Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Have you Tuesday. Welcome to Amy and Cat Chat. We
don't have a name yet, just bear with us. But
we got some emails after we announced that Cat was
going to be joining me regularly for the Tuesday episodes
here on four Things podcast. And yeah, if you've missed,
like the last couple of weeks, this is still the
Fifth Thing, but Cat is now my partner in crime
(00:28):
for the Fifth Thing, so we were thinking of renaming it.
We could just call it the Fifth Thing with Amy
and Cat. Okay, yeah, we could do that. So I
think that I know, I feel like if I abandoned
the Fifth Thing, it feels weird, to be honest, And
somebody did message me and says, I don't and said
I really don't understand why you have to change them.
Oh okay, well just for fun. We always start Tuesday
(00:48):
episodes off with a quote, though, And today I pulled
this from you Need Therapy Podcasts Instagram, which is cats
podcasts that she does, and I saw that you posted
something earlier in September that said you can't always control
what happens, but you can control how you respond to
what happens. And I feel like that's just an important
(01:10):
thing to remembers things are spiraling all around us at
any given time, whether it works personally, in the world,
and you may not be able to control some of that,
but you can control how you respond to what's happening.
And I feel that that quote kind of leads into
the email that we got about angel taps. I'm going
(01:30):
to tie these together, I promise, UM. But it's kind
of fun because Cat is the license therapist, she's the
professional here, and she's like, Amy, I don't know what
angel taps are. What are you talking about? And I said, well,
my therapist calls them angel taps. I don't know why,
but it's like something that she has me do when
we're in the middle of a session and maybe I'm
(01:50):
spiraling a little bit and she or I've got some anxiety,
or she can tell that I'm overwhelmed and she wants
to bring me back, and so she has me sit
air and think of something calming. Am I at the ocean?
Am I walking through the forest? And I, I don't know,
like I'm just supposed to take myself somewhere calm. And
(02:12):
then I breathe, and then I crossed my arms and
put my right hand on my left shoulder and my
left hand on my right shoulder, and then I alternate
taps like boom boom. I wonder if it's called angel
taps because it looks like little angle, because these look
like little wings. Possibly that makes sense. Now. I know
this is a podcast, you don't have a visual, but
(02:33):
hopefully if you can do that with your arms right now,
maybe you'll see what we're talking about. Just criss cross,
like make an X, and then start tapping your shoulders.
And as you are envisioning yourself at the ocean or
whatever or walking through the forest and you are tapping
your shoulder, you're like breathing, tapping, calming. Something about that
(02:54):
brings you back. So Amy's right. I was like, I
have no idea what this is. You're going to have
to take the here. But what you're talking about is
something called resourcing. Okay, well, there you go resourcing, and
then through that you're creating a coping skill. Okay, we
can talk more about it. I want to read the
email that we got Katie and California. Though. She said, Hey, Amy,
(03:15):
I've been listening to old episodes of the Bobby Bones
Show after listening daily, and I know I heard you
mentioned Angel tapping to Bobby just can't remember if you
said it recently or in two thousand and seventeen. I mean, man,
she is listening to some old Bobby Bones Show podcasts,
that's for sure. She's like, can you go over this
in a fifth Thing episode? Love you in your podcast.
(03:36):
Also want to shout out that I made my first
order with the Shop Forward and love having the shop
pay option on there. So, Katie, thanks for the email
on angel taps. Now, after reading the email, I remember
she heard it on the Bobby Bones Show. I thought
you and I talked about on here did we maybe?
