Understanding Your Max & Making Positive Changes - Q&A

Welcome to the Anxiety Society Podcast.

We're your hosts, Dr.

Elizabeth Mackinbell and.

Cali Werner, both therapists and individuals that have navigated our own anxiety journeys.

Have you ever wondered how we became a society that is so defined by anxiety?

Tune in as we discuss, learn, and dive into what anxiety is, how we perpetuate it, and we can stop it.

This podcast will be real, raw and unfiltered, just like the anxiety that plagues so many of us.

We are here to push boundaries, challenge the status quo, and deep dive into topics that are sure to make you uncomfortable.

If you're ready to step outside of your comfort zone and explore the unfiltered truth that will help you change your entire relationship with anxiety and get back to living your life, you're in the right place.

This is the Anxiety Society podcast.

We live it and we contribute to it.

And together we can change it.

And there's one thing that I need from you.

Can you come through?

Welcome back to the Anxiety Society Podcast.

This is my first episode back with you, Callie.

It's a twin.

I know we haven't sat in these chairs together.

I've missed it.

I know it's been a long time.

I feel like, excited and it feels so weird sometimes when you take these gaps or breaks.

Cause you're like.

Time is like, things sometimes feel really long and short at the same time.

Like, I'm like, oh, we were just here doing this.

But then it's also like, oh, it feels like it's been forever at the same time.

No.

Well, I feel like there's an episode or two I still have scheduled with someone.

Cause I thought you were gonna be out, but I was like, oh, Liz is back now.

And we could have been doing all these together.

There we go.

See what happened?

So, so much and so little has happened at the same time.

In the sense that for me, I've had twins and life is crazy.

But also sometimes life feels like it goes in slow motion when you're like sitting at home with babies and stressed out.

So both happen at the same time.

You have four kids now, four under four.

And she has been, for listeners here, bright eyed, bushy tailed.

Like you'd never know unless, like when you brought.

Or if you zoom in on my eyes, you'll know.

But like, that's the crazy thing is you just brought two little kids into the world and you're still here being a human.

Thank you.

I tell people all the time when people are like, why are you at work?

What are you doing?

And I really do tell people.

I'm like, I'm at work for me, like, I need some adult interactions, some adult conversations.

It's good for me.

But at the same time, I will say, like, I'm lucky enough that I don't have to be back full time, full time, like 9 to 5, 40 hours.

So love the flexibility, and I love being back.

Yeah.

Well, we're glad to have you back.

So, anyway, let's hop in.

Anxious moment.

You're first.

Oh, I'm like, you get to use.

Whoever thinks of it.

I'll go first.

Let's see.

Yeah.

My controlling nature.

I think that's my anxious moment is I've just noticed that when life feels a little bit out of control, which it clearly does for me between, like, kids and struggles.

And I've been having, like, I'm telling everybody.

Cause I think it's good to normalize it.

But, like, breastfeeding struggles and all the things that happen with babies that are going on, that goes on that I don't have a lot of control over, even though I can try.

I feel like you.

You know, you.

There's so much.

Only so much you can control.

I feel like when that happens, my need to control other things just picks up.

Right.

Whether it's like, tidiness or organization.

We went through our storage unit last Thursday, and I'm stressed now about feeling like we cleaned it out, but now we have piles of stuff everywhere.

We don't need all this, so we need to go through it.

But I have very little tolerance right now for an organization or a mess.

And I always know that that's when I'm feeling out of control in some other areas that I can't control.

It's this need to control over there.

And so my anxious moment has been just trying to lean into that.

I'm trying to not, you know, not spend time with the kids or not, you know, take the.

The older kids to school because I need to get this done right away.

Where that would have been my old go to is like, I wouldn't have done anything till I got things fully organized.

And, like, stuff was 100% set up.

Where now I feel like I'm at the place of, like, okay, it's messy, it's chaotic.

I don't like it, and that's okay.

Right.

How can I kind of organize that?

What I'll also say is one of the things Matt brought to my attention is that he was saying on one of the episodes that when I was talking about kind of my sometimes, like, wanting to be in control.

And those tendencies that I have, that he heard it as me saying, that's what OCD is.

And so I also wanted to clarify, Like, I thought that would be an important piece to just talk about is, yes, I have ocd, and I live with ocd, and there's things that certainly might trigger my ocd.

However, that's not one of it, you know?

And so I wanna be very clear that, like, this need to kind of control or, like, seeing that pick up when life feels out of control, that's a normal human behavior and can become disordered.

But even if it becomes disordered and your controlling nature becomes disruptive in relationships or in family dynamics, that still isn't ocd.

Right.

OCD is actually unwanted, intrusive thoughts.

It's very different than this.

Just kind of.

I wanna be in control right now.

Yeah.

And I kind of wanna echo.

I would say that my anxious moment is more of just like a reflection on this anxious season of life that I've been in.

And I went to a therapy session probably for the first time in three months recently, just because I was like, I really need this.

And I recognized that, similar to you, I've talked about this on the podcast many times.

Like, I feel like everything is disorganized when a few things are out of place, when I'm really stressed out.

And.

But I came to this conclusion that instead of going to OCD at this point, I start to, like, really harp on myself for imperfections.

Like, really harp on myself when I make a mistake and I can't let it go.

And I had this talk a few weeks back that I didn't love, and I could not let it go.

I just.

Like, we talked about.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And after I finally.

I was like, I need to set up a therapy session because I'm not processing this well and thoughts are just sticky around it.

And we came to this conclusion that, like, it's actually a win that I'm not engaging in OCD stuff.

And from my perspective, that's what's triggering.

