didn't remember people's
names and so she had to come upwith another way to, not you
know, call people the wrong nameor something.
Yeah.
Laura (13:59):
That's probably a thing Like if I'm a teacher and I have
30 something kids, I'm supposedto remember all their names
Like that's hard to do so then Ican just like create this
numbering system that makes itmake sense.
So it's really just about hereffort to like manage that
situation for herself.
And that's really what we'reall doing all the time is we are
(14:22):
managing our own situation andwe're managing our own distress,
and however we're doing thatcan sometimes affect other
people.
Michaela (14:33):
Can I like that.
I think that it's important toknow that, like though we're
responsible for our ownemotional responses to things,
people can affect our emotions,but it's our job to really work
on managing that response andworking through how that's
(14:53):
affecting us.
The other thing that I wantedto say is, like you know, it's
not about the experience ofwhatever it was that we went
through or we're going througheven now today, but especially
as children, as our brains aredeveloping and we're like
learning about the world andourselves and trying to
(15:13):
understand things better.
It's really about the nervoussystem response, right.
So, like you know, we talk alot about, like going into the
stress response and then, youknow, going into the trauma
response in these situations,right, and so if we feel like we
there's nothing we can do andwe're helpless, that's more
(15:35):
likely going to start the traumaresponse and it's going to
become something that gets alittle bit stuck for us right,
yeah, absolutely.
Laura (15:43):
And then that response will kick back up in similar
situations down the road.
So, like these things affect usin that moment by creating a
narrative and creating this liketemplate of a response that
we're going to then use later on.
And so, as we think about howthose emotional experiences
(16:04):
affect us in our later life,like, think about you know,
maybe, when you see people, whensomebody maybe like I don't
know if this is true for you,but like if somebody calls you
princess, like you're like, likeI don't like that, right, like
I don't like being calledprincess, I don't like being um,
given like a pet name orsomething, right, because you
(16:25):
have this like response to itwhere it was this negative thing
for you.
And so your nervous system islike, oh no, something about
that is bad.
I don't necessarily know whatabout it is bad, but it's bad
and we don't like it and it'snot good for us.
And so, like you're going toreject that idea in the future,
right?
Like, um, I sometimes tell therestaurant story of you know
(16:47):
where this fictional kid getsleft behind at the restaurant
after the mom and dad like packall the kids in the car, and
then you know, maybe she getsout and goes in cause she forgot
her stuffed animal.
And she gets out and goes in therestaurant and the parents like
don't realize, and they startto drive away.
Now, even if that experienceonly lasts like 30 seconds, in
(17:10):
that moment that kid is feelinglike they're being left behind
by their parents and so theymight notice.
So their nervous system isgoing to take a snapshot of
everything in the restaurant,because all of that stuff now is
going to signal danger, right,like the red chairs or the smell
of French fries or, you know,hamburgers or whatever, right?
(17:34):
So we're going to take asnapshot of everything we see,
we feel, we taste, we smell,we're using our senses to take
that information in, and thenour nervous kind of fuzzy too
Right Like it's not clear,because all that cortisol is
kind of messing with our abilityto take that perfectly clear
picture.
Michaela (17:52):
So like now, all of a sudden, a red chair is all that
we like, kind of see.
Right, that's right.
Laura (17:58):
Yeah.
So it's like taking theseindividual things that aren't
really connected and related toeach other in any way, and then
it's like saying this is this ispossibly dangerous, because I
don't know what part of thismade us get left behind, but
something did.
Was it the way we were acting?
Was it the way that?
Was it the restaurant itself?
Was it the smell?
(18:19):
I don't know.
But what's going to happen nowis my memory is going to get
activated when I see thosesimilar things, and I'm not
going to know why, because thisexperience really only lasted 30
seconds and I wasn't in anydanger and it was fine.
But I don't know that becauseI'm a baby any danger and it was
fine, but I don't know thatbecause I'm a baby.
(18:40):
I, you know, like when I'm alittle kid at the time, like
just feeling afraid.
I don't know that they'recoming back.
I don't know that.
You know it wasn't my faultthat that happened or whatever.
But I might create this likenegative, um, this negative
thought loop about like whathappened in that moment and that
it was my fault or thatsomething I was bad, or they
didn't want me, or somethinglike that, and then those things
(19:01):
can come back and get me lateron when, like, I walk into a
restaurant and I feel the and Ismell those similar things and I
see those similar things, Imight just get anxious, right,
and I might just like have apanic attack for and for
seemingly no reason.
But it's really my nervoussystem saying, hey, this is
dangerous, like this is a reallybad situation that you're in
(19:22):
right now, right, you might getleft, yeah, and you might be
abandoned.
And that's so scary that ournervous system will just like
have this response and it's nottaking in the other data, it's
not taking in that biggerpicture, like we talked about.
The big picture that says, likethis is just a restaurant and
(19:42):
it's not dangerous.
The big picture that says, likethat was a one-time thing
because of this othercircumstance and it's not
related to what's happening now.
Like I often say to clients,like this isn't that right, like
this is not that one time, thisis a different time and there's
different circumstances andit's not, you know, it's not
(20:03):
dangerous just because you werein danger.
That one time doesn't mean thatevery single time you encounter
these things that it'sdangerous.
And we have to kind of retrainour nervous system a little bit.
We have to introduce that newinformation, that adaptive,
helpful information that says Iam not in any danger, I am
(20:24):
capable of taking care of myself, I'm capable of finding help if
I need it, there's nothingwrong with me, like those
adaptive, helpful pieces ofinformation.
We can retrain our nervoussystem with those.
Michaela (20:39):
And that sounds that's and that's the ultimate goal,
right, but by the time they'reactually reaching you.
In therapy they haveencountered the same scenario
multiple times and that pathwayis pretty strong, so it takes
time and effort to rewire thingsand calm that pathway down so
that your body can go.
(20:59):
Oh wait, maybe I don't need totell you that this is dangerous
anymore.
Laura (21:05):
Yeah, it takes rewriting, like sometimes I use like a
cell phone analogy, right, likewhen our apps, like you know,
the apps on your phone like needan update so they get kind of
glitchy or whatever right Like.
