23. Showing Up For Me

Welcome to episode 23 of She's Honestly Mental. Every time I start one of these podcasts, I always sit in just this extreme gratitude of everybody that listens, that watches, that shares, that follows, that has been around since day dot, from the moment I started sharing content. And I tell you what, I am honestly grateful more than anyone could ever imagine because I know that without the people that have supported me from the get-go, I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't be where I am today, and that is in this amazing place sitting here in front of you all chatting about mental health. Crazy, hey? Like, it blows my mind that 6 years ago I had just discharged from hospital for the second time, and I feel like I'm living my dream life. I am feeling like I'm living everything that I ever wished and that I ever dreamed of, and it is actually a reality. The things I used to journal about Oh, it would be things like I wouldn't be able to get up in the morning and go to the gym and exercise. Well, I did that this morning. Tick. Don't do it most mornings, but I did today. I want to be able to get up and meal prep. I've been doing that. More on that. I want to be able to cook dinner for my family. I've been doing that, and I want to be able to have a life where the kids can be on school holidays and I can actually be home with them. And it's currently school holidays. Our littlest boy Reuben is at daycare, and my oldest two, uh, Graydon and Austin, they are nearly 13 and 11, uh, in the other lounge room. I've overtaken their lounge room, which is their lounge room, my office, and they're hanging out in the other lounge room watching The Simpsons. Fun fact, I has watched every episode of The Simpsons, probably more than once, and he is so obsessed with them. It is wild. So I suppose a little fun fact, I love Barbie, so I have a little collection of Barbies. Graydon is F1 mad, so he's pretty much got everything that's Red Bull Max Verstappen, and Austin is Simpsons mad. So we've been trying to collect him some Simpsons stuff. And then Reuben currently is obsessed with Fireman Sam and Paw Patrol, but you know, he's 3, so that's pretty relative. Normally I would have like a cute little hall table behind me, but we're in the middle of shuffling furniture around the house, and so at the moment behind me is literally Hot Wheels track, his workstation with his tools on it, and his fire station. And that's okay, that's really okay. I've just thought, I was like, why do I need to go to all the effort of building a set, I suppose, when it's always just been about me chatting? But I have got some really cool places lined up in the next couple of weeks to do some podcast recordings, like, on location, because Why not? Like, why not? There is no limitation when it comes to this. And I feel like I honestly thought today I would end up recording an episode at work at the workshop for Spotties because Celeste, who does our parts, had the audacity to take the weekend off and the Friday and Monday. And so I've had to pretend to be a parts person. I can't, I can't do that. It's not for me. It's not for me. It's hilarious. A customer rang today and I'm so lucky that when they call, it comes through to our phone system and the phone system actually records the conversations. And I know that I can ask them specific questions and from that question, I can then get Jared to listen to the call and he can decide whether we can help them or not. Anyway, the system, my system worked perfectly and I was able to say, to the customer, look, I'm not a parts person, but let me just grab all this information. I'll speak to Jared, AKA Spotty, and come back to you. And it worked perfectly. All they needed was this diaphragm thingy off the end of a pump off of something, and we had it in stock and I was able to do that. So I'm like, well, look, my job here is done. But I honestly did think for a second that I should just take my cameras with me, the recording gear with me, and just set this up in the workshop. So that'll probably happen in the next few weeks because trying to juggle recording and mumming and life things, particularly while we're through school holidays, is really, really hard. But I promised myself that I would get these episodes out weekly. Everyone loves them, duh. And I I love— I, I genuinely love being here and showing up and having these conversations. So let me share what's been going on for me lately personally. So over the last few episodes, I've been sharing about my reduction of medication. I am very, very excited to share that I have got myself down to 100mg of sertraline, and I'm no longer on my mood stabilizer. It's probably been just over a month and I've got through the withdrawal process and I am happy. I'm so happy and I'm content. I'm still taking the dexamphetamine. I only take it maybe 1 or 2 a day and I think I take it more so because I know that just by taking a little bit every