Yeah, that it's like, OCD stuff.

Totally.

And so I think that's a good indicator because I think oftentimes in the past when I would go to therapy, I would say, oh, my ocd, my ocd.

And Konstantino, my therapist would just be like, no, well, that's not ocd.

And that's actually a win that we're not seeing OCD come up during this lifetime.

No.

Amen.

Yes, I agree on all.

And I want to just echo that.

Because I think that's exactly what Constantina, who is also my therapist, by the way.

So we'll have her on soon if she's willing.

That's also what she would tell me is that I think if I were to go to her right now and tell her what's going on of like, oh, I've noticed.

I'm struggling with the control, she'd be like, and you have two newborns at home and your OCD isn't loud.

How awesome.

Who cares that you have this?

It makes sense that you don't want things out of place when things feel chaotic.

And that's just the nature.

As we're talking, I just keep having these flashes of what my living room looks like right now, which is just baby stuff everywhere.

We've moved the couches out to block the dogs from coming in.

It just looks like a wreck.

Not my house, where it's this nice setup and couches.

And that's okay.

Part of your seasons can feel like, oh, this isn't me.

But it's also like, what is the priority?

My bigger priority is being able to, like, let the babies have tummy time and be on the floor.

And even if the house doesn't feel the way I want it to.

And so I think being able to.

I just want to talk for a second about this for both of us is that the reason this is important to say is that this is not our ocd, but this is anxiety provoking.

And most of our listeners, even if you don't have OCD or you don't have a diagnosed mental health condition, we all have anxiety.

And we know that it waxes and wanes.

Right.

It comes and goes.

It ebbs and flows at different times in our life.

And so, of course, for both of us, these busy seasons bring on different anxiety and different things that might trigger us or get us activated.

And I want to talk about that because I don't want people to think, oh, every time Liz is activated, it's her ocd, or every time Callie's activated, it's her ocd.

And I also don't want people to think because we've been in therapy, we don't ever get activated.

We do.

It looks very different.

Right.

I think that when I was experiencing or if I were to experience like an active, active OCD trigger, it would look different in the sense that it would be more all consuming, it would be very urgent, it would be very triggering.

So it's not to that degree yet life still happens.

That makes us anxious.

Yeah.

And I think it's helpful to.

I mean, we could do a whole episode on this.

Like, what are your signs and symptoms that help you recognize that you're in a place where you need to be processing things differently or you need to be changing some behaviors in order to not feed your anxiety?

And I've learned a lot about those signals for me, right?

Like, the perfectionistic needing to control certain things, the harping on myself when I make a mistake more than I normally would.

But the other one that comes to mind that I wanted to hear your opinion on is I'm not as nice to people when they get on my nerves.

I was literally about to say this, but I was like, don't interrupt, Callie, because y'all know I interrupt all the time.

But irritability.

I get so irritable.

And Matt said to me on Saturday, he was like, oh, you're like, irritability's back.

He literally said that.

He didn't say it like that, but that's what he alluded to.

He might have actually said it in not so nice way.

And I was like, well, that's.

But he was right.

And I knew that I was feeling overwhelmed, I was feeling stressed.

I can't even remember what we had going on this Saturday.

It might have even been Sunday.

But there was just too much.

This is too chaotic.

And it felt like everything was falling on me.

And when I do, I just.

Yeah, I'm not.

I can recognize no one wants to be around me in those moments.

Well, I think it's even just, like, internally sometimes.

Like, for me, I hope in the workplace, people can't recognize it when I'm feeling that, but just, like, the desire to want to avoid certain situations or, like, I will be the first to admit I came to lunch a little later two days ago because I was just feeling that irritability, and I didn't want to have conversations.

I don't want to talk to people right now.

This would not be a good time.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, good for you for knowing that about yourself.

But it's true.

I mean, I think that, you know, for a lot of us, most of us, when we feel certain feelings, we try to avoid processing them.

Right.

And we try to, like, I don't want to deal with that, so I don't want it.

Right.

And that's okay to different degrees.

However, it is important to be able to say, like, because so what I've noticed, when I'm irritable, if I notice it, Matt notices it, whatever.

If I go with the like, Defense mechanism of, like, whatever, who cares?

Or, no, I'm not.

Or, you know, of course I'm irritable.

Like, if any of it is not, like, processing it and doing what I actually should do, I can't shake it for the whole day.

Like, I'm literally irritable all day long.

Or at least one statement away from being irritable.

Like, you know, I might, like, have a good moment, but then if someone says something that upsets me or the babies are crying or whatever, I'm like, back in it.

Right.

It's like, it's just there where if I actually slow down, I'm like, okay, I'm feeling irritable.

Of course I'm overwhelmed.

Let me ask my husband or ask someone I love for something I need and like, how they can help and support me right now.

I can actually move through it.

Right.

But so many of us, it's just like, ugh, who cares?

Or we don't want to talk about it because we're already feeling it, but that actually just keeps us stuck in it.

Right.

And I think there are times in life where something's going on and you don't have a moment to process it.

Right.

Like, I use this example all the time of if there's a dancer or like a football player, you can't.

If they make a mistake on the field, they can't like, go watch film, right.

Then.

Right.

They have to play the rest of the game.

And I think that our human nature is to always go to that default of, well, I can't process this right now, but there are time to do it.

Yeah, yeah, but there are times that we should be doing that.

There's also times that we shouldn't be.

And like, we can over process.

Well.

And I think sometimes.

Exactly the over processing is important because I think sometimes the processing is quick.

Right.

Like, for me, it would just be like not being defensive.

Right.