So if we don't update, so wehave to go in and manually like
click, update this app in orderto kind of rewrite that
narrative and reprogram thatparticular content in our brain.
(21:28):
If our brain is like a bunch ofneural networks and they're all
just these apps, sometimes wefind that one that hasn't been
updated in a while and we haveto go in and really like program
it and do that on purpose andgive it new information and give
it access to the present dayright the data collection from
(21:48):
the present day like connect itto the internet, get it online.
Sometimes we say like well, youneed to bring our prefrontal
cortex back online in order togive the rest of our neural
networks access to the presentday information.
Michaela (22:02):
Yeah, and that makes a lot of sense.
And, you know, grounding is areally good way of getting
people, to help them back intogetting back into letting that
nervous system calm down,getting our prefrontal cortex
back online and remindingourselves that, like, hey, I'm a
39 year old woman, I live inthis address, I I'm, you know,
(22:24):
I'm not that you know eight yearold version of myself anymore.
Laura (22:31):
Yeah, and not every single grounding tool works for
every single person too.
Like I think that's importantto note is that, like there's a
billion different ways that wecan ground ourselves, but not
all of them are going to workfor you.
So every person really needs tothink about what means safety
(22:54):
to them and like what helps themfeel competent and capable and
powerful.
Like for me, I like using myage because it reminds me that
I'm an adult and I'm not a kid.
That's helpful for me.
That might not be helpful foreveryone, right, I like to use
things in the room because itmakes the room it kind of like
(23:15):
zooms me out a little bit.
Instead of like having thislike myopic lens of just the
fear and in my head.
I like to kind of get out of myhead and get into the room and
like look for shapes in the room.
That kind of distract me alittle bit and kind of get me
more centered.
Those work for me, but thatdoesn't mean it works for
everybody.
More centered, those work forme, but that doesn't mean it
(23:40):
works for everybody.
So it's important to practicelots of skills Like they have.
You can go online and downloada list of a hundred grounding
skills and there's tons of tonsof them out there and we just
have to find the ones that workfor us.
Michaela (23:51):
That's good advice, for sure.
Laura (23:54):
And when we, you know, start to use them, they don't
always work the first timeeither.
Like someone said to merecently like, oh, that doesn't
work for.
I can't remember what it was,but it was like, oh, that
doesn't work for me.
I was like, well, why not?
What happens?
And she was saying, well, assoon as I'm done with the
(24:16):
grounding skill, like my fearcomes back or my feelings come
back, like I'm like, okay, thenyou do it again.
And so it's like it's not thatit's not working, it's just that
it doesn't last that long.
Initially, right, because we'rein that state like of hyper
arousal.
We haven't trained our body tokind of get used to and settle
(24:37):
in to the calm, because a lot ofthe time we are so amped up If
we've had a lot of really hardthings in our life and we've had
to do really hard things kindof over and over and over and
chronically and consistently ourbody hasn't really learned how
to be calm.
It doesn't know what that lookslike.
It doesn't know how to feelthat in a safe way.
Michaela (25:01):
Yeah, and so then it's going to take a little bit more
work to not only ground butalso and like, and and calm our
nervous system, but also torecognize that, like, being
anxious is what your brain istrying to tell you.
(25:23):
If we worry about everythingthat's out there, if we keep
worrying about stuff, thenthat's what's going to keep us
safe.
It isn't true, right?
We can logically know that,like, if I worry about getting
into a car accident, it's notgoing to actually prevent me
from getting into a car accident.
What prevents me is planningand preparing and paying
(25:44):
attention while I'm drivingright, these are helpful things.
But worrying about if it'sgoing to happen, that does
nothing good for me.
But our brain a part of ourbrain thinks that it's going to
be really helpful if we justworry about every scenario, and
so then that becomes ourbaseline where we think that
we're safe if we're doing that.
Right, but if we can learn howto be calm and we can calm our
(26:06):
nervous system, that's whatactually is safe.
Laura (26:10):
Yeah, yeah, like I think my dog's whining.
I'm so sorry.
So I think when we actuallylearn how to be in the calm and
realize that me being calm isn'tgoing to create like danger,
(26:31):
right?
So, for example, some peoplebelieve that if I relax then
I'll be blindsided by what comesup, right, so we have to be
hypervigilant, like well, if Irelax then it'll be worse
because something will come upand I won't be prepared.
But really the opposite is true.
When we relax and when we are,you know, our most calm self,
(26:54):
then we have access to more ofthat prefrontal cortex, that
executive functioning that'stelling us how to navigate a
situation in an effective way.
It's used.
We can use our experience andour knowledge in the most
effective way when we'regrounded and calm, versus when
we're hypervigilant.
And you know hypervigilance isreally we're just focused on one
(27:16):
thing that could possiblyhappen.
We're just focused on one thingthat could possibly happen,
versus seeing that big pictureand zooming out and being able
to, like, prepare for manyscenarios that life has to bring
right.
We have.
The world is a dynamic place.
It's not just going to.
We're not like we're not morelikely to experience the thing
that we're hypervigilant aboutthan we are to experience all
(27:39):
these other things that we needto have our brain online to, to,
to sort of deal with at thetime.
Michaela (27:45):
Yeah, that's a good point.
Um, so what else could we do tohelp ourselves manage like the
things that you know we wentthrough as a kid in our on our
day-to-day tasks, like I?
Laura (28:06):
think like we need to change the narrative.
We need to maybe retellourselves the story of, like,
what that meant about us in thatmoment.
So, if we can challenge thatnarrative and then bring in that
adaptive perspective of thiswasn't about you, this is about
(28:30):
them, or this was just a freakaccident, like, sometimes
accidents are just, they justhappen.
They don't happen, for you know, because of you, or it's not
something that you caused, like,so, rewriting that narrative
about like it's not about me,this isn't my doing, we're not
(28:52):
that powerful, right?
Like we can kind of takeourselves out of it and that can
really help us tell our nervoussystem like, oh, okay, well, if
it's not about me, then I don'thave to control it.
