LIVE Q&A | When You Can’t Feel Anything | AMA

Foreign. And a fabulous good Monday morning to everybody. Or afternoon, depending on where you're at. I hope you're having a great start to your very short week, which, you know, for some of us, we consider it awesome. For others, it's going to be a very stressful week. I know a lot of people who are in retail all are really struggling this week because it's just. It's super busy and there will be a day off and then Black Friday and. Yeah, but anyhow, so if you are one of those people who is. This is a super busy, stressful week. My thoughts go out to you and I hope you can find a way to occasionally take a moment and downregulate whatever that looks like for you so you're not caught in this autopilot, autopilot stress spiral. Now, one of the things that we had said we were going to talk about today was not being able to feel anything. And that can happen for a couple of different reasons. Number one, and. Well, both of these are pretty common. Number one is autopilot. A lot of times our cultures have trained us to not check in with ourselves. It's just keep putting one foot in front of the other. It doesn't matter how you feel. So ignore your feelings. And so we don't learn to pay attention to those feelings. We don't learn to actually feel anything. We just stay busy. When there's distress, we suppress. So that's one of the reasons why people may not feel anything. Another reason which is very common in people with depression is what we call glucocorticoid resistance. And when people are stressed for a really long time, their body becomes less receptive to the excitatory neurochemicals. Now you might think, well, that's great. I don't want to be stressed out. Well, yeah, but the excitatory neurochemicals are the same neurochemicals that are secreted when we're anxious and angry and when we're euphoric. And if you don't have glutamate, when you don't have adrenaline and norepinephrine, and when your cortisol isn't giving you the get up and go that it needs to give you, you can feel very flat, very numb, very apathetic until. Until there is a stressor of sufficient intensity to flood your circuits and actually turn on the. Turn on the system. So one of the things that is important for a lot of people with anhedonia or apathy or whatever you want to call it, not being able to Feel is number one, starting to become more mindful of how you feel. And if you're mindful and you're like I I can't feel anything, okay, that's fine. We'll be paying attention for when you do start feeling something. And a lot of people in early recovery, it's not a, it's not a light switch. Like one morning you wake up and all of a sudden you feel again not. No, unfortunately it's not like that. It will be a gradual process over time where you start having a little more energy, you start being able to feel a few more things. And that feeling of happiness or curiosity or excitement or even anger or anxiety may be kind of dull at first, but over time it starts having more noticeable differences between, you know, your highs and your lows. And one of the things, unfortunately one of the things we often feel first because it's self protective, the emotions that come back first are often anger and anxiety. And when those are left unchecked, when we don't recognize that anger and anxiety are feelings, there are body smoke alarm that's designed to tell us to get up and do something, not to sit there and stew in it and steep in it and ruminate on it. We it's a transient thing. You don't want to be carrying anger and anxiety around with you all day because that's going to drain the system and make it harder for you to feel. That's all easier said than done. I realize becoming mindful and is one engaging in as many practices as you can to reduce stress on your body and mind and reduce inflammation that will be helpful recognizing understanding where it's coming from and accepting that it is what it is. When you break your arm, it hurts. You know, that's painful and you don't probably spend a lot of time sitting there getting angry and trying to figure out, you know, how am I going to make that pain go away right now? Whereas a lot of times when people can't feel much, they want to figure out how to feel something right now. Well, it's not going to happen. That broken arm. The pain will lessen over the next few weeks at with our emotions, we will begin to feel things as we start engaging in recovery. But those feelings will become more notable over the first, you know, few months of, of the recovery process. Now why is the arm a few weeks and emotions a few months? Well, unfortunately the arms in a cast so all it has to do is heal and the, all of the tissues and cells can focus on doing that so it heals a lot faster. Our emotions are only part of what we do during the day and we're going to encounter stress, we're going to encounter things that trigger inflammation. So for emotional availability it's more of a two steps forward, one step back sort of ebb and flow but you're still at a net move forward over time it does take longer than most people would like. Understanding