And being able to take literally 30 seconds to be like, okay, Liz, you're feeling irritable.

Of course you are.

You're going on limited sleep.

You're feeling overwhelmed.

What can you do to have a minute or take a beat and at least even just recognize that versus if I'm like, oh, who cares?

Or what an a hole that he said that, or whatever.

I think or say that just contributes to it all.

It's that kind of.

I'm trying to suppress it and it's going to keep popping up.

Yeah.

Or sometimes I feel like I have this urge to, well, I need to get this off my Chest.

But then when I actually talk about it or share it with someone, I end up feeling worse for having shared it because I'm like, oh, that feels like I'm just gossiping.

I think that's a good point, too, is that sometimes what we think is processing is actually just making it bigger.

Yeah.

Right?

So, like, the point of processing is to be able to problem solve and move forward.

Right?

It is not just to, like, I'm trying to teach this, you guys, to Olivia.

Like, so Olivia's in this stage right now of, like, tattletailing, and she, like, if Grace does anything, it's like, grace.

Grace pushed me, okay?

Grace pushed me, okay?

Grace pushed me.

What are you gonna do about it?

And I'm like, I'm not gonna do anything.

Like, grace, don't push your sister.

Like, let's move on, right?

And.

But it is this stage of, like, okay, Olivia, you've told me two times.

We're not getting anywhere.

But, like, why don't you tell your sister that how that made you feel?

Or, like, let's, like, but can we start to problem solve how we're gonna manage that?

Right?

Why did she push you?

Is there something you contributed to that?

Or can you problem solve it with her and can we move on?

But also the same thing in life, you know, I tell people all the time, like, you can have a situation happen.

Any of us can.

Any of.

All of us do.

And we can choose for that situation to, like, own our day and to continue to interfere with everything we do and to be frustrating, or we can let that situation be something that, yeah, maybe it sucked.

Maybe we didn't like it, and we can move through it.

You know?

So I.

I'm making this up, but if you said something to me in the morning that offended me, Right?

Am I gonna say something like, ugh, I know Callie didn't mean that, or even go talk to you about it?

Both of which I could, like, problem solve, process it, and move through it pretty quickly.

Or am I gonna text three people about it, call somebody about it, talk about it with a coworker at lunch?

And now all of a sudden, I'm more frustrated, and by the end of the day, I'm, like, more mad at you than I have any reason to be over the same situation.

So processing is important to know that.

It'S really, like, am I problem solving?

Can we process productively?

Right.

I think we should do a full episode on that.

But how do you process productively?

We're not asking you to avoid and Suppress situations or things that are triggering.

We're.

And we're not asking you to process it where you talk about it at nausea and you just, you know, vent and you do what then, like you said, sometimes makes you feel worse because it's gossipy and it doesn't feel good.

It's.

Can we process productively?

Right.

Can we allow a situation to happen, acknowledge that we don't like it or how it makes us feel or what happened with it and move through it versus we get stuck in it?

You know, I think a lot of people think processing is talking.

Thinking, you know, ruminating.

We talk a lot about rumination.

When that actually gets us stuck in the process, that's not actually processing.

Yeah.

I think that one of the things I've realized I need to work on more is when I think of a way, okay, I could have this difficult conversation with a person, right?

Like, somebody that's made a comment to me multiple times that has started to frustrate me to a point where I'm building up this frustration and I haven't done anything about it.

But I avoid that conversation because I know it's gonna make me super anxious for, like, a whole day.

And to have it or afterwards, like to have it.

Well, like, sorry, Afterwards.

Like, I know I'm gonna dwell on it, like, think, did I totally say the wrong thing?

And sometimes I just don't wanna pay that cost.

I get that.

And then that's the part to weigh out, too.

However, what I would say is that then if you.

If I'm your clinician, right.

I would say, okay, Callie, if you're making that choice, then that means you're choosing to let it go.

Right?

Right.

So, like, it's also.

I would say to you, yeah, but if.

If you have the conversation, you dwell on it for a day.

If you don't have the conversation, if you keep dwelling on it every day.

And how is the person going to know to change their behavior?

You know, like, they don't even know that it's bothering me.

And so it's.

And sometimes it's not worth it.

Right.

Like, sometimes for us, it's like, well, I know that that's not gonna make a difference.

Or, you know, I was talking to someone about this the other day when we were talking about the kids.

And, like, you know, raising your kids and how it's really hard if you work because no one's gonna raise your kids the way you want them to be raised.

Right?

Everyone's gonna do things a little bit different and you have to kind of pick your battles.

Right.

What are the things that, like, man, I don't like that.

That frustrates me.

Versus, that's something I actually wanna talk to someone about.

Right.

Or that's something I'm gonna actually bring up as, like, hey, this isn't helpful.

Please don't do this.

And it is.

It's hard.

It is hard sometimes to say, but it bothers me.

I should talk about it.

And it's like, yeah.

But also, telling someone every single thing that bothers us is not always going to be helpful either.

Right?

Right.

Yes.

It is more of like, if you notice a pattern and something is not changing, and also, to that person's credit, they do not know that that's when it might be a good time.

But also, I think there are so many skills to work on with every avenue, because there's a lot.

I think just knowing who you are as a person, there's a lot of us that immediately get offended and then we jump out and we address it when, okay, if we take a second to reflect, did the person really mean it that way?

Like, are you already elevated?

And so kind of just easily getting triggered.

Right.

There's so many ways we need to process before we move, but not move too late.

So how do we do that?

Let's talk about that.

By the way, we're supposed to do a Q and A today, so we'll get to some questions, I promise.

But this has been fun to catch up.