kind of day, particularly during those more like stressful periods for me, that my brain handles those things a lot easier. So I've been doing that and I'm, I'm pretty good. One thing that I've really struggled with for a long time has been my weight and my body. So I've done things like Weight Watchers, calorie counting, reverse dieting. I've— I feel like there isn't much that I haven't done for probably about 12 months. I kind of played around with Manjaro, which is similar to Ozempic, which again, I I really liked because I did notice a reduction of my appetite, but also a reduction of a lot of inflammation within my body. But I found still that my eating habits were not great, and I definitely have been one of the people that has gone down the lines of binge eating and hyperfixations. So There has been times where, like, I would be on my way to work and I would call past the Coles and I would buy 2 big king-size twin-pack Crunchies and make sure that I eat those before I went in. I would notice, or I would, you know, go to Macca's and get the iced coffee frappe with all of the things. And, you know, ice cream, cream, sugar syrups. It's been like that for a long time and something that has been coming up for me because I'm 37, people are getting older, women start to hit into that perimenopause, menopause era. I wanted to try and make sure that, like, I'm like, enough is enough, really. Like, when is the point of do you actually start to take some responsibility for this? And I'm very big on not playing the victim because I know if I'm in that victim mentality, it's not helping me grow. So I wanted to step away from that. And when I was in Koh Samui for the successful retreat, there was, um, two like guest speakers that came in. So the first day we had Chris Griffin, who's my podcast coach, cool guy. You should follow him out, uh, the— on Instagram, uh, more Chris Griffin. And he has a podcast called The Pocket. Pretty cool, pretty epic for a little 24-year-old dude. He is very smart, and I'm grateful that I got to meet him. And then the other two guests that we had was Kitty and Craig. Now Kitty and Craig have a business program called Win at Life and New Strength, and they talk about women 40 and over, perimenopause, menopause. It's all about this pro-metabolic approach, and I've been— and this is really big, like, if you don't know me, right, you would think, what the fuck, Corrina? So this isn't just like another fad diet or anything. This is— I am actually meal planning, I'm meal prepping for The last 4 days I've had the same food all day, day in, day out. I've only been having like a half of my cacao, like I'm not even really drinking it at the moment because it's just not— I'm like, oh, it's not really doing it for me. But there's so many carbs, there's beautiful like, like natural sugars. I am really, really enjoying it except for the part when I get to nighttime and my husband's cooking food for him and the kids and it smells delicious and I'm like, lucky my chicken and vegetable curry is yum. So I am working with Kitty and Craig and their coach Ash. I've signed up for 16 weeks in the hope to try and lose some weight, try and like sort my metabolism out, sort out my gut health, and I'm really, really excited I'm really excited for that because I have this feeling that that's really what is going to be the next step in me progressing with my mental health journey in the sense of being able to try and come off of some more medication because I'm really, really aware of nutritionally fueling myself, making sure that I'm eating good healthy foods is definitely a trigger when I'm not of me spiraling. So I'm like, what have I got to lose? I've got a lot to lose. My boys are 13, 11, and 3, and I want to be able to keep up with them. I want to be in my best possible shape and form as I possibly can. I want to be able to run a whole lap of the hockey field. I want to do my bronze medallion. Like, these things are really important to me, and there's got to be some kind of compromise from me and my body and my brain to get to this point. It's not going to be something that's really easy. And I have never, ever, ever followed a meal plan before like this. And it's actually so good because it's taken away that mental load and the mental capacity of having to decide what to eat. And I think I find some days that I'm like, I'm actually so satisfied with what I'm eating that I'm not even thinking about food because I just know that my next plate of food or my next whatever I need is in the fridge or in my containers that I'm traveling with. So that's one of my big goals. It's like I actually want to lose 28 kilos, and I can't believe I'm saying that publicly, but I am because something that I heard was like, if we don't put our really big, scary, crazy goals out there Well, I suppose you're more likely to achieve them by actually saying them out loud. And look, I'm here for the realness and the rawness and all of the