And that can really help ustell our nervous system like, oh
, okay, well, if it's not aboutme, then I don't have to control
it.
Yeah, like I think we want tocontrol everything all the time.
Michaela (29:10):
Well, I think it also comes back to like the literal
phobia of feeling anxious, right, like those past experiences.
Whether we recognize it or notyet right, those past
experiences are affecting theway that our nervous system
responds to things.
But in the moment, well, likeyou said, what we focus on is
(29:33):
our experience of the situation.
So, like our heart is racing,we get sweaty, we get hot, we
get flushed, we feel embarrassedthat people can see that we
feel that way, and so we want toescape because of that feeling
right.
We don't like how it feels, weknow it doesn't feel right, and
(29:56):
so then we just want to get awayfrom that or we want to avoid
feeling that way.
Laura (30:03):
I think accepting that we have these negative experiences
sometimes is also important.
Trying to prevent me from everbeing triggered or trying to
prevent ever experiencinganxiety or distress that's just
not realistic.
I will experience this anxiety,I will experience embarrassment
(30:25):
, I will experience negativeemotions like that is going to
happen and I need to be okaywith that.
I need to be okay knowing that,like these emotions are going
to come and I can handle them.
Michaela (30:37):
I think that's the big thing, you know.
I think that, like anxietysteals that from us, we, we, we,
we have a catastrophic thoughtright, like the worst possible
is going to happen, and then I'mnot capable of managing it.
And that's what's stealing fromus, our our ability to say like
, okay, well, even if thathappens, I can handle it.
Laura (31:01):
Right.
Michaela (31:02):
Like I can manage it because I've done hard things,
and I think that that's a reallybig piece of like being able to
push through some of thosefears about feeling anxious or
feeling dumb or feeling whateverit is that you, you feel.
Laura (31:19):
Yeah, and I think sometimes.
So I share with people like toinvite the anxiety, to just like
sit next to you, like invitethe stuff, like let it exist,
let it be there and don't try tolike control it or push it or
like banish it or eliminate it,because it's just going to grow
(31:41):
Right, persists, that's right.
What we resist persists.
I love that.
Michaela (31:46):
But I think too, like I like that, and I I sometimes
tell clients like hey, thanks,thank, like, thank you, anxiety,
like that you're doing, yourbody is doing its job, but you
always say go, you're, you'relike you're, you're reinforcing
(32:25):
that pathway, being active, soactivated, and so then your
brain isn't like okay, I need toremind you of this 500 times
today.
Laura (32:36):
Yeah, when we are in that thought loop of I need to think
about this over and over andover until it gets done, Like
there's lots of different waysto cope with that One, we can
write stuff down and kind of getit out of our brain too.
We can check in with ourselfand just be like, hey, okay,
Like almost have a conversationwith that anxiety, Like, okay,
so you're telling me I need todo this.
(32:57):
Will I get this done?
Yes, Like what is my plan toget this done?
What is my experience that youknow?
What am I experiencing?
Is it fear?
Is it fear of failure?
Right, Like so, kind of justhaving that conversation with
yourself like what's reallygoing on here and what do I need
(33:19):
in order to make sure that Ican effectively manage this
situation?
Sometimes it's not that theproblem needs to be solved right
in that moment.
Sometimes the problem can't besolved right in that moment and
it's just about having somereflection and really just
introspection, trying tounderstand where that's coming
(33:39):
from and trying to reinforce theplan.
Right, Let yourself know like,hmm, I will be able to manage
this.
Like I'm going to do this atthis time.
I'm going to take care of this.
You know when I get to theoffice, or whatever.
Michaela (33:53):
Yeah, absolutely Well, and I think that that sounds
like maybe you know a story froma kid who maybe didn't get
their stuff done, or there was atime where there was a negative
consequence for not gettingthings done, and so now we have
to overthink okay, did I get?
Did I get this done?
We were just talking thismorning that we had a relaxing
(34:13):
weekend.
It was a long weekend and therewere things that we, you know,
needed to get done.
And you have that like panicokay, I need to get this done.
And it's like that's a goodthing.
It is there to help you, tellyou that this is important, this
is important, it needs to getdone.
(34:34):
That anxiety is driving you andso it's a good thing, as long
as you don't let it become likeyou use it for the good and not
let it just paralyze you.
Laura (34:45):
Absolutely Like that's.
What I was just thinking aboutis like I woke up at three
o'clock in the morning thinking,oh my gosh, I have to take care
of these three tasks orwhatever.
And then I'm like it's three inthe morning.
Why am I thinking about like?
This is my thought process lastnight or this morning.
I thought I don't need to takecare of this right now.
I will be able to do this todayduring the day, like after I
(35:09):
wake up and I have time.
So I ran through my schedule.
I was like okay, what's myschedule tomorrow?
I have this, this, this.
Do I have time to get this done?
I have this, this, this.
Do I have time to get this done?
Yes, Will I make sure that Itake care of it?
Yes, Is it on my to-do list?
Yes, Done.
And then I don't have.
And then I can say thanks,anxiety for bringing it up.
We've got a plan.
(35:31):
I can move forward now.
Yeah, and I can let go of thosethoughts.
Michaela (35:38):
And that's a healthy way of managing it.
So we can't stop the stressorfrom happening.
We can't stop the fact thatwe're out of our normal routine.
Laura (35:49):
Right, there was nothing I could do to prevent myself
from waking up at three in themorning, and you know thinking
about these tasks.
That's not the problem.
Michaela (35:56):
Right, the problem is being able to plan, prepare, let
it go and go back to sleep.
Laura (36:03):
Yeah, which is what I did , and it worked out great.
And then I took care of mytasks this morning and
everything's good, they're alldone.
Michaela (36:14):
See, we can do hard things.
Laura (36:16):
We can do really hard things.
I think that is just theperfect place to end it today
too, and thank you so much forthis conversation and all of
this good advice.
I really think that it'simportant that we all zoom out a
little bit from time to timeand let go of some of those old
(36:37):
templates that are no longerserving us.