But I do want to give this skill because I think it's one that I get asked a lot about from friends and people who may not have an anxiety disorder, but will say things like, when I'm frustrated or when I'm anxious, I don't know how to talk to other people about it.

And what they're really saying is that when I'm struggling with a situation with other people, or sometimes with other people themselves, as the person, how do I process this productively?

So what would you tell a client?

Like, what do you tell people when they say, okay, this situation happened?

I don't know what to do because I feel anxious about it, but I also feel anxious about talking about it, and I don't know how to move through it.

I think the first thing I would say is we can't avoid emotions, because I feel like oftentimes when patients or clients are asking that, they're asking you how to not feel angry, they're asking you how to not feel anxious, when in reality we have to feel those emotions in order to be motivated to do something about it.

Right.

And so we can't just immediately say, I'm going to.

I need to get rid of the emotion.

Can we process that?

Like, sometimes anger has a purpose, sometimes anxiety has a purpose.

And instead of trying to do everything you can to get rid of it, which is probably an unhelpful behavior to begin with, sitting back, reflecting and seeing, like, what changes could be made that would be a positive benefit to the situation for you and for that person.

And I think that's tough.

Totally no to I.

Yes on all.

I think that most of us, you know, a lot of my friends will say things like, well, I've tried to process it and I've said to them, well, what have you done?

And they'll say things like, well, I've just been thinking about it nonstop and I'm trying to figure it out.

And I want to.

Can we, like, I want to bookmark that for a second and talk about it.

Is.

Is processing something, solving something?

No.

You know, is processing figuring it out?

And if not, what is it instead?

Yeah, there's this comedian who made fun of millennials one time, and I thought it was so funny because he was a millennial himself.

And so he said, millennials are so self aware.

They're so good at pointing out what diagnosis they have.

They know that DSM 5 like the back of their hand.

And they can say, I have this diagnosis.

But the problem with millennials is they don't do anything about it afterwards.

I have this diagnosis and work with that, you guys, instead of, okay, so I need to do something about it to help myself to move forward, to respond differently.

And so I think, yes, processing is the first half to understand what is going on, why you're responding in that way.

But the second half is doing something about it, changing your behavior.

And sometimes doing something about it is accepting.

You know, I think a lot of times we think if we're frustrated, if we're upset and I talk to someone about it, then that means they need to fix their behavior, they need to fix the situation.

And the reality is we can't control other people.

They may hear it, be super receptive and be willing to try to change, or they may not, and they may not be capable, or maybe changing is going to take a lot longer than we want or than we hope.

And so I think it's so important to acknowledge that when we talk about processing something, what we actually mean is moving through it.

And that means feeling uncomfortable.

It means allowing all the uncertainty that might exist that we don't want to be.

We don't want to be there.

We don't want to accept.

It's really about saying, okay, this is happening.

I have these fears and that's okay.

I'm gonna let them be there and I'm gonna work through that.

Meaning I'm gonna feel the discomfort and try to not do anything about it.

Now that feels so, like, mind blowing.

Right?

Well, how is processing feeling discomfort and doing nothing about it?

Right.

For most people, they would say, well, that's the opposite of processing, Liz.

You're asking me not to process it.

And what I would tell you is that's what I want you to take away from today, is that processing is actually about allowing space for discomfort.

More often than not, it's about allowing space for discomfort and choosing to let that be there.

Right.

Not necessarily doing something about it.

Sometimes there's something to do.

You need to make a decision.

Sometimes the discomfort and processing is just like, make that decision, get that done.

However many times, it's really just about, can I be uncomfortable, can I experience discomfort?

And can I choose to not do anything about it?

Yeah.

We've talked about this before, but I have an example.

And I was in a class in my education degree at some point and did not like this class.

Like, I think we've all been there at some point, we took a class that we did not like.

And everyone in my cohort would text about it and I would get so irritated, so elevated about these, this class because I would read these messages, listening to others getting elevated and irritated, and it wasn't helping, right?

I wasn't.

I feel like I was getting stuck in that emotion.

Whereas I want to be very clear, it's helpful to feel anger, it's helpful to feel those emotions.

It's not helpful to stay stuck in those emotions.

You want to move through them.

Right.

And so I had to mute the group thread.

And it was, it did wonders for me because there wasn't anything like I couldn't remove myself from the class.

I needed that credit.

Right.

Like, that wasn't an option.

And so I had to instead mute the conversation and work through this class on my own.

And my anxiety and frustration probably went down significantly just because I wasn't getting that extra elevation.

And that was the behavior change that I needed to do at that time.

It reminds me of the political anxiety episode that we did, right.

Where we talked a lot about how during political climates, this was obviously back right before the election, but even now, or in general, as Things go.

People get elevated, you get activated.

You hear things you don't like, you get frustrated.

And are you gonna spend all your day consuming news that activates you more?

Talking about it with people who might have differing opinions that activates you more?

Getting frustrated, you know, feeling really.

Or are you gonna say, okay, I'm frustrated.

I don't like this.

This is triggering me.

This is something I don't agree with, and here's what I'm gonna do about it.

And I'm not gonna do more than that, because that's gonna keep me stuck in it.

Right.

So there's ways to say, I mean, you guys, we've lived through Covid.

Right.

That was the perfect example of something where there was this scary thing, and we didn't know a lot about it.

We were terrified, and all of our safety behaviors and the way we responded looked different, and we had to make our own decisions.

Yet you saw individuals who became more preoccupied and stuck in the COVID pandemic than they needed to, and most of that was because of them not being able to process it and instead being stuck in it.

Right.