that your nervous system is rewiring itself is also important. And then something some people may just not know how to label things feelings. They have a lot of somatic symptoms. You know, their palms get sweaty, their heart starts to race but they're not really able to put a label on it. And that I mentioned that last because they're actually feeling something they're just not as able to label it as they want to. Other things that people can do to start helping themselves feel is and healing as I mentioned, reduce as much unnecessary stress as possible. When you do get stressed, practice good effective down regulation skills for you whether that is singing loudly, square breathing or for some people it is taking that energy that was released into their body when they got stressed and going on a walk. Yeah the walk's not going to solve the problem but it uses up a bunch of that blood sugar and and helps the adrenaline kind of bleed off so then they can get into their wise mind. Alrighty. So good morning, Adriana, Tyrone, Crystal. People unite. Welcome. And you are very correct. D mix please Please remember to subscribe and like I'm really, I really, really wanted to have the channel over a million subs by the end of the year. I just don't think I'm going to be able to get there. Maybe with your help I can. So that would. Oh that would make my year if I could get over a million subs by by the end of the year but right now it's looking more like February. Siren song says I don't really have to do anything because I'm on disability but I want to do something with no idea what that something is. I'm not sure. Siren song if you're in the u. S I would encourage you to go down to your local department of vocational rehabilitation. They may have options for you for different volunteer opportunities or what have you. I know once you're on disability working can actually be counterproductive because it cuts into your disability benefits which is a screwed up system. But recognizing considering try out a few things. What might you like to volunteer to do and explore if you are maybe you like hanging out with older adults. I love Hanging out with older adults. You can volunteer at assisted living facilities. Maybe you want to volunteer at a food bank or on a phone bank for helping people who were in crisis. I don't know what your interests are. I would encourage you make a list of the things that you enjoy doing or the things that you're good at and then think what in this area might I enjoy doing? Maybe it's not even going out anywhere. Maybe it's gardening. I don't know what your. You say you're on full disability. I don't know what your disability is but, but gardening is possible for just about anybody and it has a lot of benefits aside from helping people feel empowered and, and more self sufficient. Obviously I'm a big fan. And you can grow food, you can grow flowers, whatever you want to do. You can volunteer to foster animals. That's one of my favorite things to do. So there's a lot of different options. It's a matter of figuring out what interests you and what needs you're trying to fulfill. Is it human connection? Is it doing the right thing by your definition, and then figuring out, you know, what options are available in your, in your area? Yes. Inflammation is very pesky, Tyrone. When we're anxious, we do have a lot of somatic symptoms that are triggered. And anxiety is a word that we learned to use to label what those somatic symptoms are. When we start feeling shaky, when we have that adrenaline feel like it just rushes up our, from our gut to our throat. When we start having sweaty palms, we, we know, we recognize that as anxiety and that's what we've learned to label it as. When my son was little, we used to do feelings identification. And I'd be like, show me what board is. And he'd go, and I'd say, show me what happy is. And you go, yay. And you know, we'd go through the different feelings, but I would encourage him to try to identify what, what would his body look like, what would his body feel like if he were feeling these different emotions? And we can do the same thing as adults because it changes a little bit as we get older. When I get stressed, for example, I grind my teeth. That's like the first sign that I'm stressed as I notice that I'm grinding my teeth before the palms get sweaty, before any of that. But becoming more mindful of our bodily states, we can often intervene in those distressful emotions before they become full out anxiety or rage. Well, I'm glad you caught us too, sweet Hope. Yeah, it is. You're on central time just like we are. So it is a beautiful start to the Monday here, at least in in Tennessee. And changing patterns. After a lifetime of hypervigilance, people Unite is an amazing step towards your physical and mental health recovery and being patient with yourself. Recognizing that sometimes you may feel hyper vigilant and you don't know why, and that's okay. Get curious or just acknowledge, hey, I'm feeling anxious right now. I'm feeling hyper vigilant. Let me see. Scan the environment. Figure out if there are any threats. If there are