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Finding Our Voice with Erin Valente, LMFT · The Trauma Therapist

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Trauma Therapist Podcast. My name is Gimick person.
0:04
Speaker 1: I interview incredible people who've dedicated their lives to helping
0:07
Speaker 1: those who've been impacted by trauma. A big thank you
0:11
Speaker 1: to our sponsors and our guests who are supporting this show.
0:14
Speaker 1: All right, so five four, three, two and one, our folks,
0:19
Speaker 1: welcome back to the podcast. Very excited to have us
0:22
Speaker 1: my guests. Erin Valente Erin welcome.
0:25
Speaker 2: Thank you, It's so nice to see you.
0:27
Speaker 1: Awesome. Erin is a licensed marriage and family therapist based
0:31
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles who works with adults, couples, and families
0:34
Speaker 1: seeking healing and connection. She specializes in Trauma informed therapy,
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Speaker 1: EMDR Semitic awareness, and Kenemine assistant psychotherapy. Blending evidence based
0:43
Speaker 1: methods with sensitivity to the human experience. Erin helps clients
0:48
Speaker 1: reconnect with their inner voice, process past wounds, and build
0:51
Speaker 1: meaningful relationships while offering both in person and virtual sessions.
0:56
Speaker 1: All right, Erin, just a bit about you before we
0:58
Speaker 1: can go and share with our listeners where you're from
1:00
Speaker 1: originally and where you are currently.
1:02
Speaker 3: Yea from Topanga, California. I'm still here, I've I grew
1:07
Speaker 3: up here and came back after many years, and it's
1:12
Speaker 3: really beautiful.
1:14
Speaker 1: Topanga as in Topanga Canyon. Yeah, yeah, amazing. Yeah, you're
1:21
Speaker 1: from there, that's where you like, that's amazing, that's beautiful there.
1:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, born and raised.
1:26
Speaker 1: All right, So let's get going here. Let's start where
1:30
Speaker 1: I love to start, which is at the beginning. How
1:32
Speaker 1: the heck did you get into this field and this
1:35
Speaker 1: interest in this passion? How did it start?
1:37
Speaker 2: Yeah? I was thinking about that this morning.
1:39
Speaker 3: And I have always been fascinated by the human experience,
1:45
Speaker 3: where two people could have the same exact experience but
1:49
Speaker 3: process it in a completely different way. So even starting
1:53
Speaker 3: as a little girl, I would just you know, I would.
1:56
Speaker 3: I was a voracious reader, and really, when you think
1:59
Speaker 3: about books, it's all about human experience. It's about the
2:03
Speaker 3: experience of the person. And I think I've always been
2:05
Speaker 3: fascinated that, like there is no answer to any of it.
2:11
Speaker 3: So that's where like the interest has always come. And
2:15
Speaker 3: really getting into the field, it was it was really
2:17
Speaker 3: the only thing that I wanted to do. The idea
2:19
Speaker 3: of being able to sit across from people and hear
2:22
Speaker 3: their story and be paid for that.
2:25
Speaker 2: I was like, this is amazing. I'll do that. Yes, please?
2:30
Speaker 1: So you what, you go graduate high school, you say,
2:35
Speaker 1: I'm going to do what?
2:37
Speaker 3: So I actually had my babies really young, and so
2:41
Speaker 3: after I had my son, I you know, I wanted
2:45
Speaker 3: to have a purpose outside of him, and so if
2:49
Speaker 3: it was going to be if anything was going to
2:51
Speaker 3: take me away from him, it had to be something
2:53
Speaker 3: that really mattered and something I was really passionate about.
2:56
Speaker 3: So I started going to school when my little ones
3:00
Speaker 3: were very small, and I would go at night when
3:02
Speaker 3: they were sleeping, and by the time they were in
3:08
Speaker 3: preschool then I was able to start doing my hour.
3:10
Speaker 3: So it took me longer because I was trying to
3:12
Speaker 3: do it while I was taking care of three little ones.
3:17
Speaker 2: But I did it and I got to the other side.
3:20
Speaker 1: And when you when you did it, what did you
3:22
Speaker 1: did you say? I want to be a therapist. I
3:24
Speaker 1: wanted to do what? Was there a particular focus that
3:28
Speaker 1: you had?