So they were getting so much information, too much information, not sure what to do with it, not sure how to move through it, and the anxiety became overwhelming.

That's because you were stuck in it.

You weren't actually productively processing it.

So, anyway, this was not the point of today's episode, but it has become.

But I think it is so important for you to really sit and get quiet and think about when you are triggered.

When you're struggling, are you processing productively or are you staying stuck?

Yeah.

Because honestly, like, life isn't worth staying stuck.

And those of you that are stuck, you know that.

That it.

Being stuck is being in a place where you're with your friends, you're at work, and you're still having this dreaded feeling of anxiety.

Right.

You're still ruminating and thinking about certain situations.

Instead, really spend time processing those.

And at the same time, we both want to acknowledge that, yes, processing is harder.

Like, we get that.

Of course, nobody wants to do that.

And it will allow you to have that weight off your shoulders that you deserve.

Yeah.

And if you're going to take action, I would.

If you don't really know how to move through something, if you're not sure, okay, I've processed this.

I understand this, But I still don't know how to move forward.

Then really think about who you're going to reach out to when it comes to seeking the advice.

I know Going to my therapist, she's going to keep me accountable.

I know.

Going to my best friends, they're going to hype me up and make me more angry.

That's probably not the most helpful move because they're just going to validate the anger, which, you know, is what some best friends do to try to have your back.

But that's not helpful for me to take action with that processing.

So I would just before seeking that advice, really think about who you're going to seek it from and make sure that it's someone that's going to challenge you to get out of your comfort zone, because that's where the best change.

Happens, a hundred percent.

So we should probably dive into a few of these questions.

And I'll take the first one that we had submitted, and it was, how would you describe the difference between EMDR and CBT treatment?

So go ahead.

Yeah, I guess I'll hop in.

So EMDR is a specific intervention that was developed really for ptsd.

And when you think about CBT as a whole, CBT cognitive Behavioral therapy is an umbrella of therapeutic approaches.

So there are many different CBT approaches or interventions that you can do for any mental health condition you might live with.

So, for example, under the CBT umbrella is like for.

For trauma, for example, there's three different ones.

There's emdr, there's cognitive processing therapy, and there's prolonged exposure for eating disorders.

There's specific CBT protocols that you follow for substance use disorders or specific protocols that you follow for ocd.

You do exposure and response prevention, which is a specific form of cbt for generalized anxiety and social phobias.

You do more of exposure therapy and general CBT work.

Cognitive distortion work.

Right.

So there's lots of thought challenging.

There's lots of different interventions under the CBT umbrella.

And EMDR is one of those.

Yeah, I'll just add.

I'm.

I'm laughing because I thought I was going to take that one, but I could see that that would be confusing.

Cause I was like, I'll take that question.

Um, so EMDR relies more on accessing and reprocessing of past memories.

During sessions, clients briefly recalled distressing memories while receiving bilateral stimulation.

Um, and so thinking more about, just like those past experiences.

And then cognitive behavioral therapy focuses more on structured, present moment, distorted thinking patterns.

So I'm really, like, amazed that you answered that so eloquently without that.

I just want to share specifics, you know, because I don't know, like, there's not enough context in that Question to know what individual is asking.

But EMDR is not an evidence based intervention except for trauma.

Right.

So if you know.

So really like CBT is an umbrella which a ton of interventions fall under.

But if you're living with ocd, you wouldn't be looking at emdr, you would be looking at the specific form of CBT called erp, where if you're living with trauma, you might think about emdr.

But again, it shouldn't be EMDR or cbt.

Yeah, it would actually be if you're living with ptsd, it would be emdr, cognitive processing therapy or prolonged exposure, which are all three CBT trauma based interventions.

And just to plug, there's an amazing trauma episode we did with Emily Williams, one of our clinicians here.

And we really walk through lots of this, the different current interventions and what it looks like to treat trauma.

Yeah, check it out.

It's a really good one.

Okay.

How do you differentiate between normal anxiety and clinical anxiety that requires treatment?

We get that question often and I think it's important we answer it often.

Yeah, my question is, my answer sorry is always pretty simple.

I have had so many people tell me they wish they would have sought treatment earlier.

And I've never had someone say, I wish we would have sought treatment later.

You know, so if you are wondering if you need treatment, if you have a diagnosis of an anxiety disord, you're not going to regret getting good treatment.

So don't wait, don't sit there and weigh out, is this significant enough that I should seek treatment or not?

If you're questioning if you should seek treatment, you probably should, right?

I always tell people, if you're questioning it, if it feels out of the norm, if it feels like you're feeling heavier, you have more anxiety, you're struggling with it than what you feel like you should be or your norm is, or someone else's norm is seek treatment.

If you are going to a good, qualified anxiety disorder specialist, we are going to help tell you if you need therapy or not.

We're going to tell you the frequency of it.

You know, we are not here to want your money.

We, we've got plenty of patients.

We're very busy.

You know, our job should be to say, okay, this is actually subclinical.

Here's some skills, but here's some things to look out for.

If it gets to this degree, consider seeking therapy.

Or we're going to say things like, okay, this is the type of therapy you'll benefit from.

And here's how often we think you should come.

And so I would really say leave it to the experts.

Think about it like a medical illness.

Right.

If you are experiencing symptoms that are out of the norm, you should seek medical advice.

And when you go to a doctor, they should be able to guide you to say, yes, this is something to worry about.

We should do more tasks.

Or you should do this sort of protocol or regimen or antibiotic, you know, whatever it might be.

Or, okay, like, we checked you out and this is fine.

Or it's a common cold and it's gonna pass.

Yes, you feel sick, but there's nothing to do about it.