not, then you can turn your attention. When we numb, numb out. If I can get the dog to quit trying to lick me in the mouth, that's nasty. When we numb out, we're essentially shutting down, sometimes dissociating because were avoiding distressful feelings. And when you were going through pmdd, it would be the anxiety, the distress, the stress hormones would be so overwhelming that your body's response was, I can't do this. I can't run this hot. This hurts too much. I'm numbing out now. When you talk about seeing younger people bonding, but it's difficult for you. Again, you're being triggered emotionally for something that is overwhelmingly stressful. So understanding your body is protecting you from feelings of distress and overwhelm and then working backwards. And you say that you see younger people bonding, but it's difficult for you. Okay, so what I might think about is why is it difficult for you to bond? And are there things that you can do to help you feel empowered and able to move toward bonding in some meaningful way, maybe with yourself first and then with others? You know, I don't know what the issue is that is preventing you from bonding, whether it's trauma or, well, generally any of your avoidant personality disorder, maybe it is. Maybe you're somewhere on the spectrum and you feel like you have difficulty connecting with others. I don't know. I don't know what is particularly causing it for you. But recognizing okay, I'm having this difficulty and it is hurtful and part of my rich and meaningful life means being able to bond with other people. What does that look like? What does bonding look like to you and where are you at right now? Then identifying what are some steps you could take to start moving toward what it looks like to bond healthfully with other people. And again, the first step might be healing some of your prior trauma, healing some of your grief that you have about not bonding until now so you can feel safe enough to connect with another person. You're not going to be able to connect and bond until you feel safe. What other questions do you have for me about mental health, about wellness, about making it through the holidays? Anything health and wellness related, particularly wellness and mental health related, are fair game during this. Ask me anything. And pull yourself up by your bootstraps. Can feel, in my interpretation, can feel somewhat accusatory or aggressive in some ways. And yes, we want people to be able to find the power to move forward towards what's important in their rich and meaningful life. But sometimes people need a, a hand up, not a hand out, but someone to help them get up. And as I get older, you know, from a very physical point, I used to be able to pull myself up with no problem. But sometimes if I've had a really hard workout or my back's hurting or something, sometimes I need a hand up. And that doesn't mean I'm we. That doesn't mean there's a problem with me. It just means that that's where I'm at for that day. But being willing to ask for assistance to get to where we want to go is also an important part of the healing process. Being able to trust others to help us move up and forward. Hello, lana love. And that's excellent that you found a medication that is helping you people unite. There's about 40% of people who take medications, antidepressants that feel significant relief from them. 60% don't, but the 40 do. It's a game changer for them. And finding what works for you is really important. If you've been on, unfortunately, the way insurance is right now, you have to have failed on or multiple medications. You, you need to have tried multiple antidepressants and they haven't worked. And then insurance will pay for what they call a pharmacogenetic testing, which is the test that they give you that can help identify. It's not, it's not 100%, but it can help identify which antidepressant may work better for you. And a lot of people have, have had really good success with that. Unfortunately, like I said, the way our system is right now, um, you have to have tried a couple of them and not had success before. Insurance will pay for that test. You can in many cases pay for it out of pocket early on, so you don't have to go through those trials. But it's expensive, so it's a trade off, unfortunately, in, in what you're going to do. SSRIs can be really challenging for people. And lithium is a mood Stabilizer, but it's also used in, in bipolar as an antidepressant. Then you have your MAOIs, your monoamine oxidase inhibitors, which are your old fashioned antidepressants, and then you have your SSRIs, and then you have another class out there that is busperone, that doesn't really fit nicely elsewhere. So those are all different approaches for medicating a variety of different symptoms. It's also important to recognize, as we've talked about in so many videos, that for some people, and it's probably the 60% for whom SSRIs are not effective or antidepressants aren't effective, even your MAOIs, etc. The depressive symptoms may be being caused by dysregulation of the nervous system, inflammation, hypothyroid alterations in your