And we didn't talk tapping? But is it just because
I stalked? And yeah, okay, I can't. You know, when
(04:00):
you talk to friends like I go on cats podcast,
we go on walks and have talks and then we
record this just like she doesn't remember where I heard it. Then, okay,
so here we are and we're going to talk about
the Angel taps and really, I mean Cat and I
broke it down before I read the email for you, Katie,
So hopefully that makes sense. But if anybody else is
(04:21):
maybe wanting to go a little bit deeper with it,
I do know that my therapist has me do the shoulders,
but I've seen other people do it where you tap
your kneecaps like right left, right, left, right left, and
so cat. You just mentioned resourcing, So you're resourcing like
(04:46):
the forest, idea or the ocean. What you're doing there
is creating something that I would call like you're creating
your safe place. You go somewhere that feels good. So
that is something that anybody can do anywhere. But what
this is from finding me up. I don't know a
lot about the tapping. I do know that they did
it in Jane the Virgin. Her therapist taught her to
(05:06):
do it. Oh yeah, so that means it's a good skill. Clearly,
the Telemundo TV is telling you that I loved that show.
I wish it didn't end. I started watching it at
the beginning of the pandemic back in early and I
was watching it all the time because we were stuck
at home, and I remember being so thrown off because
they were hanging out in crowds and I was like,
(05:27):
they're not wearing masks. But it was filmed like forever ago,
so of course they weren't wearing masks, but it was
just weird because we were so isolating. This was when
we were on lockdown, like not leaving houses, and I
just was blown away that people were hanging out on
Jane the Virgin. But that was just a weird time then, right,
I know, but it was weird for me. Something I remember.
(05:48):
I will always associate Jane the Virgin and Tiger King
with those early pandemic I know, I'm not interested. I
don't care anyway. So I was going to say, is
the tapping is resembles in mimics something that is used
in E m d R. It's it's the bilateral stimulation.
(06:10):
So E m d R is a type of trauma therapy,
and they combine bilateral stimulation with reprocessing of old experiences
and memories and beliefs, and the bilateral stimulation actually does
specific things that are useful outside of m d R.
So I'm saying this, but I don't know much about tapping,
(06:30):
but just from what you've said, it makes sense. What
it does is it it helps you create distance between
whatever it is that is popping up, whether it's stress, anxiety,
maybe it's an actual event or an actual thing. It
creates a distance from that. At the same time, it
slows you down and it allows an easier ability for
you to like switch and change the story or whatever
(06:51):
it is that's going on in your head. So it's
helpful for more than just your reprocessing your trauma. You're
doing that stuff way more than you think. Like going
for a walk is a form of bilateral stimulation. Running
riding bikes to the beat of music is bilateral stimulation,
and all of that helps you reprocess and cope better
(07:11):
with the stuff in your life. Yeah, okay, well, so
that is like expanding on the angel taps and maybe
why they make sense. And again, clearly angel taps is
not the textbook name for what we're talking about here,
but something else. My therapist actually just did with me
this week to kind of bring me back because I
was all over the place and I couldn't quite get
(07:34):
to where she wanted me, and I could tell that
she thought she was losing me. She's like, I'm not
getting anywhere with you today because I was bouncing all
over the place. She goes, So I want you to
take a second and close your eyes and start breathing,
and then we're going to do the four seven eight,
which I've been doing for seven eight, breathing for a
long time. That's we do that with the kids. I've
(07:55):
read it in parenting books like for adults. So you
breathe in for four, hold for seven, out for eight.
But I don't always close my eyes when I do that,
and I don't always Yeah, envision like somewhere peaceful and calm.
And what she had me do with my exhale was
almost like make my mouth really tiny, like you would
be using a straw, but you're blowing out so instead
(08:17):
of like sucking in with a straw. But I was like,
in for four, you could count for four, count for four.
We'll do this if you're wherever you are, if you're driving,
don't close your eyes, but you could still breathe. Am
I counting in? You count and I'll do it, and
I'm gonna do it with people. So everybody join us,
ready and for in for four, two three four out,
(08:40):
hold hold for seven. Cats the professional here, Yeah, you
go in for four, seven for eight. Okay, so we're
trying this again, people, Okay for four one two three four,
hold for seven two three four five six seven out
(09:04):
for eight seven six five for three two one. And
so she had me do that five times, So repeat
that five times. We won't do it here on the podcast,
but I mean that, really it brought me back and
(09:24):
it was so what different about that than normal breathing? Well,
what do you mean normal? Normal? Normal? Seven eight breathing? Well,
it to me it was normal for seven eight. I
just hadn't had I don't know why she had me,
do you know. I don't know why my therapist calls
it angel taps. I don't know why she had me
do it like I was breathing out of a straw.