Go of some of those oldtemplates that are no longer
serving us, and thank you somuch for listening to why Am I
Like this?
If you like our show, pleaseleave us a rating and review on
your favorite podcast platform,follow the show and share it
with your friends.
This episode was written andproduced by me, laura Wood and
Michaela Beaver.
Our theme song is Making EndsMeat by Thick as Thieves, and a
(37:00):
special thanks to Core Self,Benavieri Counseling and Active
Healing Psychiatric Services forsponsoring this show.
Hello and welcome to.
Why Am I Like this?
The podcast for those whodidn't get enough hugs as a
child?
I'm Laura Wood and I'm a traumatherapist.
Michaela (00:10):
And I'm Michaela Beaver.
I'm a psychiatric nursepractitioner.
Laura (00:15):
So, Michaela, why are we doing this podcast?
Michaela (00:18):
I'm so glad you asked.
We want to help you understandyourself a bit better how the
things you learned aboutyourself and the world in
childhood are still affectingyou today.
We want to figure out why arewe like this those random things
about ourselves that we mightwonder about, like why am I so
jumpy?
Why am I so anxious?
Why do I take everythingpersonally?
(00:38):
Why are my thoughts so negative?
Why do I feel like I have tofix everything?
Laura (00:42):
all the time.
Ugh, yes, and today we'retalking about hard things and
how they shaped us.
We're going to try to answerthe following questions how did
the past experiences affect usthen, how could they be still
affecting us today and what canwe do about it?
So let's get started.
(01:03):
What do you think about pastexperiences and how they kind of
have a big impact on us?
Michaela (01:09):
Yeah, as I was thinking about like this podcast
and thinking about like whatwould I want to talk about, what
would I think about for this?
And I was thinking about likeone thing I was thinking about
was you know how, um, what welearn about experiences.
So I was thinking about mythird grade experience and I
(01:32):
don't think we've talked I don'tthink I've talked about this
one on the podcast.
So I had this teacher and, um,she called all the students by
like princess one, princess two,princess three, whatever.
So we got numbers and I was kindof like a shy, quiet kid or
(01:54):
whatever.
And her favorite favoritestudent, um, was this guy who
was very like animated and loudand like very talkative and like
just like the exact opposite ofme, and so I was thinking about
like what that taught me thenwas that like, like I wasn't
(02:16):
good enough, like like there wassomething wrong with me.
That like I, I think I was likeprincess 32 or something like
that, like and so like that Ithink further, like made me go
into myself more than it did,like help me be more like
animated and like want to belike the other kid yeah, but it
(02:40):
didn't really like nurture anykind of learning or growth.
Laura (02:45):
It really just shaped like you kind of shut down a
little bit maybe didn't want tochange or didn't want to do
anything differently, becausemaybe you were afraid.
Michaela (02:55):
Yeah, I think I was.
I think that, like you know, asa kid we look at like who we're
like, what we're like Right,and we think about like I'm not
like the kid that she liked, I'mdifferent than that, so there
must be something wrong with me.
And I think that, like when Ithink about the nervous system
response that that probablycaused was a lot of freeze right
(03:19):
, like um fight or flight freezeresponse, and so I think that,
like that just taught my nervoussystem what to do when I just
didn't feel like I wascomfortable.
Laura (03:33):
Yeah, anytime we have those hard experiences, our
nervous system it creates like amark on our nervous system.
Like our survival response is tooptimize, like our capacity to
survive in that moment and we'regoing to do what we feel like
we need to do in order to getthrough it with as minimal
(03:54):
injury.
Right, and so if it's too muchof a risk to make a change or
like to put yourself out therelike to feel vulnerable, that's
not going to work.
So we shift to the other wayand then our parasympathetic
nervous system kind of takesover and like slows us way down
and and puts us into like ashutdown, or you know, our
(04:16):
sympathetic nervous system couldactivate and put us into a
freeze, which is where we'rejust like frozen in fear or
frozen in like, um, frozen infeeling like nothing that we do
is going to work or nothing thatwe do is going to be good
enough, Like we don't have, likewe're feeling helpless, Um, and
then I tried my best, and mybest wasn't good enough, and so,
(04:40):
therefore, I have to conserveenergy Like I have to.
Michaela (04:44):
I have to just survive .
Laura (04:48):
Yeah, and what's interesting is these marks on
our nervous system like theystay with us forever, like they
create almost like a template ofa response that then gets
inserted into other scenariosthat are similar.
Yeah, so our body will keepusing that same response over
(05:09):
and over and over.
Like I don't remember a lot ofmy childhood experiences, but
like when I do, they're likethose visceral memories, right
when they're really powerful,like vivid memories, and it's
like it teaches you somethingright, like what you said you
were learning in that moment.
Like I'm not good enough,there's something wrong with me.
A lot of the time, these hardexperiences create a negative
(05:33):
narrative about ourselves in ourhead where we think, like I
can't do it or I'm not goodenough.
I'm broken, or I'm bad or I'mdifferent.
Michaela (05:48):
Well, and I think that , like too, I think that, like
in this experience, I'm like,okay, I could totally see like
people pleasing being a responseto you know, like trying to
overcome not feeling like we'regood enough, right, like just
always trying to make everybodyelse happy so that you know we
don't rock the boat, or like,you know just, or like hiding,
(06:09):
right.
So I think of, like you know,imposter syndrome in this
scenario, right.
So like when I and I stillthink I know that this is a
thing that I feel, but I knowthat, especially like when I was
not quite in NP yet and I wasstill learning and I was working
in the emergency room, I thinkI felt a lot of that, and so,
(06:29):
like you know, the doctors wereso kind and they were so helpful
and they were trying to likehelp me learn and help me grow.
But I think that, like that,that's a moment where I felt
that that freeze came back,where I was like, oh, my gosh,
I'm not good enough, likethey're going to judge me and
I'm going to fail, and so itwould create a similar response.
(06:51):
And so, you know, I felt like,even though I knew a lot of
answers or whatever I was likeoh, I'm going to, I'm going to
do something wrong.
I'm not going to give the rightanswer Like I'm.
I'm a fraud, right.