gonadal hormones, estrogen, testosterone, progesterone, as a result of chronic stress. So understanding whether the medications you're taking are just kind of a band aid or a workaround to manage life while having those symptoms or those underlying issues, or whether the medication is actually addressing a true deficit in certain neurotransmitters. And remember, neurotransmitters, it's not just as simple as not enough or too much. You can have not enough secret, not enough made if your gut's out of whack or your circadian rhythms are out of whack. And serotonin is mainly produced in the morning. So if your circadian rhythms are out of whack, you may not be producing enough serotonin. Say you produce enough. It may not get enough may not get secreted into the synapse between the nerve endings. Okay, well, that's a problem. Maybe enough is secreted, but it gets broken down too quickly before it has a chance to do its job. It's like using a degreaser in the kitchen and not giving it a chance to sit and break up the grease before you wipe it up. Doesn't do any good. Or there could be a problem with, with the receiving end, the receiving receptors not actually responding because they've become tolerant for some reason to that neurotransmitter. So there are a lot of different reasons that a neurotransmitter may be insufficient. We can't just automatically say, well, let's just increase this and it'll do better. No, no. The body compensates in very interesting ways. So for example, if one of the reasons you're feeling flat is insufficient serotonin, your serotonin gets broken down too quickly and then you increase serotonin. Well, that's great, but your body may increase the enzymes that break down serotonin more proportionally. So you may not really feel that much benefit. It can be very frustrating if you have different perspectives about things than, than your family does. And, and Sweet Hope is pointing out that their parents are very, have very different opinions about Christmas and the holidays than they do. And that can be a real downer when other people around you are very baham bug acknowledging, you know, maybe that's not what works for them. So are there people that you can be around that might share that same holiday spirit? And it may take a minute to find a group that feels comfortable, that feels like it shares similar things, that feels safe to talk about because you said you don't feel, you never felt safe talking to your parents. And I'm also hearing in that that there may be some, A, a fair amount of attachment, trauma, insecure attachment because you never felt safe and supported by your family. And that's great that you're in therapy. Lana Love, I would encourage you to think about the statement that you need to make bigger changes. Sometimes baby steps are more long lasting than making big changes all at once. And thinking about, yeah, you may make a big change. Like a lot of people make New Year's resolutions and it's this big change that they're going to totally overhaul their diet or they're going to start going to the gym five days a week and that sounds great, but it's a big change in their life and it lasts until about, oh, Valentine's Day because it's just is not sustainable because it was too big of a change too quickly. In behavior modification, we would talk about behavior strain. We're going to do things that are most rewarding and if the that huge change doesn't produce a compensatory huge reward, it may be difficult to maintain that change. Whereas smaller changes generally are less painful, less stressful to make. And so it doesn't require as much of a reward. But 365baby steps is a whole lot of progress and, and often you're going to get to the same place eventually, but it may be more sustaining in, in the long term. Hello, A little space, time and gold redevelopment. Are there any other questions for me today? I know a lot of us have a lot of stuff coming up. Whether you're, you know, kind of in the midst of it right now because you work in a profession that is particularly busy this time of year, or you're busy because You've got family and holiday stuff that you got to deal with, whether it's a happy thing or a not happy thing. There's a lot of stress at this time of year for a lot of people. And I encourage people to really ask themselves, do their morning mindfulness inventory and ask yourself every morning, how am I going to use my energy today to nurture the things that are important in my rich and meaningful life? So you have a plan ahead of time, and you don't get sidetracked by getting irritable about the lines at the grocery store or the slow drivers or whatever it is. You're actually paying attention. And when you start to throw energy at things that are not important in your rich and meaningful life, you're able to be mindful and check yourself. Not saying you will be able to turn it around right away, but at least you're mindful. And you start making that attempt to say, you know what? Not worth my time and energy. And I encourage you. I'm a visual person. So when I do that, I. In the morning, I envision. I see the things and people and