There's lots of different ways people respond, and it should be similar for mental health.

Yeah.

So I have, you know, a lot of thoughts and questions that I know people ask, but one of the questions we get most frequently is how do you encourage a loved one to seek treatment if they are not really wanting to?

So maybe they're in denial.

Maybe the family members accommodate a lot and so they don't really feel like they need to seek treatment.

But how do you encourage someone you love when you know they're struggling to seek treatment?

Yeah, I think it's.

It really does depend on the role you have with that person.

Like, if you are the one accommodating, really helping them recognize, like, for.

For an adolescent or a teen.

One of my favorite ways to encourage them is to say, goodness.

What is it that you want to do in your future?

Like, what do you want to do going forward?

Is it that you want to be successful in college?

Is it that you want to have a highly successful career?

Okay, well, you're experiencing this anxiety now when school is half as hard.

Right.

And so is it really going to make sense for you to not get that treatment now so that you can accomplish those things in the future?

Really have them see that this is not in line with their values.

In whatever ways you can, if you're accommodating, the method, if they're completely treatment resistant, would be to work on decreasing those accommodations.

Right.

And you can do that in a therapeutic way.

There's a treatment modality called space, where the individual, the family system, is working on reducing accommodations with the therapist, having them kind of keep them accountable.

And so I think there's a lot of different approaches depending on that role that you play with the individual.

But my first and favorite way to promote some buy in is goodness.

This, like, not getting treatment seems like it's not really helping you achieve your goals and dreams for the future.

So I want to I agree, Totally agree.

And I want to hop into accommodations for a second just because a lot of our listeners might be like, well, how do I know if I'm accommodating?

What was that?

What would that look like?

So, Callie, I would love if I say something to you, but like, yes.

And my kid, you know when I tell them that they need to go to therapy or we need to do something about it, like, they don't listen.

They refuse to leave the room.

They're playing video games.

They don't care.

It doesn't matter what I say.

They're not willing to go to school because it makes them anxious.

They're not willing to go to therapy because they don't think it'll work.

I don't know what to do.

I can't drag my 16 year old out of the room.

Yeah.

So I would ask, well, what are you doing for them?

Because are they still eating?

Are they still getting what they need to do?

They still have their cell phone in their room.

And the answer is probably yes.

If they're not leaving their room, are you bringing their meals to them?

Right.

Are you accommodating by doing their laundry for them?

And I think that why would they Change free Wi Fi, right.

24 7?

Yeah.

Like, why would they change these behaviors if they're comfortable in their room?

Right.

No teenager would.

Because I think we know that they would want life to be easy.

And if it's easy in that way, they're not going to change those things.

And so really asking yourself, is there something that I need to let go of that would really have them self reflect of, gosh, I really do want my laundry done.

I don't want to wear these clothes to school again if I are like, I know that I love my phone and so I need to get out if my parents are going to turn the WI fi off if I'm only in my room.

Right.

That gets them to start thinking about some of these behavior changes that they can make.

And I think the biggest challenge for parents is recognizing most teenagers wouldn't change a behavior if they got what they wanted in that really comfortable space.

Right.

Like, we need to help them see that they can move through that space by facing certain challenges and achieving them.

That builds resilience and motivation to accomplish things in the future.

100%.

And I think it's so important to recognize at the same time how hard it is, especially as a parent.

I think sometimes parents hear us saying, like, this is your fault or, you know, you're failing your kid.

And that's not what we're saying.

What we're actually saying is, of course you've been doing these things like you're a parent who loves your kid and you don't want to see them distressed or uncomfortable.

However, when we create opportunities where individuals don't ever have to feel discomfort and we know that that opportunity is starting to be a disservice for them, is usually always because people can never go through life not feeling any discomfort and that be good for them.

We do have to change our behavior.

And so what I want to say is that if you're a parent listening and you're saying, you know, hey, I kind of know that's me.

Like I know I probably need to do some things different and I don't think I can do that.

I don't think I can make that change.

I just want to validate that that is okay.

And you should seek some work for your, some support for yourself.

Right.

In the sense that there are clinicians that we will work with, you will help you be.

Because a lot of this might be, hey, this is my own anxiety that I don't think I can allow my kid to experience this level of distress or have to feel this way.

And that is okay.

That's normal human behavior.

And we need to help you work through that.

And so we want to be able to give you some tools on how to address your own anxiety, how to work through that so that you can best support your loved one.

Yeah.

What about if it's the spouse or partner that you are accommodating?

How?

Same thing.

You know, I think it's, it's obviously can sometimes be harder if it's an adult and sometimes it's easier because you feel a little bit less, maybe, I don't know if the word would be a requirement, but you feel a little bit less responsible for managing their day to day life as you would for your own child.

Right.

When it's a functioning or a potentially functional adult, however, it's very similar.

You know, are you enabling the behavior?

Are you condoning the behavior or are you making it uncomfortable for the behavior to continue?

And when we say uncomfortable, we don't mean in a cruel way.

Right.

We're not saying that you're being really rude or you're saying demeaning comments or you're, you know, tantalizing the person.

Like that is not what we're talking about.

But what we're saying is if you're enabling, right?

If somebody you love is struggling with, let's just say contamination, ocd, and they struggle to make meals.

So you prepare every meal and you do it for them so they never have to do it.

You're not actually helping them.

Right.

If your loved one has social anxiety and so you're isolating with them and you're never leaving the house, and you're never encouraging them to leave the house because you don't want them to be uncomfortable, you're not actually helping them.

If your child is anxious about going to school and so you're just homeschooling them and you're letting them withdraw from school and not have to experience anxiety, you're also not helping them.