Laura (07:03):
Yeah, and when we have that feeling it really hijacks
us and like takes away ourperspective from the bigger
picture.
Like it makes it so, like wezoom in so much to the fear that
we really can't zoom out andsee that like we're just one
person out of 30 students orwhatever, and you know it's not
(07:27):
that big of a deal, like it'snot the end of the world If
somebody, if we make a mistakeor if somebody like judges us
even, or you know, but we can'tzoom out and we can't see that
big picture of like the wholething and the the you know more
(07:48):
important things about it.
Like I'm going through thisexperience and I'm learning and
I'm growing and I'm um, I don'thave to have all the answers,
that's right, that's right.
That's like with a growthmindset we don't already know
everything we have.
When we have a growth mindset,we realize that we're in the
(08:09):
process, we're realized thatwe're not experts yet and we're
um, we're open to learning fromour experiences and when we have
an experience that teaches us,um, something, we take the
teaching versus the failing.
Like, we focus on the learningversus focusing on the mistake,
(08:29):
and that's with a growth mindset.
But sometimes, in those momentswhen we feel small or when we
feel like our nervous system iskind of hijacking us, it's so
hard to see that growth mindset.
In that moment, everything justfeels too big and everything
just feels like, like we're thethis, like spotlight is on us
(08:54):
and everybody's going to noticeevery single flaw that we
possibly have.
Michaela (08:59):
Well, and I think you know, I think back to like the
third grade experience, like inthe home setting, you look like
you're completely normal becauseyou're in a comfortable place.
That's safe, right, and it'snot that I didn't like tell my
parents what was going on, it'sthat they didn't know how much
it was affecting me.
I didn't know it wasn't normal,right, like I didn't know that
(09:23):
this was a thing that was like,not what, how everybody else
felt, cause I'm, I was eight,right, and I was, I was.
I started school on the youngend.
So, like, I was the probablylike one of the youngest kids in
the class.
So there's all these kids thathave a lot more, you know, a
year, almost a year, ahead of meand their knowledge and their
(09:44):
growth.
So I was always probably tryingto play catch up with them
developmentally.
I didn't know that, though as akid right, as a kid, you don't
really think about those things,and so you know, I think that
that you know, I think about how, like I asked for help, I told
my parents what happened, butnothing changed.
How could that have affected mynervous system?
(10:06):
Right, like I'm alone, I can'tdo, I can't.
There's nothing I can do to fixthis?
Nobody's going to save me,right?
Nobody has any answers for me,right?
I'm on my own.
Laura (10:18):
Yeah, and that feeling of being on your own when you're a
kid is so big it'sinsurmountable.
Right, we can't make it on ourown.
We need support and help.
But we also don't necessarilyknow how to communicate what we
need or like really dig intolike what the problems are.
And then also sometimes, whenkids have problems like adults
(10:38):
in our lives, like just kind ofsay like okay, that's not that
big of a deal, like you'll befine or it's no big deal.
But when we're not getting thatattunement to like the concern
and nobody's really saying likeI really understand where you're
coming from and I really feellike this, this is big for you,
like I can tell that you'rereally upset.
You know kind of connectingwith that and attuning to that,
(11:00):
like any experience that youhave with the adult in your life
, when the adult is not, um, Idon't know connecting and
attuning, then we're in aposition where our nervous
system is going to respond tothat like that we're alone and
that we don't have the supportthat we need and we're going to
feel helpless.
Michaela (11:21):
Right, but also like my adult brain now, looking back
at that situation, I'm likethat was dumb, who cares Right?
Like why?
Why did that?
You know?
Like.
So I think that, like, look anadult looking into this and this
is one of the things that youcan take away from this is that,
like as an adult, when your kidcomes to you with a problem,
just because you don't thinkit's a big problem, doesn't mean
(11:43):
that it's not a big problem forthem.
Laura (11:47):
Yeah, we have to have empathy for our kids.
And it's hard to have empathyfor kids because everything is
so big.
Like kids can be dramatic,right, they can, kind of they
can make mountains out ofmolehills, and we don't want to
feed into that like overlydramatic response.
We don't want to like makeeverything a big deal.
(12:08):
But I think sometimes justsimply acknowledging and saying
like hey, I see you, this isreally hard for you, it's really
hard for you to make thischange, it's really hard for you
to go through this class, it'sreally hard for you, you know,
like kind of reflecting, justreflecting back on what they're
going through, like you're goingthrough a hard time and I get
(12:28):
that and you know I'm here foryou can go a long way.
Michaela (12:34):
Yeah, Well, and I think that you know, helping
them to understand like hey,right now you think that this
means something about you, andthen helping them come up with
like why it doesn't.
Laura (12:48):
Right.
Michaela (12:49):
Okay, it makes you feel like you're not good enough
, but maybe like, are there someways that you think that maybe
you are good enough, right, andlike highlighting the positive
things and helping them come upwith the answers on their own,
so that they can kind of realizeoh okay, maybe these thoughts
aren't true.
Laura (13:04):
So that they can kind of realize oh okay, maybe these
thoughts aren't true.
And in trauma therapy we workto change that negative
cognition to a positive one or aneutral one, and so sometimes
the answer isn't positive, theanswer is just neutral, like
maybe this doesn't mean anythingabout you, maybe this story
isn't about you at all.
It's about this teacher who is,you know, not necessarily
(13:28):
making the best decisions forhow she addresses her class and
um, and it's not, it's notreally taking a nurturing
posture.
I think sometimes we thinksomething.
This means this has to meansomething about us.
But the reality is it doesn'tmean anything about us, it means
everything about the otherperson.
Michaela (13:48):
Yeah, like maybe this lady didn't remember people's
names and so she had to come upwith another way to, not you
know, call people the wrong nameor something.
Yeah.
Laura (13:59):
That's probably a thing Like if I'm a teacher and I have
30 something kids, I'm supposedto remember all their names
Like that's hard to do so then Ican just like create this
numbering system that makes itmake sense.
So it's really just about hereffort to like manage that
situation for herself.