whatever that are important in my rich and meaningful life. And then when I start getting distracted, I envision myself taking something from them. And usually it's like Monopoly money or something, but I envision stealing from them and giving it to something that doesn't matter. And I'm like, oh, no, I don't want to do that. If you've ever, you know, y' all seen Brewster, he. He was up on my lap earlier. And if you've ever taken a. A toy away from a dog or had food and not shared it with them, I know we're bad around here. We share people food. But you see their eyes, and they're just like, don't you love me anymore? Okay, that's not what I want the things and people in my rich and meaningful life thinking. So I pull my energy back and I give it back to them. Hakama. If your life is demanding, what I'm hearing is normal burnout. And the way that you're coping with it, maybe just wanting to stay in bed and shut out the world, that tells me you're in stimulation, overload. Whether it's emotional, mental, people, environmental, whatever, you're in overload. And your body just wants to say, no, I can't. No more input. I am at that point. Is it the way children respond to being overwhelmed? Sometimes. But it's also just a natural reaction to being burned out and. And recognizing maybe, maybe you've been burned out, maybe you've been drained your whole life. So it is sort of related to your inner child. But ultimately ask yourself, what is that behavior saying? It's saying, I can't take on one more thing. I can't, I don't have patience for other people. I just, I'm over stimulated. And then identify what strategies might be helpful for you to number one, deal with it right now. You know, what can I do right now that will help me feel like I can get out of bed? And then go through and make a list of everything that is adding stress, adding a demand, overwhelming, whatever. Make a list of all those and identify which ones you can delegate to other people, which ones just you have no control over. So there's no, no sense worrying about them. I know easier said than done. Which ones you can mitigate, minimize a little bit. And which ones you need to make a plan for. Because a lot of times once we have a plan, we can start gradually taking those baby steps forward and eliminating that burden over time. But burnout, especially if you have to do it in active recovery, you can't just go sit on a beach in the Cayman Islands for a month. Burnout takes time to heal from. And recognizing it as your body being just completely overloaded, just, and taking care of yourself just like you would, would take care of yourself if you had pneumonia or something else physically wrong with you, you would slow your pace down, you would eliminate unnecessary stressors. We need to do the same thing with burnout, but we also need to acknowledge or identify what is driving that burnout. And if there are things that you know, like ruminations or carrying around, just carrying around with us, our anger and our resentments and our guilt. That's exhausting. That's exhausting. So what can we do to lighten that load? When you want to make friends, but you're afraid of rejection, perfectly natural, perfectly normal for a lot of us. And it's important to identify and take it slow. Finding one person that you enjoy spending time with and, or maybe joining a club, you know, if you're an extrovert club, if you're an introvert, probably finding one person at a time where you can meet somebody and start connecting with them. Recognizing that what I'm hearing is a lot of emotion based reasoning. So you say, I feel like everyone would eventually not like me or hurt me, which leads me to isolate. Okay, that's feeling focused. That's emotion focused reasoning. What are the facts in this context at this time? You meet Jim Bob and you Start spending time with Jim Bob, you know, what have you, and you're like, okay, you know, I think we could be friends. But then the little voice in you, your inner critic, your inner child, whoever was abandoned, whoever was traumatized in the past says, oh, they don't really like you or they're going to be like everybody else and they're going to hurt you. Okay, well, let's check the facts in this context at this time. Do they really like me? What evidence do I have that they like spending time with me? And what evidence do I have that they don't? And, you know, facts. Not assuming, not reading, micro expressions, not mind reading. But what are the objective facts? If there are particular triggers for you that other people have done in the past that, that let you know or that ultimately ended up to them abandoning you? Okay, understanding those triggers may not mean the same coming from another person. For example, if Jim Bob breaks a date with you because they have to work late. Okay, and, and I say date, I'm assuming friends. But whatever, in your mind you may say, oh, they don't want to spend time with me. They're just trying to avoid me, to, like, go away. You know, we can spin all kinds of things. What are the facts? No, the facts are that Jim Bomb called and said, hey, I need to break our. Break