Right.

This isn't relatable when they get a job one day in the real world.

This isn't relatable when your loved one has to cook a meal.

Because you travel like you, things happen that we need you to be able to have flexibility and the people you love to have the same.

And you have to help help them achieve that.

Really?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And there's, you know, this question.

Sometimes parents will say, well, yeah, I'm anxious, but I just, like, know how to tolerate it.

Like, I can.

I can tolerate it.

It's fine.

I don't need to do anything about it.

Like, everyone is functioning.

And I think the question I would ask you is, but don't.

Do you think that your own anxiety might negatively impact your child's emotional development?

Yeah.

Right.

100%.

Right.

And we know that.

We know that if, you know, anxious parents have anxious children.

Children see everything their parents do, you know, from when it.

If.

If a kid yells a lot, what do you think they're hearing in their household?

A lot.

Right.

If a kid cusses a lot, where do you think they're picking up on that?

Right.

It isn't their own dreams and imagination.

Right.

Kids are models of their parents.

They are reflections of what they see in their own environments and in their own life.

And so anxiety is actually no different.

You know, sure, a diagnosed mental health condition is not quote, unquote contagious of, like, if I see you doing OCD behaviors, I'm going to have ocd.

However, if I notice you're anxious and this is how you respond anxiety, you don't tolerate it.

I am probably, as a child going to respond the same way.

And part of that is learned.

I watch you not tolerate anxiety.

It teaches me that I should never have to feel anxious.

Also, you're probably sending me those messages because every time I'm anxious as a kid, if you're enabling me, if you're fixing it, if you're not letting me feel uncomfortable, I'm going to continue to hear and believe that message.

That anxiety is not something I should ever have to feel or experience.

Have you heard of the show Black Mirror?

It's like a pretty dark show.

I don't think you'd like it.

Okay, well, then, no, I have not heard of it.

It was really popular, like, five to seven years ago.

And there was this episode that, like, stuck with me for.

It's all about things that could happen in the future that could, like, real realistic things that could happen in the future that would, like, really affect society as a whole mentally and physically.

And there was this episode of a mother and a daughter.

And the daughter, the mom was able to, like, put some kind of filter on the daughter's eyes so that when something stressful showed up in her life, it would be blurry so she wouldn't actually see it.

So, like, for example, she would walk by a fence and a dog would be barking.

And like, the first time that happened, she got scared and the mom got a notification on her phone.

So she made blurry so she, like, couldn't see the dog barking, wouldn't get distressed anymore.

When the daughter turns 18, the distressor, like, the weight, ability to blur, it's like, illegal for that to happen.

Or she finds a way to, like, turn it off.

And so then what do you think happens?

Oh, my gosh.

She walks through this world in a state of panic.

Terrifying.

Or she can't even function at all.

Or go out in the world because she has no tolerance for this distress.

Yeah, we need that.

I need that episode.

We should play that at the clinic to teach everybody.

Well, the ending is a little too dark, probably.

Maybe not, but just act hard.

Just know that really bad things happen.

Just that scenario would be.

Yeah, but isn't that wild that, like, seven years ago.

I feel like we've come such a long way in mental health.

But, like, that was an answer that we should have been utilizing in talks, like, this way.

But just recognizing, right, that, like, you can totally understand why a parent who loves their kid would love the child to not have to feel anxious to.

See the difficult things.

I don't want to see hard things.

I don't want to be anxious.

I don't want to be activated.

Like, man, how cool that would feel.

Or how great that you think that would be.

If you could protect someone you love from having to feel discomfort, that would be awesome.

No, until you can't it is not awesome.

It is not good.

And I get it.

So, Grace, I feel like my heart has been kind of heavy the past two weeks just because Grace has.

Every time she gets home from school, I'll say, what'd you do at school today?

And she's like, oh, nothing.

And I'm like, oh, who'd you play with?

She's like, I didn't play with anyone.

And it's made me so sad.

Like, you know, as a parent, I'm just like, what do you mean?

And so I'll ask her, and Olivia will be like, no, she sits by herself at recess, like, unless I play with her.

And it just breaks your mom heart, right?

And what do you want to do?

Like, as a parent, of course, you want to, like, call the school and run to rescue her and figure it out and, like, fix it yet.

That wouldn't be helping Grace.

Now.

Could I still do some things to try to help her?

Of course.

So, like, what am I trying to do?

I'm trying to organize, like, play dates with kids in her class and things that she could build, be able to build those relationships.

She's in a new class.

She moved up in January.

I've had them miss, like, three weeks because of the newborn.

So there was a lot going on, you know, and so I can certainly try to cultivate opportunities for her to build relationships.

But I know that if I called the school and said, hey, I want you to make these relationships work, that actually wouldn't really help Grace, right?

Because I wouldn't really be teaching her.

Okay, now you're in a new class.

I know you had a lot of old friends and you missed them from your old class.

We have to make new friends.

And here's how you can do it.

Now, again, I can provide some support, right?

I can cultivate more opportunities for her to have that experience, but I can't do it for her.

And I want to.

Trust me, Like, I hate it, right?

I want to do it for her.

I want Olivia, someone to do it for her.

Like, it's not fun.

And you know, that that wouldn't be helpful, you know, and it.

It's going to take longer, and it's going to be harder for her.

And she's probably going to say things like she already says, which is, I'm okay by myself.

And I'm like, but you're not.

You can't play by yourself.

You know, but you could.

But it's.

Right, it's stuff.

And I think that there is.

It makes.

I Just want to validate.

Like, of course no one wants to watch someone they love.