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Speaker 3: Yeah, I always knew I wanted to be a therapist.
3:32
Speaker 3: I was very clear and picking like my program that
3:35
Speaker 3: I wanted something that was going to have training in therapy.
3:38
Speaker 3: And there's actually kind of only one program in Los
3:40
Speaker 3: Angeles that has that that focus. And then I started
3:45
Speaker 3: working at a counseling center and their focus was trauma.
3:50
Speaker 3: And the reason I chose the center is because they
3:52
Speaker 3: had really great supervision and that was something that I
3:54
Speaker 3: knew that I really wanted. And I would say ninety
3:58
Speaker 3: eight percent of the clients had trauma. And when I
4:02
Speaker 3: started to really understand how trauma works on the brain
4:05
Speaker 3: and how to get to it, I was really hooked.
4:10
Speaker 3: And so that was the modality that I went into.
4:14
Speaker 1: When you started working sitting with people who'd experienced trauma,
4:19
Speaker 1: obviously that could walk into the room in many ways,
4:23
Speaker 1: look many different look like many different presentations. What was
4:29
Speaker 1: that like for you?
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Speaker 3: Yeah, when I first started, I could feel so the
4:36
Speaker 3: center that I was at, there's like a nine month waitlist,
4:40
Speaker 3: so by the time they come and sit with you,
4:42
Speaker 3: they've been waiting. And the desire to really feel better
4:48
Speaker 3: was there right Like, no matter what I would have
4:50
Speaker 3: said to them, they would have done it if it
4:52
Speaker 3: meant that they would feel better.
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Speaker 2: And when I was working with trauma, what it.
4:55
Speaker 3: Always felt like, it felt like there was always this
4:58
Speaker 3: wall between me and the client, and it always felt
5:02
Speaker 3: like they're like reaching around trying to grab me.
5:05
Speaker 2: But this wall was just too big.
5:07
Speaker 3: And so when I was learning about how to treat
5:11
Speaker 3: trauma and really that like talk therapy has its limitations.
5:15
Speaker 3: And when I started to understand how EMDR worked and
5:17
Speaker 3: psychedelic assisted therapy worked and somatic work worked, the wall
5:24
Speaker 3: would go down.
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Speaker 1: And what was what it was that wall?
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Speaker 3: It's the it's really the brain going like this is
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Speaker 3: not safe, right, Like as much as you can create
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Speaker 3: a safe space with the relationship that this is not safe,
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Speaker 3: wall is strong and sturdy. And what these different modalities
5:47
Speaker 3: have taught me is like creating the safety in the
5:50
Speaker 3: body first, calming the brain down, getting the those those
5:54
Speaker 3: circuits to calm before we get into the processing. And
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Speaker 3: so that's what the trauma THA has really taught me.
6:02
Speaker 1: That's interesting. So you're sitting with these people. Were these clients,
6:08
Speaker 1: these individuals who came to you. Was there a specific
6:13
Speaker 1: type of trauma or was it just trauma across the board.
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Speaker 3: At this center, it was majority big T trauma. So
6:22
Speaker 3: it was sexual abuse, physical abuse, being in life threatening
6:26
Speaker 3: situations day and day out.
6:30
Speaker 2: So those were definitely big T traumas.
6:32
Speaker 3: What I've realized is I've moved into private practice where
6:35
Speaker 3: there are little tea traumas. Now I really see trauma
6:38
Speaker 3: as something that has shifted you or how you see
6:42
Speaker 3: the world. It all shows up in the exact same way.
6:46
Speaker 3: So whether it's a big t trauma or a little tea,
6:50
Speaker 3: it presents exactly the same way.
6:53
Speaker 1: When you started encountering people who'd experience interpersonal trauma, let's say,
7:03
Speaker 1: what were you experiencing yourself? What was that like for you?