our date for tonight because I got something that I've got to do or I've got to work late. Well, it happens. Sometimes we've got to work late. Sometimes our pet gets sick and we've got to take them to the vet. Things happen. Life happens. So evaluating the facts now, if they do it five times in a row, then it might be time to have a conversation. And that's where assertiveness comes in. If we are forming a relationship with other people, we need to be able to be authentic to a certain degree. I mean, you're not going to tell them every deep, dark secret the first week you know them, but we need to be able to ask authentic questions. Hey, Jim Bob, you've broken our last five dates. I'm wondering if you're too busy for a relationship right now. I'm wondering if I did something. Can you tell me what's going on? Instead of guessing, instead of mind reading. Is it scary? Yes. Journaling can help. Journaling every day about the relationship or the relationships in your life. And what in those relationships is going well and tells you that it's a safe, secure relationship? And what in those relationships, if anything, might make you a little uneasy? And then what can you do about that? For those of us who have a history of abandonment, it can be really easy to focus on the threats and minimize the, the good things. We assume that if this is going on, then the worst thing's going to happen. It's important to not push yourself too hard. And we, in other videos we've talked about boundaries, and boundaries are like a house. The UPS man. You know, you're probably not going to invite them in and offer them tea, and that's just not something you're going to do right away. You're going to acknowledge them when they drop your package off. Over time, if you start up a conversation, you may feel comfortable inviting them inside the house. And that's what our emotional, mental, physical, cognitive boundaries are. We need to gradually learn to trust people. Can I trust you to come up to my door and not hurt me? Okay, so that would be like going to a group activity, maybe Habitat for Humanity. You start going, you start building houses, you meet some people, you enjoy talking to them. It feels pretty nice. Whatever you're like, okay, maybe I'll let you in my house a little bit. So what if I invite you out for coffee? Okay, so that is something that's a little bit more intimate or a little bit more vulnerable and see where that goes for a while. You know, can we meet for lunch, can we meet for coffee, can we meet at the gym together? Pretty easygoing stuff. I'm still not sharing a bunch of vulnerable stuff with you. I'm not giving you ammunition to hurt me. I am learning whether you're trustworthy over time. Once you feel like, hey, they're trustworthy, then you might start sharing more with them and doing things with them that are. And when I say intimate, I don't necessarily mean sexually. I mean emotionally intimate, where you're spending time talking about things that are actually meaningful. You're sharing your thoughts and your feelings. But again, you're not going to just automatically start sharing everything the first time. You're going to, you know, share a couple things with them, see how they react, see if they can be trusted, and then go, go on from there. There are a lot of changes, Daran, in psychology, and I'm not really familiar specifically with spiritual psychology, but recognizing that there is no one size fits all for human beings, cognitive behavioral works really well for some people, not so much for others. Psychoanalysis works for some people, not so much for others. We need to be open minded to different approaches that are going to be supportive and meaningful for the individual. Lana. Love and that Is what I'm hearing possibly might be signs of codependency. Worrying about others first, because when you grew up, if you didn't worry about them, nobody would. Worrying about others first because you were afraid that if you didn't take care of them, if you didn't, weren't, didn't make yourself indispensable, or if you didn't lavish them, they would abandon you. That's where a lot of that stuff comes from for a lot of people. I don't know about your case. Your therapist assertion that you need to focus on how you feel and take care of yourself is so important. Because if we have a secure attachment with ourselves and if we are consistent, attentive, responsive, encouraging and safe to our own inner self, then we don't rely as much on others for validation. We don't fear abandonment as much. Does it hurt if they abandon us? Yes, it does. However, it doesn't feel crushing. Children 6, 7, 8, even 11, 12 year olds, they can't take care of themselves. So if their caregiver abandons them, their world is crushed. You know, they can't, they can't survive. So if your abandonment experiences started early on, then your inner child may still be reflecting a lot of that and fearful that if these people go away, either because I didn't take care of them and make sure they were okay, or because I didn't lavish them and make them want to stay around, whichever it is, if I don't do that, then