Yeah.

Be uncomfortable or, you know, you want to fix these hard situations for them and you actually have to just move through it with them together.

Right.

And you think about, understand it.

The benefit of Grace having that first friend that she made on her own, how proud of herself she's going to be, totally confidence that she'll have a.

New friend and what it's going to feel like for her and how.

Exactly.

Exactly.

And I would take that away from her.

You know, that's the other thing is if I do it for her, her, I actually take away that experience and that opportunity for her to feel really good about it.

Yeah.

So the last question I have, and I think we'll kind of wrap up for today, is, is.

Is about treatment and mental health treatment and treatment in general.

When somebody goes through treatment and they feel like treatment was a success for them, should they expect that they will never need therapy again in their life?

Should they expect that they'll always need therapy?

Like.

Like what makes therapy successful?

You know, what does that look like?

Like, how does somebody.

Because, I mean, we share openly, you and I both still go to therapy.

It may not be the consistency or frequency it used to, or it needed to be at one point in time, yet we still rely on it and we're clinicians.

So what should people expect?

Yeah.

I think that when they first go to therapy, they're wanting to see a reduction of symptoms.

Right.

Like the ability to function again in everyday life.

The ability to not live in fear of whatever symptom they were experiencing, anxiety, depression, anger, frustration, trauma, whatever that is.

And if you are back to full functioning and you feel like you're able to engage happily and embrace life, then you might be at a good place.

Right.

Like, I think the goal is to be able to do the things that you were once able to do that maybe the anxiety or the symptom took away and one you can do that again and you feel like you've maintained that progress.

Maybe it's that you are independently working on some of this for a while.

I think for me, the first indicator that, you know, it would be good for me to have a session is I love accountability.

I love for somebody to ask me, hey, Callie, did you do your homework or did you have that hard conversation?

That's a big one for me because I'd way rather not have the hard conversations or way rather not have to set the boundaries.

And if I know that not setting boundaries have.

Has been negatively impacting my life for a while or I know that I've been feeling really anxious for a while and I've been stuck in that and I haven't made a change.

Then I need that accountability to get me to make that change.

It's not that I don't necessarily know how to do it or what to do, but I think knowing that someone's gonna check in with me will get me to get my work done.

I love that and I love the analogy at the beginning where you were like the main point early on is a big reduction in symptoms, right?

And that is the main point of therapy.

And I always tell a lot of my patients once that happens, you don't necessarily need therapy moving forward.

Right?

I don't need to still go to therapy, as you probably don't either.

Yet now it.

I feel like one thing therapy has done for me when you really do the work is it gives you such a heightened indifference, sense or ability, whatever you want to call it, of self awareness.

Like I am so much more self aware of myself, my emotions, my mental health and even the way I process it.

Like yesterday I was really upset about a family situation and some like comments and feeling like I disappointed someone I love even though I knew I didn't like do anything wrong.

And it's really more of like what they're like their own stuff right now.

And my go to is like, I just want to fix it and I want to hurry up and fix it because I don't want to feel uncomfortable about it.

I have not fixed it yet and I'm still figuring out what I'm going to do.

Like I'm still going to respond somehow.

I just don't know what that response will look like.

But I think that for me I'm in such a different place around my anxiety and the way.

But I'm self aware enough now to be like, okay, here's where I can recognize I might have still done something not perfect, right?

I don't think I did something wrong.

But like there is something that I can still say, hey, I can improve on this.

Like, okay, here's.

I understand why this upset them.

Like I understand that and I think the response is unwarranted and like, how can I, how can I not provide this like urgent response that validates their response, if that makes sense.

You know, it's being able to balance both.

That is only possible because of the work that I've done, right?

Because I'm at a place where my anxiety doesn't drive my responses anymore.

I'm able to tolerate distress around upsetting someone or feeling discomfort and move through it in a much, much healthier way and also understand it.

Like, I can see very clearly, okay, I've done my work, which is why I'm able to respond this way.

Maybe they haven't done all their work or maybe there's work for them to do and that's okay.

Yet I need to be able to acknowledge that instead of trying to rescue or fix it.

Right.

Right.

Your ability now to see both sides right like that something that, like, I almost feel like sometimes when I talk to people that have the ability to see both sides, I want to tell them, you've done some therapy and you can tell.

Right.

Like, I have.

One of my good friends has done.

Done such a great job in therapy, and I love having conversations with her because every time we do, the way she describes other people and their struggles, you're like, oh, I.

Like, I can see how healthy you are around this perspective.

Even if it's hard, it's inspiring.

It's inspiring, you know, and that's the.

Like, I don't know.

The takeaway from today is I want us to recognize that when you do your work, you will still experience hard things.

You will still have challenges, you will still have anxiety, yet your perspective on it and your ability to move through it will feel so different than it once was.

And that's the power of both therapy and learning how to sit with move through distress.

But the motto for today is how to process productively.

And if we can get you to that spot, man, it's gonna feel so different, so true.

This is the Anxiety Society.

We live it.

We contribute to it.

Together, we can change it.

Thank you for joining us today on the Anxiety Society podcast, where we hope you gained insights into the world of anxiety that you didn't know you needed.

To stay connected and access additional resources, visit our website@anxietysocietypodcast.com and follow us on Instagram at the Anxietysocietypod.

There you can explore more content, submit your questions for the show, and connect with our growing community.

Don't forget to subscribe to our podcast on your favorite platform so you never miss an episode.

And if you enjoyed what you heard, please consider leaving us a review.

Your feedback helps us improve and reach others that might benefit from hearing our message.

And there's one thing that I need from you.

Can you come through.