7:07
Speaker 1: Cause I know just from my own experience, and everyone's different,
7:10
Speaker 1: of course, but there was this desire, this pull to
7:15
Speaker 1: work with people who'd experienced trauma. But at the same time,
7:19
Speaker 1: and I'm talking when I was starting out, at the
7:21
Speaker 1: same time, I was like, oh my god, this is
7:26
Speaker 1: so intense. You know. I the knowledge isn't there, the
7:30
Speaker 1: experience isn't there, But the kind of the want to
7:34
Speaker 1: quote unquote help will be there was there. But what
7:38
Speaker 1: was your experience?
7:39
Speaker 3: Like, Yeah, people asked me that a lot, and I
7:42
Speaker 3: related to right, Like, there's like er doctors where when
7:45
Speaker 3: I think about what they do.
7:46
Speaker 2: I'm like, how do you do that?
7:47
Speaker 3: Doesn't that just like and they can And when it
7:51
Speaker 3: comes to trauma, I feel the same way.
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Speaker 2: It doesn't affect me in that way. Really, it's like
7:57
Speaker 2: this deep curiosity to understand.
7:59
Speaker 3: I think I've always struggled with the idea that there
8:04
Speaker 3: are bad people in this world, right, like doing serious
8:08
Speaker 3: harm to others, And so I think my curiosity of
8:11
Speaker 3: understanding why bad things happen.
8:14
Speaker 2: To people or.
8:16
Speaker 3: What creates this feeling of bad so to me, I
8:19
Speaker 3: just actually get into like a really deep curiosity of
8:22
Speaker 3: like what happened how I usually don't say what happened
8:26
Speaker 3: when it comes to trauma, but it's.
8:27
Speaker 2: Just a deep curiosity of the experience.
8:29
Speaker 3: Because the other thing is is that it seems to
8:32
Speaker 3: happen to a lot of people, right, It's not. It's
8:37
Speaker 3: not a small group of people. And so the more
8:41
Speaker 3: I dive into it, of just it's more of this
8:43
Speaker 3: like understanding. I want to know, I want to understand,
8:46
Speaker 3: and I want to understand why did it affect you
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Speaker 3: this way when I've seen it affect someone a totally
8:52
Speaker 3: different way. So I think the curiosity sort of blocks
8:58
Speaker 3: the or the pain for me.
9:03
Speaker 1: So, all right, you worked in this facility in LA.
9:10
Speaker 1: How long did you spend there? Yeah?
9:13
Speaker 3: I was there for three years, so I think it
9:16
Speaker 3: takes about two years. But because I had three small children.
9:18
Speaker 3: It took me a little bit longer to finish those hours.
9:22
Speaker 3: So I was there for three years before I transitioned
9:24
Speaker 3: into private practice.
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Speaker 1: But sounds like an incredible experience.
9:27
Speaker 2: It was great.
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Speaker 3: People say, you know, complain about how many hours we
9:33
Speaker 3: have to do, but I actually think it's the perfect
9:35
Speaker 3: amount of time because you have every situation that could
9:39
Speaker 3: possibly come up come up in those three years, and
9:43
Speaker 3: you have supervision, right, you have someone to consult with
9:47
Speaker 3: and talk with. And I think that's what makes really
9:50
Speaker 3: good clinicians.
9:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree. And sometimes when you're starting out, you
9:55
Speaker 1: don't realize that, right you Maybe you just want to
9:57
Speaker 1: get out of there and do your own thing, not
10:00
Speaker 1: really knowing what that is. But all right, so you
10:03
Speaker 1: start start private practice, what do you think? What are
10:06
Speaker 1: you thinking when you're going to start this private practice
10:08
Speaker 1: you're going to Is there a thought, Okay, I'm gonna
10:11
Speaker 1: this is gonna be my target audience, I'm gonna work
10:13
Speaker 1: with these people or what.
10:15
Speaker 3: I've never loved the target audience thing because it's so
10:18
Speaker 3: hard to niche down people. Sure, right, it's like, oh,
10:24
Speaker 3: I only work with anxiety, I only work with depression.
10:27
Speaker 2: I don't even know how.
10:28
Speaker 3: You would split those things up. So I've always been
10:32
Speaker 3: really intuitive the way I work. It's it's it's I
10:35
Speaker 3: feel like my people come to me. The people who
10:39
Speaker 3: are meant to be with me end up with me,
10:41
Speaker 3: and the people who don't don't.