they're, they're going to go away and I am going to dissolve, I'm going to die, I'm not going to be able to survive. Well, that may have been true when you were six, but if you are 26, not so much. Again, it hurts. It hurts like hell when people abandon us or betray us. However, it is not something that is literally going to destroy us. So yeah, making changes in self care. But again, I encourage you. Small changes. What's one thing that you can do today? One thing, one small change you can do today that is going to take better care of yourself. Maybe that means starting practicing mindfulness at each before each meal, you know, checking in with yourself. There's a radical concept that most of us don't do that would be huge. Maybe when we say the cares mnemonic consistency, that's the mindfulness being consistent with how you treat yourself. Attentiveness is that proactive attention. Spending time, maybe 15 minutes a day or 30 minutes a week. I don't know how much time you have doing something with yourself, for yourself that you enjoy. If it's playing with your animals, if it is gardening, if it is taking a bubble bath, whatever it is that you like to do. But spending positive time where you are focused on self, even once a week, can be huge. So, yes, starting to establish that sense of security and connection with self is really important. And when you feel secure in your own skin, you feel more empowered to deal with what life throws at you, which means your nervous system starts to balance out, which can help reduce inflammation and further help improve emotional and hormonal stability. Steps for deep trauma work are number one. In most cases, make sure you're doing it with someone who is safe and trustworthy. Doing deep trauma work by yourself is almost always a mistake because it is so easy to dysregulate. Okay. So that's the first thing. Connect with somebody who is safe. Some people want to do deep trauma work and, and they don't want to use a therapist or a spiritual guide or whatever. Okay. But at least do it concurrently with somebody else who's doing trauma work. I really wouldn't advise that. I think you. I think deep trauma work is important to do with a person who can help you. Because part of our way that we've survived trauma in many way, in many cases is that we've learned to block out certain things. We just don't even remember them, or we don't see them, or we can't draw the connection. It's too painful. A objective third party can help us potentially make those connections. So that's why they help us stay safe and they help us see connections that we would normally have blinders to. But before you get started, you identify that person. Great. And then you develop down regulation and emotion management skills. Because once you open that Pandora's box, it can be exhausting. And if you go to therapy or you work on something for an hour and, you know, maybe you feel safe and empowered when you leave, great. But then at 2 o' clock in the morning, some other day that week, you start having flashbacks. It can feel terrifying. And it's important to be able to know that you have the skills, the tools and the supports needed. And that includes having somebody you can call when you are going through this. Because essentially, deep trauma work for a lot of people, not everybody, there are multiple ways to do it. Deep trauma work for a lot of people involves revisiting the trauma and maybe understanding it from a different point of view or integrating it some way, some. That's the way most people approach trauma. Trauma Recovery. But you are kind of opening that Pandora's box. And sometimes it's hard to shut it or hard to keep it shut once you've unlocked. Is important over the holidays to be respectful of what other people can and cannot do. Even if your love language is gifts, you may need to adjust your expectations to be reasonable over the holidays because there are a lot of people. I don't remember what it was. It was like 60 or 70% of people right now, I think are living paycheck to paycheck. And that's, that's huge. That is heart wrenching. But that also means they can't afford to be buying gifts for everybody and their house cat. They may not be able to afford, be able to buy gifts at all. They may make you something. So being responsive to that, being sensitive, if you are able to buy food and you can afford your food bill, going places where they have Bogos and the one that you get for free, donating to a food pantry, that's something else you can do. But there are a lot of things to take into consideration during the holidays to help people free feel safe and empowered. If they feel judged because you didn't give them, if they feel judged because they didn't give you the right present or they didn't spend enough money or whatever, then it's going to trigger abandonment, it's going to trigger hard feelings, it's going to trigger a lot of stress. So gracious acceptance of what people can give, even if that is just of themselves and their time can be huge during the holidays and letting people know ahead of time, you know, I don't expect, you know, with my