22. Loneliness Part 2: Five factors that put you at HUGE risk for loneliness. Learn how to combat loneliness in a way that gets to the root cause.

Welcome to my podcast. I'm Dr. Nicole Cain, a naturopathic doctor with a master's in clinical psychology and a former anxiety sufferer turned anxiety freedom rebel. Today you are going to learn about five huge risk factors for loneliness, and you're going to walk away with strategies to combat loneliness that actually get to the root of your experience. In this video, you're not going to get a pep talk that says, call your friends, get out more. We're actually going to talk about how to beat loneliness by understanding what's actually happening psychologically and what you can do to write a new story. Did you also know we have a podcast on loneliness? If that's interesting to you, then I'll make sure to include the link in the show notes. So check that out. So here's my question for you. Have you ever felt lonely even when you're with other people? Whether you're at a family gathering and feeling just unimportant and isolated and maybe even forsaken feeling, or with a big group of friends and you're with a bunch of people, but you just still have this feeling of being lonely. And if you felt that way, know that you're not alone. And I felt that way many times where I'm feeling like maybe I want to look at my phone or connect with somebody when I'm with other people. And so the question is, is why does that happen and what can we do about it? And I'm going to share with you five reasons. And so those five reasons are vulnerability to perceived isolation. Number two is attachment trauma or attachment wounds. Number three is struggling with self regulation. Number four is self esteem, self confidence, self love. And then number five is social expectations. The one thing I want you to know that's number one, the most important thing about loneliness is that it's not a circumstance. Loneliness is an experience of a circumstance. And this is why you may be with a group of people and feel completely lonely, but then somebody else may be in a cabin with their dog and feel completely content and like they have everything they need. And so the question is, why would your circumstances result in you having the experience of loneliness? And how can we change your experience so that regardless of your circumstances, you're feeling connected and loved and supported and that you're getting your needs met. And so let's start with number one, which is the vulnerability to perceived isolation? So when we think about that, everybody has a different threshold when social detachment becomes a sense of loneliness or when social detachment becomes a sense of isolation. Social detachment is exactly what it sounds like it's where we feel detached socially. And that's a big problem during a pandemic, right? We're not able to go and be amongst people. We're discouraged from being amongst family and friends, and there's quite a lot of isolation and loneliness. This can also be amplified during the holidays when there's people that we miss or people that we lost, or we're just not able to get to them or get to be with them. And so when we think about social detachment, we want to think about what is our threshold to that social loneliness. And we've actually seen in the research that perceived isolation is most important when, regardless of how much time you spend socializing. And we see that perceived isolation may be impacted by genetics, childhood attachment patterns, and with our cognitive patterns. So what do we do with this? First, I want to ask yourself the question, am I logistically socially detached? Am I actually spending time with people, whether it's on the phone or in chat rooms or in person or from afar? And if you're connecting with people, if you have social attachment, is that combating your loneliness? The question is, are you lonely because you're just not with people, or are you still lonely despite being with people? If you're lonely because you're not with people, then the answer is quite a lot different. The solution is different versus if you're with people and still feeling incredibly lonely. So if connecting socially doesn't fit the loneliness void, we want to look deeper. So the second is, let's expand on attachment trauma and attachment wounds. If you've been in a relationship where you feel violated or abused or fearful, or if your caretakers neglected you or didn't meet your needs, if they were emotionally unavailable, if you've been in a divorce or someone's cheated on you, or you had a breakout with a friend group and then you ended up feeling ostracized, any broken friendships, any of these different things could serve as an attachment wound. It wounds us and it impacts our ability to feel comfortable and safe. And so when you're reflecting on this question is, think about, what are my attachment figure relationships? Do I have caretakers who were there for me, who were reliable, who I could turn to, who are still present? What about my friendships, my partner partnerships? What are these patterns like? And if there are wounds, if there are attachment traumas, doing work on that is going to be a prerequisite for conquering the loneliness battle, right? And so the next is self regulation. And so as social creatures, we cognitively develop our ability to Regulate ourselves by looking at how our caretakers regulated themselves. And so if you reflect back through your life and you think about your caretakers, ask yourself how did they deal with stress and how did they deal with big emotions that were coming up? And are you using any of those strategies today that you learned when you were little? And so if we learn self regulation by watching unregulated people, we may not learn how to regulate. But the good news is that I have a solution for this. In the Axe method, we focus in module one on all about regulation. We talk about attachment, we talk about our experience in the world. And you're going to learn about something called affect