And that's really what we'reall doing all the time is we are
(14:22):
managing our own situation andwe're managing our own distress,
and however we're doing thatcan sometimes affect other
people.
Michaela (14:33):
Can I like that.
I think that it's important toknow that, like though we're
responsible for our ownemotional responses to things,
people can affect our emotions,but it's our job to really work
on managing that response andworking through how that's
(14:53):
affecting us.
The other thing that I wantedto say is, like you know, it's
not about the experience ofwhatever it was that we went
through or we're going througheven now today, but especially
as children, as our brains aredeveloping and we're like
learning about the world andourselves and trying to
(15:13):
understand things better.
It's really about the nervoussystem response, right.
So, like you know, we talk alot about, like going into the
stress response and then, youknow, going into the trauma
response in these situations,right, and so if we feel like we
there's nothing we can do andwe're helpless, that's more
(15:35):
likely going to start the traumaresponse and it's going to
become something that gets alittle bit stuck for us right,
yeah, absolutely.
Laura (15:43):
And then that response will kick back up in similar
situations down the road.
So, like these things affect usin that moment by creating a
narrative and creating this liketemplate of a response that
we're going to then use later on.
And so, as we think about howthose emotional experiences
(16:04):
affect us in our later life,like, think about you know,
maybe, when you see people, whensomebody maybe like I don't
know if this is true for you,but like if somebody calls you
princess, like you're like, likeI don't like that, right, like
I don't like being calledprincess, I don't like being um,
given like a pet name orsomething, right, because you
(16:25):
have this like response to itwhere it was this negative thing
for you.
And so your nervous system islike, oh no, something about
that is bad.
I don't necessarily know whatabout it is bad, but it's bad
and we don't like it and it'snot good for us.
And so, like you're going toreject that idea in the future,
right?
Like, um, I sometimes tell therestaurant story of you know
(16:47):
where this fictional kid getsleft behind at the restaurant
after the mom and dad like packall the kids in the car, and
then you know, maybe she getsout and goes in cause she forgot
her stuffed animal.
And she gets out and goes in therestaurant and the parents like
don't realize, and they startto drive away.
Now, even if that experienceonly lasts like 30 seconds, in
(17:10):
that moment that kid is feelinglike they're being left behind
by their parents and so theymight notice.
So their nervous system isgoing to take a snapshot of
everything in the restaurant,because all of that stuff now is
going to signal danger, right,like the red chairs or the smell
of French fries or, you know,hamburgers or whatever, right?
(17:34):
So we're going to take asnapshot of everything we see,
we feel, we taste, we smell,we're using our senses to take
that information in, and thenour nervous kind of fuzzy too
Right Like it's not clear,because all that cortisol is
kind of messing with our abilityto take that perfectly clear
picture.
Michaela (17:52):
So like now, all of a sudden, a red chair is all that
we like, kind of see.
Right, that's right.
Laura (17:58):
Yeah.
So it's like taking theseindividual things that aren't
really connected and related toeach other in any way, and then
it's like saying this is this ispossibly dangerous, because I
don't know what part of thismade us get left behind, but
something did.
Was it the way we were acting?
Was it the way that?
Was it the restaurant itself?
Was it the smell?
(18:19):
I don't know.
But what's going to happen nowis my memory is going to get
activated when I see thosesimilar things, and I'm not
going to know why, because thisexperience really only lasted 30
seconds and I wasn't in anydanger and it was fine.
But I don't know that becauseI'm a baby any danger and it was
fine, but I don't know thatbecause I'm a baby.
(18:40):
I, you know, like when I'm alittle kid at the time, like
just feeling afraid.
I don't know that they'recoming back.
I don't know that.
You know it wasn't my faultthat that happened or whatever.
But I might create this likenegative, um, this negative
thought loop about like whathappened in that moment and that
it was my fault or thatsomething I was bad, or they
didn't want me, or somethinglike that, and then those things
(19:01):
can come back and get me lateron when, like, I walk into a
restaurant and I feel the and Ismell those similar things and I
see those similar things, Imight just get anxious, right,
and I might just like have apanic attack for and for
seemingly no reason.
But it's really my nervoussystem saying, hey, this is
dangerous, like this is a reallybad situation that you're in
(19:22):
right now, right, you might getleft, yeah, and you might be
abandoned.
And that's so scary that ournervous system will just like
have this response and it's nottaking in the other data, it's
not taking in that biggerpicture, like we talked about.
The big picture that says, likethis is just a restaurant and
(19:42):
it's not dangerous.
The big picture that says, likethat was a one-time thing
because of this othercircumstance and it's not
related to what's happening now.
Like I often say to clients,like this isn't that right, like
this is not that one time, thisis a different time and there's
different circumstances andit's not, you know, it's not
(20:03):
dangerous just because you werein danger.
That one time doesn't mean thatevery single time you encounter
these things that it'sdangerous.
And we have to kind of retrainour nervous system a little bit.
We have to introduce that newinformation, that adaptive,
helpful information that says Iam not in any danger, I am
(20:24):
capable of taking care of myself, I'm capable of finding help if
I need it, there's nothingwrong with me, like those
adaptive, helpful pieces ofinformation.
We can retrain our nervoussystem with those.
Michaela (20:39):
And that sounds that's and that's the ultimate goal,
right, but by the time they'reactually reaching you.
In therapy they haveencountered the same scenario
multiple times and that pathwayis pretty strong, so it takes
time and effort to rewire thingsand calm that pathway down so
that your body can go.
(20:59):
Oh wait, maybe I don't need totell you that this is dangerous
anymore.
Laura (21:05):
Yeah, it takes rewriting, like sometimes I use like a
cell phone analogy, right, likewhen our apps, like you know,
the apps on your phone like needan update so they get kind of
glitchy or whatever right Like.
So if we don't update, so wehave to go in and manually like
click, update this app in orderto kind of rewrite that
narrative and reprogram thatparticular content in our brain.
(21:28):
If our brain is like a bunch ofneural networks and they're all
just these apps, sometimes wefind that one that hasn't been
updated in a while and we haveto go in and really like program
it and do that on purpose andgive it new information and give
it access to the present dayright the data collection from
(21:48):
the present day like connect itto the internet, get it online.