10:45
Speaker 2: But it really it always.
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Speaker 3: Ends up being people wanting to find their voice, people
10:51
Speaker 3: wanting to find their center, people who don't want to
10:55
Speaker 3: be depending on a therapist for a really long time.
10:58
Speaker 3: I always tell people, you know, we're looking at like
11:01
Speaker 3: my hope is like a two year relationship. Some people stay,
11:06
Speaker 3: stay longer, some people a little bit shorter. But it's
11:09
Speaker 3: the purpose of the work that we're doing is that
11:11
Speaker 3: you find your voice. I'm just kind of the person
11:14
Speaker 3: who goes like, I don't know, let's try this, let's
11:17
Speaker 3: try that, let's try that. Does that feel right?
11:19
Speaker 1: Does that?
11:19
Speaker 2: How do you know what feels right? So that's really
11:22
Speaker 2: how I see it.
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Speaker 1: I love that. It's such a great kind of goal
11:27
Speaker 1: if you will or purpose to find one's voice. And
11:33
Speaker 1: as we many of us know, that ain't easy. How
11:37
Speaker 1: do you how do you go about that? And again
11:42
Speaker 1: it's just different for everybody, but we're just talking here.
11:45
Speaker 1: How do you go about that. When someone walks in.
11:49
Speaker 2: I always start with what isn't your voice?
11:54
Speaker 3: So most of the time people are coming in with
11:58
Speaker 3: like debilitating anxiety or depression or PTSD, and these things
12:02
Speaker 3: are really like leading their entire life. It's leading their
12:05
Speaker 3: decision making, it's leading how they connect with themselves and others.
12:09
Speaker 3: And so I always start with what is not your voice?
12:14
Speaker 3: And I do kind of this practice of depersonalization of
12:17
Speaker 3: that voice of like, okay, so that voice is that
12:20
Speaker 3: a nice?
12:20
Speaker 2: Is the voice nice? Is it kind?
12:23
Speaker 1: Is it big?
12:25
Speaker 2: Is it overpowering? Is it me right?
12:27
Speaker 1: Like?
12:27
Speaker 3: And so we actually sort of create that voice into
12:30
Speaker 3: a character. And I notice that when we can separate
12:34
Speaker 3: the voice out from them, it doesn't hold as much power.
12:37
Speaker 2: And so the more that we can get that.
12:39
Speaker 3: Voice away from them, the more that they can start
12:43
Speaker 3: to hear their own.
12:45
Speaker 2: And so that's really how I begin.
12:47
Speaker 3: And then finding your voice becomes like, okay, so what
12:52
Speaker 3: is a yes for you?
12:54
Speaker 2: What's important to you?
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Speaker 3: Usually, like if you ask someone like, well, what's really
12:58
Speaker 3: important to you, it'll come quickly.
13:02
Speaker 2: They can tell you pretty quickly.
13:04
Speaker 3: They might like backpedal on it, right if the depression
13:07
Speaker 3: or anxiety comes in, but they're pretty clear on what's
13:10
Speaker 3: really important to them. And then it's going, well, what
13:13
Speaker 3: actions and thoughts and behaviors are leading you in that direction,
13:19
Speaker 3: and where are you going in the opposite direction?
13:22
Speaker 2: And why?
13:23
Speaker 3: So that's kind of the framework of how I get
13:26
Speaker 3: people back to their voice.
13:28
Speaker 1: Why is it? Then, listening to you say that it's
13:33
Speaker 1: very simple. I mean it is that. That's simple what
13:37
Speaker 1: you just said. Why is it so hard for all
13:40
Speaker 1: of us? For many of us?
13:42
Speaker 3: Yeah, I you know, it always goes back to the
13:44
Speaker 3: nervous system.
13:46
Speaker 2: I say.
13:48
Speaker 3: You know, human beings are are like our brain and
13:54
Speaker 3: our body is built to like not die, right. Our
13:57
Speaker 3: brain is constantly telling us of ways, like how to die.
14:00
Speaker 3: But the thing is is that most of the time
14:02
Speaker 3: we're not under attack. I mean ninety nine point nine
14:06
Speaker 3: percent of the time we're not under attack, and so
14:10
Speaker 3: the nervous.