tolerance. Affect is our emotional experience and tolerance is how well we can deal with that or modulate our emotions. And the more self regulated you become, the more you'll be able to tolerate feelings of loneliness and the more equipped you will be in making changes. So let's keep moving. The next is self esteem. And when it comes to self esteem, being overly critical with ourselves can cause feelings of loneliness and reinforce loneliness behaviors. Oftentimes lonely individuals find it hard to reach out into the world because they feel like they don't have anything valuable to offer. They may withdraw or hold back or social distance. And that can result in feeling more socially isolated. Healing work that involves being more honest in your assessment of your gifts and your positive traits will help you get on the right track of writing a new chapter in your story. And there's something that I teach about in the anxiety course. It's about the five diamonds. It's about who you are on a fundamental level. And we work on building an honest, balanced sense of self esteem. Social expectations is next. And so when we think about social discord, this can come from a misfire in what we expected to happen and what actually did happen. And this can play out in several ways. One is maybe you expect everyone to abandon you and so you withdraw before they even have a chance. Or maybe your expectation is the opposite and you believe that they're going to show up for you in a way that they never were capable of or intended. And regardless of the scenario, conquering loneliness is to get clear on two things. One are what are your expectations? And two, what are the expectations of your social connections of you? I know this sounds like a lot, right? And I actually walk you through this entire process in the anxiety breakthrough course. And we have tons of free content to get you started. We also have a podcast on loneliness. And so check that out in the morning that you learn the more data that you have, the more empowered you will become in the course. You're going to get walked through in eight, one hour videos, all sorts of handouts and beautiful worksheets that will make the process fun and engaging with the course. You could also jump into the free Facebook group so that if you have questions or you hit obstacles, that you have somewhere to turn and my team has got your back. I also want you to know that we all need relationships and finding the right people can be really hard. Right. And I get that. And I want you to know that you're not alone. I've gone through seasons in my life where I felt really isolated, and creating an intentional community was a lifesaver for me. And while in person, relationships boost oxytocin, reduce cortisol, increase your life expectancy. And intentional community, even if it's online, can also be profoundly helpful, which is really important in this current climate. And so during difficult times when we can't get out and be in person, we want to turn to those different social media mediums that are protective and supportive and good. And I was wondering if you knew that we had a free and private Facebook group that you can go to to get support. I created it with a heart of giving us all a place where we can be, where we can be real, where we can be authentic when and especially if we can't go out in person. One of the things that sets this group apart is that the members are handpicked. We have an application and you will be handpicked to make sure that you're a good fit for this group. And we're looking for people who are supportive, who are kind, who are encouraging, and who are on the anxiety Freedom journey. And so to find the group, you would just simply type in Anxiety Freedom one week challenge in the search bar. I'll also put a link in the notes. And as a welcome gift from me to you, we have a 14 tip, anxiety freedom bundle that you're going to get, which is a week of videos. And in each of the videos, you're going to do two things that you can do every single day. And I think it's going to make a huge difference for you. We've had hundreds and thousands of people go through this challenge and the support has been just amazing and people are really loving it. So check it out. And so if you're lonely, start to go through these five steps and figure out how we can get to the root cause together. If you want to get in the group, do that today. If you want to check out the course, we'll make sure that we make the link available to you. Otherwise, I'm going to be here every week to support you, to give you free information, and to be there with you along the way. I'm Dr. Nicole and you can learn more about me and my practice by going to www.Dr.nicolecolecane.com. i'll see you guys later.

The recording you just listened to consists of the personal opinions of Dr. Nicole Cain, a a naturopathic doctor with a Master's in Clinical psychology. While these opinions are based upon literature, her counseling education, medical training, and clinical experience, this content should not be viewed as the definitive opinion on these subjects. Listening to this podcast is not a substitute for any sort of medical, psychological or other form of treatment. If you are in a Crisis, please call 911 or call the National Suicide Prevention Line at 1-827-38255. If you're in need of counseling, don't hesitate to make an appointment with a counselor in your area. Dr. Nicole Cain is so passionate about people getting their life back. If this resonates with you and you think this podcast would help someone you love, please share it with them. Stay in the conversation with Dr. Nicole Cain about writing the next chapter of your life so that it plays out just the way you want it. Explore your options for working with her at www. Dr. Nicolecane. Do that's Dr. D R Nicole N I C O L E Cain C-A-I n.com when you're there, be sure to take advantage of the Free Anxiety Freedom One Week Challenge. We look forward to seeing you on the next episode of the get yout Life Back podcast. Here's to your next chapter.