conversations. And so yeah, I'm like, 28 kilos. I've got 28 kilos to lose. That's wild. But I can't wait to be 28 kilos lighter and to actually be able to run and participate in playing hockey. And hanging out with my kids and being able to paddle a surf life-saving paddleboard, like, without that extra weight on me. Like, that just brings me so much joy. But I've had to remember— I remember a doctor saying to me when I had the kids, he's like, Corrina, now is not the time to be focusing on weight loss or exercise. Now is the time to be focusing on looking after yourself in the sense of you've just had 2 kids or you've got 3 kids. Like, stop pushing, stop pushing all the time. And I definitely have been really, really guilty of that, of trying to push myself to succeed, to achieve, to do all the things because we've been told that by doing all of the performance things, you know, being a mom, being a wife, working, having kids, keeping the house clean, keeping on top of all of the jobs, that is our success metric. And I hate that so much. I'm like, how come our success metric is basically based on performance? Can our success metric actually be based on how we are feeling and how we're coping within our body? I don't know, but I feel like that feels a lot nicer than on how well we're supposed to be performing in life. I would want someone to be like, hey, how are you doing? And how are you feeling? Genuinely, rather than like, girl, you're looking snatched. Like, what? It does definitely come down to appearance, and I'm not gonna lie, like, I have been and am still sometimes those people that judge others on their appearance, but have we ever stopped to really question, like, oh my gosh, like, I wonder what is actually going on for them in their life, in this perspective of being empathetic and caring, instead of being like, oh my God, she's so fat, or she's so skinny, judge, judge, judge, judge, coming at things from like a, 'Oh, I wonder,' because we never really know what's going on behind closed doors. So yeah, when I catch myself in those places of judgment, I then realize 9 times out of 10, the places that I'm judging other people is from my own insecurities of how I'm actually feeling about myself. It's so true though. We do base our expectations on how we perceive others and how we believe that other people's perceptions of us will meet their expectations. I don't even know if I can re-explain that, but it's a bit of a wild thought. Yeah, I'm excited. I am really, really excited to see how I go. I, like I say, I've got 14 days of having the same food every day for 14 days. That will set our baseline with my body's weight, with how I'm tracking, with how I'm measuring, with how I'm— my energies. And it's funny because I, for the last couple of weeks on my Whoop band, I've been in the red or in the like low yellows. And the last 2 days my Whoop has been sitting at 75 to 73%. So I'm in the green. And I think that's because I'm actually fueling myself. I'm actually nourishing my body with food and nutrition. Starting the day with Greek yogurt and fruit, starting the day with like milk, like proper milk, not almond milk. Starting the day with this big bowl of like fruit, rice cakes, yogurt, raw honey, then milk and this like weird carrot salad. I still can't get my head around that, but we'll get there. Lunch, I've been doing potatoes and mince that I've seasoned with Parmesan cheese and butter. Yes. Afternoon tea is like grapes and then some more yogurt and banana and honey, and then dinner is this chicken rice vegetables. Dessert though, homemade ice cream made from scratch, made by me, and then a little 15-minute brownie also made by me, but it's full of like sugar and like dark cacao. It's so good. It is so good. And so I get to the nighttime and I'm like, I'm actually satisfied. I am so satisfied. Yes, my husband's eaten a lovely steak. Yes, my husband's had some delicious chops. And yes, the kids have been snacking on some sausages, but like, I feel satisfied and I actually feel fueled. So I don't think I can really complain about that. So another couple of things that have been going on for me, and it's something that I wanted to be really truly open and honest about, is I have invested a fair bit of money into the podcast. I really, really believe in this so passionately that I've sunk some money into this. I borrowed it from my dad. Thank you, Dad. Because having Chris as my coach has been invaluable. He's helping review my content, the podcast, making sure that I've got it all set up really well so that I can make the most of it. And then secondly, I'm working with this beautiful Kate from— she's called The Launch Queen, and we are building our first official She's Honestly Mental community. And it is my goal and my dream to have this online community that women are a part of. It is a paid community, but the point of it is to be able to have a space where we can be together, where like-minded women, we're