kids right now because they're at, they're young people, they're trying to, you know, get started in life. And they're feeling the crunch like everybody is right now, or a lot of people are. And I'm like, we don't need presents. If you can come over on Thanksgiving, that would be fabulous. But for my daughter, for example, she's working six days straight, she has Thanksgiving off and then she's got to work Black Friday and she struggles with autoimmune issues. And I'm like, well, honey, I would love to see you on Thanksgiving, but if you need that day to recuperate, take it. Don't feel obligated to haul your behind all the way over to mom's house because we live about an hour away from her. I don't know if she'll listen or not, but it's really important. In my mind, it's really important for me to say, you know what, what's most important to me is your health and well being and you know we can, we've done holidays on other, other days too. When she went to her in laws for one holiday I was like don't worry about rushing back so we can celebrate Christmas on Christmas. Go there, have Christmas, that's fine and then in a couple of days come over here and we'll have Christmas. It's not that big of a deal. What's more important is that I get to see you. Clearly my love language is not gifts though. So. Is it okay if you don't attach too much to a person? If they leave you feel hurt but easily keep moving on. That is your call. Does that feel fulfilling enough? Some people and and what too attached looks like differs for different people. And what I'm hearing from you is a very healthy relationship where you're attached to them but if they leave, your world doesn't come crushing down. That's okay. If you feel like it is blocking intimacy, that you're not creating a deep enough connection, then that would be something to explore. But every person's level of attachment and what they feel is going to be somewhat different. Darshan in in terms of books, I really don't do much casual reading. I guess about the only book that I read that's not in PubMed or whatever is the Bible. So I'm not a real good I don't have a lot of real good suggestions. I guess if I have to think back, there is an author by the name of Sark S A R K and she does a lot of really interesting books, but those are kind of therapeutic in nature as well. So. Oh when my kids were little, the Skippy John Jones series did love I still love that series. It's about a Siamese cat that thinks he's a Chihuahua. Lyron Tiger. What I'm hearing is the sugar triggers a dopamine, serotonin and endorphin release. So you're addicted to the highly processed foods and it makes it difficult to let those go because it helps you feel safe. It helps you feel comforted. Those that sugar, the endorphins, the foods you're eating may also be connected to the few times in your childhood when you felt safe. For example, if your mom always made brownies or something, then you may be experiencing that also that memory connection as well, which is intensifying the endorphins. Ultimately. Getting back to what is the purpose? What is the function of the behavior. What is the actual function of the sugar? Is it to remind you of a happier time? Does it help you feel safe? Does it triggered the release of feelgood chemicals? All of the above. Okay, what can you do? That also does that. And that's something that I work with with a. A lot of people that have addictions. We're not going to be able to completely replicate the rush or the euphoria from cocaine or something, nor would we want to, because that's really stressful on the nervous system. But it was serving a purpose. It was helping for most people, it was helping them feel something that was positive and numb out the unpleasant feelings. So what else can be done to. To do that? And since you started out the statement, or started out with the statement that you have attachment trauma or what I'm hearing is that sugar and highly processed foods have become a surrogate for human interaction. And I don't say this in jest or to minimize what you're going through. One thing you might consider is trying to establish an attachment with a pet, because pets are much less rejecting, they're much safer. And a lot of people would rather spend time with their dog than other humans. That can help serve as an intermediary until you start feeling a little bit safer. And it may help release endorphins when you're needing it. Instead of engaging in sugar, there's also going to be a detoxification period where your body, you know, adjusts to not having those simple sugars and everything. I would encourage you to talk with a registered dietitian about strategies you may be able to take. Talk with your doctor about any having blood work done to identify if there's something else going on under the hood, so to speak, like insulin resistance, diabetes, something that would be directly impacted by the sugar you're eating and may be contributing to that addictive quality. Okay, everybody, that has been my hour. Thank you all for attending and being so interactive. I will see you next Monday. Have a fabulous Thanksgiving. It.