I don't know. I don't know if there was something
to that, but I thought, well, I've shared for seven
(09:46):
eight before on the podcast a lot, but I thought
I would share this new method and actually acted out
for people so that they can hear what it should
sound like, because there might be something to the I
don't know, just like there's something to the taps. I
don't know. I don't know. But do you know when
you do that, why it's important to breathe in shorter
(10:06):
than you breathe out? I want to know. Okay, you're
looking at me like, yeah, so this is regulating your
nervous system, and so you have two parts of your
nervous system. I feel like we've probably talked about this before.
You have your parasympathetic and your sympathetic nervous system. And
once your inhale, once your exhale, the inhales like your gas,
(10:27):
your sympathetic nervous system, the exhales your parasympathetic nervous system.
That's the break. And so when we get really anxious
and when we get all wrapped up and whatever it
is our stuff is, we are usually doing a lot
of really shallow breathing, and so we're creating that anxiety.
We're making it worse. And this is why they do
this in yoga, why they have this like really long
(10:48):
breaths in yoga, You're slowing down your nervous system. You're
tapping on the brake longer than you're like slamming on
the gas. Okay, that makes sense. Yeah, I like that.
Thanks for that. In sider ampos and I didn't know
a lot about the top, you know, I felt like
I needed some redemption. You contributed your your you proved
your license therapy. Good job you went to school. I
(11:11):
did get to school. What are your letters like, do
you have letters letters or LPC MHSP but depending on
what state you're in, that might not mean anything because
different states have different letters. Even though we have the
same license. Got you Like in some states a therapist,
like a license therapist can't diagnose clients. In Tennessee, we can,
so I can diagnose people with mental health disorders. But
(11:33):
like there are some states that you can't do that.
You have to be like a psychologist or well, no,
we're not going to do that. Okay, Well, thank you
Katie for sending in the email. We love hearing from y'all.
You can send in notes for the fifth thing with
Amy and cat Boom. That's a great same name. Four
Things with Amy Brown at gmail dot com is where
(11:53):
you can send the note. Put fifth Thing in the
subject box, so that way we know that's what it's for.
And Katie had mentioned in her email that she used
the shop pay option on the Shop Forward, and that's
not always something I think that's going to be available.
I know Mary was just trying that out as like
a trial run. So if that is something you're interested in,
it's like a way for you to pay and installments,
but there's no interest like it comes up when you
(12:15):
check out. There's a little purple box. It says shop pay,
you do that, and then it'll automatically do different installments
for you, but you don't end up paying more, which
with the credit card, if you end up doing payments,
you pay interest. But this is a way to do that.
But Mary was just trying it out, and honestly, I
don't know that it's something that she for sure, for
(12:36):
sure is going to keep. But we did get a
lot of feedback, a lot of you like it, so
maybe she will. And I will just say too that
a lot of people are saying to start your Christmas
shopping early because COVID and shipping and all like. Have
you seen like the ports in California or the boats
and the oceans of like containers trying to come in
(12:57):
They can't. It's like totally backed up, crazy and stuff
is stuck on there. So even Target was saying they
can't get their toys and you better buy what they
have now because they don't know when they're gonna be
able to restock and they anticipate like selling out for
Christmas or prices increasing down the line. I mean, we
see price increases all the time on a lot of
the stuff that we're doing and so unfortunately that affects everybody.
(13:19):
So just heats up, not even if you're shopping with Espoire,
the Shop Forward or anything like, even if you target anxiety.
So it's a good thing that they now have the
angel tapping and breeding skill to use. Okay, yeah, I
know it's while they're doing the Christmas shopping. I know
it feels like you're not ready for Christmas. But what
we get Christmas movies. At the end of October, we
get all kinds of things like Christmas is here. So yeah,
(13:42):
there's your tip. Don't let it give you stress. But
if you are stressed, then four seven eight it out
for seven eight it tap it out. You'll be good
to go. Bye bye