all going through the same things or similar things, we're all in this place of wanting to support others, to talk honestly about mental health, and to kind of just feel really safe. There is so many women out there at the moment that are getting diagnosed with ADHD, and you've spent your whole childhood or your whole early years thinking, what the fuck is wrong with me? And then all of a sudden someone goes, oh yeah, by the way, you've got ADHD. And you're thinking, what? I definitely went through a grieving process when I was diagnosed. Definitely went through a grieving process, particularly because I didn't finish school. I left school in year 11. I went and worked at the local travel agents and I did a traineeship there. I remember taking home a whole $252 a week. What the heck? And it really just— I really— this net makes me so nervous. I have just realized that the sound hasn't been recording. Ah, what the heck? I don't want to do that. Okay, Chris has promised me that if the sound stops or doesn't record, that we can make this work, but I'm just conscious that I'm like 20 minutes into the podcast. Anyway, I'm sure this will be fine. I'm sure it will be fine because I've got audio on my two other cameras, and surely that will be okay. Oh, okay. So I'm really excited for the community, and it will be opening on the 11th of June, and in my head it's kind of like People spend so much money on going to the gym, looking after their physical body, and we don't do that for our mental health. These conversations are not normal. So imagine having a place where we can all kind of jump in. There is a community where we all just talk openly and honestly about life. I have trained in different modalities, you know, I've trained in NLP, neuro-linguistic programming. It's all about the way of the language that we use when we talk to ourselves. Hypnotherapy. I've worked with a doula, and the most important thing— this is the thing that I haven't been able to find with anyone else, really— is that I've had this lived experience. I've been in this place. I really get and understand what it's like to be one of those women where you've not been diagnosed and then you get diagnosed and I've been admitted, I've been to hospital, I've, I've, I've dealt with suicidal ideation, anxiety, depression. I'm a mom, I've got businesses. Like, there is so much stuff that qualifies me to hold this space, but yet I have never backed myself. And so that's what I'm doing this time. I'm truly backing myself. And so I'm hoping that with the first launch of the community, like, if I could get I want to say 100 people, but I'm like, if I could get 50 people in the first round of the community, I would be so, so, so excited. But we're still building that, so we'll come back to that a little bit later. Oh, there's some cool things that I'm like, I feel like are a bit naive, right? Or a bit of myself, but it's like some cool things I would love to see this year is 10,000 followers on my Instagram. I'd love to have over 10,000 downloads on the podcast. 10,000 just seems to be the thing. And I'd love to have like a couple of hundred people go through the first rounds of the communities. So they'll run in like 90-day cohorts and then we will continue throughout the year. And in each cohort, we're kind of focusing on different things. So we build tools, we get techniques that help us with coping and just build those strategies so that people are actually getting kind of tangible things that they can use to help with life. Like, for me, there has been so many different tools and techniques that I've learnt that have been able to help me with my mental health that without them, without having that toolbox and without having that toolkit, I wouldn't be where I am today without going through those processes. And like, when I went to the doctors a couple of weeks ago and the doctor said to me, 'Oh, Corrina, just give yourself permission to go back on that medication.' I was like, 'No, I have come so far. Like, I don't know whether what I'm doing actually works if I'm still doing the same thing. Like, if I'm still on that medication— yes, I definitely needed it 2 years ago. Absolutely. I was not coping. I wasn't sleeping. I wasn't eating. Like, I just wasn't functioning. So I knew I needed something to support me.' But now I'm a month out from having taken that medication for the last time, and I'm now in this place where I'm like, do I need a mood stabiliser? No, I don't. But also, there is so much I find where I'm thinking throughout the day, just noticing where my head's at, where my body's at, what I'm feeling, what I'm frustrated with, what I'm satisfied with. To knowing and understanding that it's actually normal to have these fluctuations. But I have a friend at the moment who's really deep in the darkness, and she's crying every day for most of the day, and that is not normal. That is not okay. That is definitely a sign that you need more support. But the problem is trying to get support for her has been so hard. Like, we are, I would say, nearly 3 weeks into waiting to getting a psychiatrist appointment for her, and we are finally getting that appointment today. 