14:10
Speaker 2: System just pulls us so fast and so quickly.
14:15
Speaker 3: That that's why it's hard, right, Like I feel like,
14:18
Speaker 3: you know, the soul's experience is going, Oh, I want
14:21
Speaker 3: to I want to try everything, I want to feel everything.
14:23
Speaker 3: There's no fear, there's no there's no doubt, there's just
14:26
Speaker 3: experiences but the human body is like that is bad,
14:31
Speaker 3: that is good, that is dangerous, that is safe, right,
14:34
Speaker 3: and and that isn't really what life is. But when
14:39
Speaker 3: we're led from that place, it gets really confusing and
14:44
Speaker 3: hard and painful. And that's why it's so hard, because like,
14:49
Speaker 3: we're not we're not wired correctly.
14:53
Speaker 1: How did you get here? Erin? I mean we could
14:58
Speaker 1: be right now, we could be talking about trauma per
15:01
Speaker 1: se trauma specifically, or EMDR, but we're talking about helping
15:06
Speaker 1: people find their voice, which is really amazing to me.
15:10
Speaker 1: I love this topic. But what got you to that point?
15:17
Speaker 3: Probably the way everybody gets to this point, right, is
15:20
Speaker 3: where you lose your own voice and then you find
15:23
Speaker 3: it and then something else happens where you lose it again,
15:26
Speaker 3: and then you find it again, and then the voice
15:29
Speaker 3: is shifted a little bit. And so you know, I
15:33
Speaker 3: never present myself to my clients. Is that like I
15:36
Speaker 3: have all the answers or I am making all the
15:39
Speaker 3: right decisions. I'm like no, no, I am a human being
15:41
Speaker 3: in the trenches here with you.
15:43
Speaker 1: Right, Well, how did you how did you end up
15:45
Speaker 1: losing your voice?
15:47
Speaker 2: Yeah? I mean where do you start? Right? Like in childhood?
15:51
Speaker 3: I grew up in a very violent household, and I remember.
15:56
Speaker 2: As a small child just being being like I don't understand,
16:00
Speaker 2: like why are these adults acting so badly?
16:03
Speaker 1: I don't get it right, like that are we talking
16:06
Speaker 1: like physical violence or verbal both? Everything? Okay?
16:10
Speaker 2: Yeah?
16:11
Speaker 3: And to me as a child, it always seems so
16:13
Speaker 3: matter of fact, like you don't do that, or you
16:18
Speaker 3: or leave right, Like it always seems so simple, and
16:20
Speaker 3: so a lot of it was understanding again like it's complicated,
16:26
Speaker 3: you know, it's very complicated.
16:28
Speaker 2: And so I think also knowing like.
16:30
Speaker 3: When these big things had happened to me, how it
16:36
Speaker 3: started to affect how I saw the world and how
16:39
Speaker 3: I was acting in the world, and how it was
16:41
Speaker 3: coming from a place of protection and fear, and so
16:44
Speaker 3: having to really like dismantle that, right, Like when you
16:47
Speaker 3: show up in these ways, you see like there's like
16:49
Speaker 3: issues in relationships or issues how you're showing up. And
16:54
Speaker 3: so that's always led me, right, It's I can always
16:58
Speaker 3: feel in my body when I'm not aligned with myself.
17:03
Speaker 2: Do I listen right away?
17:05
Speaker 3: No?
17:05
Speaker 2: No, I don't. Usually it takes time.
17:09
Speaker 1: That early experience you just described, I mean sounds for
17:15
Speaker 1: lack of a better word, just very intense, very kind
17:23
Speaker 1: of paradigm forming in a sense, right, this is you
17:29
Speaker 1: said it? Kind of you knew nothing else this It
17:32
Speaker 1: was very matter of fact. I think you said, yeah,
17:37
Speaker 1: what does that translate to? When you're thirteen fourteen, fifteen sixteen?
17:43
Speaker 1: How does that impact you? How are you showing up?
17:47
Speaker 3: I think what it did to me is it made
17:50
Speaker 3: me think again that there's like a right answer and
17:55
Speaker 3: a wrong answer. And as a teenager, it was like,
18:00
Speaker 3: if you're doing the wrong thing, then I don't want
18:03
Speaker 3: to have.