Sometimes we say like well, youneed to bring our prefrontal
cortex back online in order togive the rest of our neural
networks access to the presentday information.
Michaela (22:02):
Yeah, and that makes a lot of sense.
And, you know, grounding is areally good way of getting
people, to help them back intogetting back into letting that
nervous system calm down,getting our prefrontal cortex
back online and remindingourselves that, like, hey, I'm a
39 year old woman, I live inthis address, I I'm, you know,
(22:24):
I'm not that you know eight yearold version of myself anymore.
Laura (22:31):
Yeah, and not every single grounding tool works for
every single person too.
Like I think that's importantto note is that, like there's a
billion different ways that wecan ground ourselves, but not
all of them are going to workfor you.
So every person really needs tothink about what means safety
(22:54):
to them and like what helps themfeel competent and capable and
powerful.
Like for me, I like using myage because it reminds me that
I'm an adult and I'm not a kid.
That's helpful for me.
That might not be helpful foreveryone, right, I like to use
things in the room because itmakes the room it kind of like
(23:15):
zooms me out a little bit.
Instead of like having thislike myopic lens of just the
fear and in my head.
I like to kind of get out of myhead and get into the room and
like look for shapes in the room.
That kind of distract me alittle bit and kind of get me
more centered.
Those work for me, but thatdoesn't mean it works for
everybody.
More centered, those work forme, but that doesn't mean it
(23:40):
works for everybody.
So it's important to practicelots of skills Like they have.
You can go online and downloada list of a hundred grounding
skills and there's tons of tonsof them out there and we just
have to find the ones that workfor us.
Michaela (23:51):
That's good advice, for sure.
Laura (23:54):
And when we, you know, start to use them, they don't
always work the first timeeither.
Like someone said to merecently like, oh, that doesn't
work for.
I can't remember what it was,but it was like, oh, that
doesn't work for me.
I was like, well, why not?
What happens?
And she was saying, well, assoon as I'm done with the
(24:16):
grounding skill, like my fearcomes back or my feelings come
back, like I'm like, okay, thenyou do it again.
And so it's like it's not thatit's not working, it's just that
it doesn't last that long.
Initially, right, because we'rein that state like of hyper
arousal.
We haven't trained our body tokind of get used to and settle
(24:37):
in to the calm, because a lot ofthe time we are so amped up If
we've had a lot of really hardthings in our life and we've had
to do really hard things kindof over and over and over and
chronically and consistently ourbody hasn't really learned how
to be calm.
It doesn't know what that lookslike.
It doesn't know how to feelthat in a safe way.
Michaela (25:01):
Yeah, and so then it's going to take a little bit more
work to not only ground butalso and like, and and calm our
nervous system, but also torecognize that, like, being
anxious is what your brain istrying to tell you.
(25:23):
If we worry about everythingthat's out there, if we keep
worrying about stuff, thenthat's what's going to keep us
safe.
It isn't true, right?
We can logically know that,like, if I worry about getting
into a car accident, it's notgoing to actually prevent me
from getting into a car accident.
What prevents me is planningand preparing and paying
(25:44):
attention while I'm drivingright, these are helpful things.
But worrying about if it'sgoing to happen, that does
nothing good for me.
But our brain a part of ourbrain thinks that it's going to
be really helpful if we justworry about every scenario, and
so then that becomes ourbaseline where we think that
we're safe if we're doing that.
Right, but if we can learn howto be calm and we can calm our
(26:06):
nervous system, that's whatactually is safe.
Laura (26:10):
Yeah, yeah, like I think my dog's whining.
I'm so sorry.
So I think when we actuallylearn how to be in the calm and
realize that me being calm isn'tgoing to create like danger,
(26:31):
right?
So, for example, some peoplebelieve that if I relax then
I'll be blindsided by what comesup, right, so we have to be
hypervigilant, like well, if Irelax then it'll be worse
because something will come upand I won't be prepared.
But really the opposite is true.
When we relax and when we are,you know, our most calm self,
(26:54):
then we have access to more ofthat prefrontal cortex, that
executive functioning that'stelling us how to navigate a
situation in an effective way.
It's used.
We can use our experience andour knowledge in the most
effective way when we'regrounded and calm, versus when
we're hypervigilant.
And you know hypervigilance isreally we're just focused on one
(27:16):
thing that could possiblyhappen.
We're just focused on one thingthat could possibly happen,
versus seeing that big pictureand zooming out and being able
to, like, prepare for manyscenarios that life has to bring
right.
We have.
The world is a dynamic place.
It's not just going to.
We're not like we're not morelikely to experience the thing
that we're hypervigilant aboutthan we are to experience all
(27:39):
these other things that we needto have our brain online to, to,
to sort of deal with at thetime.
Michaela (27:45):
Yeah, that's a good point.
Um, so what else could we do tohelp ourselves manage like the
things that you know we wentthrough as a kid in our on our
day-to-day tasks, like I?
Laura (28:06):
think like we need to change the narrative.
We need to maybe retellourselves the story of, like,
what that meant about us in thatmoment.
So, if we can challenge thatnarrative and then bring in that
adaptive perspective of thiswasn't about you, this is about
(28:30):
them, or this was just a freakaccident, like, sometimes
accidents are just, they justhappen.
They don't happen, for you know, because of you, or it's not
something that you caused, like,so, rewriting that narrative
about like it's not about me,this isn't my doing, we're not
(28:52):
that powerful, right?
Like we can kind of takeourselves out of it and that can
really help us tell our nervoussystem like, oh, okay, well, if
it's not about me, then I don'thave to control it.
And that can really help ustell our nervous system like, oh
, okay, well, if it's not aboutme, then I don't have to control
it.
Yeah, like I think we want tocontrol everything all the time.
Michaela (29:10):
Well, I think it also comes back to like the literal
phobia of feeling anxious, right, like those past experiences.
Whether we recognize it or notyet right, those past
experiences are affecting theway that our nervous system
responds to things.