3 weeks later, 3 weeks this person's been in crisis for, and we're only just able to get psychiatric help for her. That is what is wrong with the system. So, oh, I'm just excited and I feel so pumped and I'm so proud of myself because of how far I've come and just where I'm at with this, but I'm even more excited because I'm backing myself, I'm showing up for myself, and I'm doing these things I haven't been able to do before. And I wouldn't be here if I hadn't have done the work. I wouldn't be here if I hadn't have in those moments chosen that I was worthy, that I was okay, that it was— I had permission to rest, that I had permission to let go. I wouldn't have been able to do that without the people that held space for me and without the messages and without the people saying, 'Hey, me too.' So I'm going to wrap up today's episode with a whole of about 6 minutes of the audio actually recorded properly, hoping that the audio from the cameras is going to be enough. I don't know what I'm going to do with that. Go from there. But I have a really, really big favor to ask, and I hope that— well, my favor is, if you listen to the podcast, if you see one of my social media posts and it resonates with you, can you please comment, like, subscribe, or share it? Because the more we engage with these posts, the more that we engage with things that are in alignment with us— not even just my content, but anyone's content— the more we're able to spread this messaging throughout the world. And I think in a world where there is so much shit news all the time, we want to be sharing the things that really resonate and feel true to us, which kind of is funny because I've had people say to me in the past that they don't like or comment or even follow me on social media, even though they agree with what I'm saying, because they're too scared of the judgment from other people. I, like, I hate that we're still living in a reality where that is how people still think. So I truly hope that in the next 5 to 10 years that we've had enough of an impact with She's Honestly Mental that we can continue these conversations and that they continue to be safe and that more people are quite open in talking about their mental health. I actually remembered that when I was working with Kate going through the information that she needed to help me with launching the community, she said, 'Who do you see as a competitor?' I said, 'I've honestly never looked at anyone that talks about mental health as a competitor,' because the more people sitting at this table and more people that are having these conversations, the better off we are. Okay, it's so good. So yeah, I've never honestly looked at anyone as a competitor. I think that's really odd. I don't know. And it's hard being in this space of social media and podcasting where everyone's trying to reach number one and everyone needs to try and get attention because unfortunately that's just what we've got to do to try and get the message out. That we have to think of it like that. It was funny, a really good friend of mine that I've known for the last few years, she said to me, oh my gosh, I was talking to someone the other day and can't even think of what their name is or who they are, or like, anyway, they were just saying, you know, when you try and have a conversation with someone and you try to like bait them almost to see if you can get them to do a little judgy kind of spiral, or what do you think of this person situation? She said it was like that. They were trying to like almost bait to be 'Hey, what do you think of Corrina? Like, you know her?' And she's trying to say, 'Yeah, well, she's actually one of my best friends.' And she's like, 'Yeah, but you know, this stuff she's sharing on social media, like, that's a bit much, don't you think?' And my friend turned around and said, 'You wouldn't believe it, but that is actually a part of her way of processing what she's been through, and there is actually safeguards and safety rails around what she talks about.' So it's not like I'm out here throwing my dirty laundry around to be like, 'Whoa, look at me.' I'm out here because I know the cost of not talking about it, because when I was going through this, no one said a word. And I refuse to sleep at nighttime not talking about the realness and the rawness of life. I'm not sitting here in a victim mentality being like, 'Oh, it's happened to me.' I'm sitting here in this power of I'm owning it and I'm using it as a tool to get better. So yeah, I'll wrap up today's episode there. Thank you so much for listening. I feel so good today. It might be because I didn't do a little breathwork session beforehand. I've also had some coffee, but I'm pinging anyway. So yeah, love you all. Talk soon.