18:03
Speaker 2: Anything to do with you.
18:05
Speaker 1: Because why Because.
18:07
Speaker 3: I think as a child, I was like, it was
18:09
Speaker 3: my father who was violent, and to me, I was
18:11
Speaker 3: like with my mother, well why don't you leave? I
18:15
Speaker 3: just it was something that I couldn't understand. It's interesting
18:18
Speaker 3: how what ended up happening was how I started in
18:22
Speaker 3: the field was actually I worked in a domestic violence
18:24
Speaker 3: shelter and they put you through a very deep dive
18:28
Speaker 3: training really of like understanding why people don't leave. And
18:35
Speaker 3: it's interesting because I always feel like anything i've ever
18:38
Speaker 3: sort of like judged or thought there was a right answer,
18:41
Speaker 3: somehow it always leads me back to a place of
18:44
Speaker 3: like deep understanding later, right, how I ended up in
18:50
Speaker 3: a dB shelter with women where I thought there was
18:58
Speaker 3: a very clear answer and it actually made me get
19:01
Speaker 3: into like a deeper understanding.
19:03
Speaker 2: It allowed me to understand my mother. But it took,
19:06
Speaker 2: you know, twenty years.
19:10
Speaker 1: Let me just remind everyone speaking with erin Valente, we're
19:13
Speaker 1: talking about finding purpose, finding one's voice specifically. All right,
19:21
Speaker 1: so here we are, you have private practice. At what
19:27
Speaker 1: point did you find EMDR and somatics.
19:33
Speaker 3: Yeah, when I was in the when I was in
19:36
Speaker 3: the center. So when I was at the center, they
19:40
Speaker 3: gave you EMDR training at the end of Wow, which
19:43
Speaker 3: was great, which was another reason why I chose that center.
19:47
Speaker 3: So that's how I discovered EMDR. And then when I
19:50
Speaker 3: as I would go again, like with all these modalities,
19:53
Speaker 3: sometimes it resonates with people and sometimes it doesn't. And
19:56
Speaker 3: that was also when I anytime I hit a roadblock,
19:59
Speaker 3: I'm like, what is it that I don't know? Like
20:03
Speaker 3: I don't usually accept roadblocks very well. I'm always like,
20:06
Speaker 3: there's there's got to be a way around it. And
20:10
Speaker 3: that's what led me to psychedelic assisted therapy because once
20:13
Speaker 3: I understood how psychedelics worked on the brain. I'm like, oh,
20:17
Speaker 3: there's like a button that sort of like brings the
20:20
Speaker 3: wall down. And again not for everybody, but it's it's
20:26
Speaker 3: another tool.
20:27
Speaker 1: Where did you study that I did it.
20:31
Speaker 2: I let's see if I can remember.
20:32
Speaker 3: It's Integrative Psychiatry Institute.
20:36
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, what I.
20:38
Speaker 3: You know, I started it maybe like five years ago.
20:42
Speaker 3: And again, like, psychedelic assisted therapy is really new, and
20:45
Speaker 3: so the training, you know, these trainings they take it
20:52
Speaker 3: from a protocol and sort of build on it from
20:54
Speaker 3: their own perspective. And so what I've learned with all
20:59
Speaker 3: of these modality is like you under you get to
21:01
Speaker 3: understand the structure, but then you have to decide how
21:05
Speaker 3: you're going to utilize it with your clients, Like, how
21:07
Speaker 3: is it that I use this tool feel different than
21:11
Speaker 3: some other therapist? And so I feel like with psychedelic
21:15
Speaker 3: assisted therapy, it has allowed for much more creativity and
21:19
Speaker 3: a lot more of myself to be able to come
21:21
Speaker 3: into the room as a clinician because it is so new.
21:26
Speaker 1: Can you give me an example what that might look like.
21:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, So I start my sessions with a lot of
21:34
Speaker 3: somatic relaxation, right, really getting into calming the body, making sure,
21:41
Speaker 3: we're creating a relationship between me and the client, and
21:44
Speaker 3: I go deep into intention, right, like what is it
21:49
Speaker 3: that you're wanting to.