But in the moment, well, likeyou said, what we focus on is
(29:33):
our experience of the situation.
So, like our heart is racing,we get sweaty, we get hot, we
get flushed, we feel embarrassedthat people can see that we
feel that way, and so we want toescape because of that feeling
right.
We don't like how it feels, weknow it doesn't feel right, and
(29:56):
so then we just want to get awayfrom that or we want to avoid
feeling that way.
Laura (30:03):
I think accepting that we have these negative experiences
sometimes is also important.
Trying to prevent me from everbeing triggered or trying to
prevent ever experiencinganxiety or distress that's just
not realistic.
I will experience this anxiety,I will experience embarrassment
(30:25):
, I will experience negativeemotions like that is going to
happen and I need to be okaywith that.
I need to be okay knowing that,like these emotions are going
to come and I can handle them.
Michaela (30:37):
I think that's the big thing, you know.
I think that, like anxietysteals that from us, we, we, we,
we have a catastrophic thoughtright, like the worst possible
is going to happen, and then I'mnot capable of managing it.
And that's what's stealing fromus, our our ability to say like
, okay, well, even if thathappens, I can handle it.
Laura (31:01):
Right.
Michaela (31:02):
Like I can manage it because I've done hard things,
and I think that that's a reallybig piece of like being able to
push through some of thosefears about feeling anxious or
feeling dumb or feeling whateverit is that you, you feel.
Laura (31:19):
Yeah, and I think sometimes.
So I share with people like toinvite the anxiety, to just like
sit next to you, like invitethe stuff, like let it exist,
let it be there and don't try tolike control it or push it or
like banish it or eliminate it,because it's just going to grow
(31:41):
Right, persists, that's right.
What we resist persists.
I love that.
Michaela (31:46):
But I think too, like I like that, and I I sometimes
tell clients like hey, thanks,thank, like, thank you, anxiety,
like that you're doing, yourbody is doing its job, but you
always say go, you're, you'relike you're, you're reinforcing
(32:25):
that pathway, being active, soactivated, and so then your
brain isn't like okay, I need toremind you of this 500 times
today.
Laura (32:36):
Yeah, when we are in that thought loop of I need to think
about this over and over andover until it gets done, Like
there's lots of different waysto cope with that One, we can
write stuff down and kind of getit out of our brain too.
We can check in with ourselfand just be like, hey, okay,
Like almost have a conversationwith that anxiety, Like, okay,
so you're telling me I need todo this.
(32:57):
Will I get this done?
Yes, Like what is my plan toget this done?
What is my experience that youknow?
What am I experiencing?
Is it fear?
Is it fear of failure?
Right, Like so, kind of justhaving that conversation with
yourself like what's reallygoing on here and what do I need
(33:19):
in order to make sure that Ican effectively manage this
situation?
Sometimes it's not that theproblem needs to be solved right
in that moment.
Sometimes the problem can't besolved right in that moment and
it's just about having somereflection and really just
introspection, trying tounderstand where that's coming
(33:39):
from and trying to reinforce theplan.
Right, Let yourself know like,hmm, I will be able to manage
this.
Like I'm going to do this atthis time.
I'm going to take care of this.
You know when I get to theoffice, or whatever.
Michaela (33:53):
Yeah, absolutely Well, and I think that that sounds
like maybe you know a story froma kid who maybe didn't get
their stuff done, or there was atime where there was a negative
consequence for not gettingthings done, and so now we have
to overthink okay, did I get?
Did I get this done?
We were just talking thismorning that we had a relaxing
(34:13):
weekend.
It was a long weekend and therewere things that we, you know,
needed to get done.
And you have that like panicokay, I need to get this done.
And it's like that's a goodthing.
It is there to help you, tellyou that this is important, this
is important, it needs to getdone.
(34:34):
That anxiety is driving you andso it's a good thing, as long
as you don't let it become likeyou use it for the good and not
let it just paralyze you.
Laura (34:45):
Absolutely Like that's.
What I was just thinking aboutis like I woke up at three
o'clock in the morning thinking,oh my gosh, I have to take care
of these three tasks orwhatever.
And then I'm like it's three inthe morning.
Why am I thinking about like?
This is my thought process lastnight or this morning.
I thought I don't need to takecare of this right now.
I will be able to do this todayduring the day, like after I
(35:09):
wake up and I have time.
So I ran through my schedule.
I was like okay, what's myschedule tomorrow?
I have this, this, this.
Do I have time to get this done?
I have this, this, this.
Do I have time to get this done?
Yes, Will I make sure that Itake care of it?
Yes, Is it on my to-do list?
Yes, Done.
And then I don't have.
And then I can say thanks,anxiety for bringing it up.
We've got a plan.
(35:31):
I can move forward now.
Yeah, and I can let go of thosethoughts.
Michaela (35:38):
And that's a healthy way of managing it.
So we can't stop the stressorfrom happening.
We can't stop the fact thatwe're out of our normal routine.
Laura (35:49):
Right, there was nothing I could do to prevent myself
from waking up at three in themorning, and you know thinking
about these tasks.
That's not the problem.
Michaela (35:56):
Right, the problem is being able to plan, prepare, let
it go and go back to sleep.
Laura (36:03):
Yeah, which is what I did , and it worked out great.
And then I took care of mytasks this morning and
everything's good, they're alldone.
Michaela (36:14):
See, we can do hard things.
Laura (36:16):
We can do really hard things.
I think that is just theperfect place to end it today
too, and thank you so much forthis conversation and all of
this good advice.
I really think that it'simportant that we all zoom out a
little bit from time to timeand let go of some of those old
(36:37):
templates that are no longerserving us.
Go of some of those oldtemplates that are no longer
serving us, and thank you somuch for listening to why Am I
Like this?
If you like our show, pleaseleave us a rating and review on
your favorite podcast platform,follow the show and share it
with your friends.
This episode was written andproduced by me, laura Wood and
Michaela Beaver.
Our theme song is Making EndsMeat by Thick as Thieves, and a
(37:00):
special thanks to Core Self,Benavieri Counseling and Active
Healing Psychiatric Services forsponsoring this show.
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