21:51
Speaker 2: Find or create for yourself?
21:54
Speaker 3: Sometimes I bring in therapy, sometimes I bring in sound baths,
21:58
Speaker 3: so I can be really creative in the session for
22:00
Speaker 3: what the client is needing. But if you look at
22:03
Speaker 3: protocols for psychedelic assistant therapy, it's very you bring them
22:07
Speaker 3: into the room, they lie down, they put the mask on,
22:11
Speaker 3: you put the music on. It's very like regimented. So
22:15
Speaker 3: it's allowed me to be more creative and tailor things
22:19
Speaker 3: a little bit more for a client.
22:22
Speaker 1: What is the particular medicine that's being used that you use? Kettymine? Okay,
22:29
Speaker 1: it's in the name, yeah, and ketamine why.
22:34
Speaker 2: Right now?
22:34
Speaker 3: Because it's the only one I'm legally allowed to use
22:36
Speaker 3: with my license.
22:38
Speaker 2: This is the real.
22:39
Speaker 1: Reason, Okay. And for those who maybe aren't familiar, what
22:45
Speaker 1: is ketamine? How is it? How is someone going to
22:48
Speaker 1: experience that?
22:50
Speaker 2: Yeah?
22:50
Speaker 3: So I use lozenges and I do that on purpose,
22:53
Speaker 3: because when you start to use IV or intramuscular, you
22:57
Speaker 3: have to have more medical things on sight, and so
23:02
Speaker 3: it changes the experience quite a bit right, it feels
23:04
Speaker 3: a little bit more medicinal versus I like it to
23:08
Speaker 3: feel a little bit more ritual, a little bit more spiritual.
23:12
Speaker 3: And so it's a really relaxing experience. Out of all
23:18
Speaker 3: the psychedelics, I feel like it just sort of lands
23:21
Speaker 3: floats you in, lands you in very gently, where the
23:24
Speaker 3: other ones can be very jarring and kind of soul shaking.
23:31
Speaker 3: And so for a lot of my clients is like
23:34
Speaker 3: they get to have this experience of relaxation and safety
23:38
Speaker 3: in their body, which that in itself is so much medicine.
23:42
Speaker 2: Right.
23:43
Speaker 3: They can have this experience of like, oh, this is
23:45
Speaker 3: what it feels like to just be present with me
23:50
Speaker 3: and not all of my baggage or my voices or
23:54
Speaker 3: my trauma, right, It's just it's just.
23:57
Speaker 1: You and in your experience. You know, you mentioned the
24:02
Speaker 1: importance of intention. How often is it that someone's intention
24:09
Speaker 1: doesn't necessarily match their experience, which doesn't necessarily mean it's
24:14
Speaker 1: a bad thing.
24:15
Speaker 2: But yeah, no, that's a really good question.
24:20
Speaker 3: I feel like you always end up where you want
24:24
Speaker 3: to go, it just doesn't always look the way you
24:28
Speaker 3: think it's going to look. I think a lot of
24:30
Speaker 3: people go in thinking that they're going to come out
24:32
Speaker 3: with some type of certainty, and I would say that
24:35
Speaker 3: one hundred percent of the time, you are not coming
24:36
Speaker 3: out with any type of certainty, Like you're coming out
24:39
Speaker 3: more with like, oh, there's no certainty in anything.
24:41
Speaker 1: God right, Right? And does your work with ketamine does
24:53
Speaker 1: that also tie in to finding one's voice? It does?
25:00
Speaker 2: Yeah?
25:01
Speaker 3: Absolutely, Again it's it's it's just another vehicle to get
25:04
Speaker 3: to it.
25:06
Speaker 1: Well, so where have you gone in terms of, you know,
25:15
Speaker 1: kind of doing your own work? How have you evolved
25:19
Speaker 1: with all this?
25:21
Speaker 3: Yeah, every modality I've ever used, I've done myself. I've
25:27
Speaker 3: gone through the trenches of all of them. And really
25:33
Speaker 3: I feel like it's important to understand each of these medicines,
25:36
Speaker 3: right e M d R talk. There be somatic and
25:38
Speaker 3: then the psychedelics. They're they're all medicine and and really.
25:44
Speaker 2: Diving into each one.
25:45
Speaker 3: And they weren't like it wasn't like oh I'm gonna
25:47
Speaker 3: I'm gonna do this now so that I understand it.
25:50
Speaker 2: Usually I get called to it.
25:53
Speaker 3: Right, something will happen in my life where I'm like, well,
25:56
Speaker 3: I've heard about this, Okay, I'm going to dive into it.
25:58
Speaker 3: And the more I dive into it, the more I'm like, oh, okay,
26:01
Speaker 3: I understand this. This is something that I want to
26:04
Speaker 3: either learn more so that I can offer it to
26:06
Speaker 3: others or so that's usually how I get to all
26:11
Speaker 3: of these modalities. There are modalities that I use that
26:15
Speaker 3: sometimes they worked for me in the moment, and I've
26:17
Speaker 3: also had experiences where like, oh okay, this does not
26:20
Speaker 3: work at this moment in time.
26:24
Speaker 1: So currently, who are you working with? Are you seeing
26:28
Speaker 1: both men and women or adults kids? What?
26:31
Speaker 3: Yeah, I do mostly couples and women and men, like adults,
26:37
Speaker 3: probably majority women than men.
26:40
Speaker 2: I think it's I don't know.
26:41
Speaker 3: I think it's really important for men to sit with men.
26:45
Speaker 3: I think it can be really powerful and there's something
26:47
Speaker 3: that they can offer that I can't. But I do
26:49
Speaker 3: have a couple of men on my roster.
26:52
Speaker 1: I saw one of your posts on Instagram about couples,
26:55
Speaker 1: and I think that the heading was for those couples
26:59
Speaker 1: who say they don't fight. There's always those people, right,
27:07
Speaker 1: we don't fight, We've never had an argument. I'm like,
27:09
Speaker 1: who are you kidding? But you said what which I
27:13
Speaker 1: thought was very interesting. Do you remember what you said?
27:15
Speaker 2: And then I'm not sure if I remember exactly what
27:17
Speaker 2: I mean.
27:17
Speaker 1: Okay, well, then I'll tell you. But then, just so
27:19
Speaker 1: I'm sure this will make you remember you said. For
27:23
Speaker 1: those people who don't fight, there's probably a reason, which
27:28
Speaker 1: is they haven't gotten to a point where one or
27:32
Speaker 1: both of them don't feel safe enough to kind of
27:35
Speaker 1: express who they fully are, which I thought hit the
27:38
Speaker 1: nail right on the head. Say more about that, and I.
27:41
Speaker 3: Would even say that it probably starts with themselves, right,
27:45
Speaker 3: they haven't gotten to a place that feels safe enough
27:48
Speaker 3: to even say it to themselves. There are a lot
27:53
Speaker 3: of truths that are hard to digest. Right if we
27:57
Speaker 3: accept them, it might means that we have to shift
28:00
Speaker 3: direction or we have to upset people, and that can
28:04
Speaker 3: be really scary. Upsetting people you care about can be
28:07
Speaker 3: really scary. And I think also the more that you
28:10
Speaker 3: withhold yourself from yourself or from a partner, the more
28:14
Speaker 3: it validates this idea that if I share, it will
28:18
Speaker 3: be upsetting to them. I've also recognized that most of
28:22
Speaker 3: the time our partners don't get upset. It's something that
28:26
Speaker 3: we It's a kind of a fear that we've created
28:28
Speaker 3: in ourselves.
28:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, all right, Aaron, how do people learn more
28:35
Speaker 1: about you, what you're doing everything. What's the best way.
28:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, they can find me on Instagram a Healing the
28:41
Speaker 3: Human Experience.
28:43
Speaker 2: That's the best place to find me.
28:44
Speaker 1: Okay, we'll have that linked up here at the show
28:47
Speaker 1: notes page at the Trauma Therapist podcast dot com erin
28:51
Speaker 1: appreciate you. Thanks so much for joining me today.
28:53
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me.
28:55
Speaker 1: All Right, We'll be in touch. Take care, Bye. Could
29:03
Speaker 1: not do it and the offend